C.: well, d.c. I guess that you are off the hook. Mr. Anonymous is taking care of all the funeral arrangements in Uvalde. You can keep all your royalties now, right?
d.: No, Cal.E., I cannot. I made a commitment, and I intend to stick to it. The victims that died were not the only victims in Uvalde. There were seventeen more who were injured badly enough to be hospitalized. They will need money for medical care, even if they do have medical insurance, Or CHiPS or Medicaid pays their hospital bills.
C.: Y???
d.: They will need medical supplies do dress their own wounds and/or a wound-care nurse to come and change their bandages for quite some time when they are released from the hospital. That is why I am going to commit ALL royalties for ANY books from now until July second of this year to help them with those costs.
C.: There are many more victims in other places. What about them?
d.: It is a sad thing to say, but you are right. However, one can only do so much. This is the tragedy that is closest to where I live, so I will be trying to help those victims in any way I can.
C.: How else can someone with limited funds help?
d.: They are still asking for blood donations. Many people are volunteering to give blood now, but that will slow down over time. I am going to wait until the blood is needed.
C.: I HATE needles! I would do ANYTHING else but give blood to help!
d.: Fortunately for you, I do not think they need animal blood, just human. I am anxious to resume giving blood, because I am one of those rare people that needles do not bother, if I know that the needle is clean. I can get up off the table after giving a unit of blood, take a few breaths, and go about my business. It is also a good excuse to eat a steak!
C.: Then why did you stop giving blood? YOU said that you were anxious to RESUME giving blood, indicating that you stopped for a period. Why?
d.: It is a long story, Cal.E. One that I do not have the room on this blog to tell. Suffice it to say that I needed permission from my oncologist, and he advised against it. It has been long enough now, though, that I can give blood.
C.: Okay, now that is settled, you said yesterday that you had several reasons why you did not believe in conducting a big, fancy funeral. You gave only one. What are the rest of the reasons?
d.: As I said yesterday, I started my nursing career as a hospice nurse. I learned the signs of imminent death quickly. There is a point that the soul, spirit, consciousness, depending on your beliefs, leaves the body. It happens before the heart stops, sometimes a day or two before the heat stops beating. I do not want to go into religious beliefs right now, but even doctors who are atheists would agree with this statement. The person is no longer in the body. S/he will not know what kind of funeral that is conducted for him or her. The funeral is for the living, not the dead.
Additionally, there is an excellent organization, The Neptune Society, that will take the body for scientific research. This organization did give money for the bodies at one time, but they have stopped doing that now. I have dealt with this organization on multiple occasions. All those involved with this organization are very professional and genuinely good people. I enjoyed dealing with them.
Since funerals are for the living, I believe it would be best for those closest to the victims to share their memories of the person at a memorial service. It can be cathartic for those involved. This does not require that the body of the deceased be present. Many people are “eulogized” when their bodies are lost at sea or in war. Some of the bodies are never recovered. One instance was when the World Trade Center Twin Towers were attacked by terrorists and collapsed. There were around 3,000 people killed that day. It would have been impossible to find all their bodies. Many of the families of the victims held memorial services without the victim’s bodies being present. I think that is better for the victims’ families.
My final reason for not spending a lot of money on a funeral is this. My paternal grandmother was ninety-one when she died. She spelled out everything in a living will, from what measures to keep her alive were and were not acceptable to when her funeral should be held. She wanted it to be held on a weekend so that people from her native state of North Carolina could attend. It was a packed house at her funeral, so that was a wise decision. My grandmother did not have much money, but she paid in advance for her own funeral and relieved her children of any responsibility of needing to make any decisions about her care before or after her death. I followed my grandmother’s lead. I have done the same as she did.
Even though my grandmother was my primary caregiver from the time my mother returned to work when I was two until I went to school at the age of six, I can only remember visiting her grave once after she died. I went with my father to put flowers on her grave the year after she died.
My father was close to my grandmother. He stayed at her side from the time she went into a coma until the day she died. I do not think, though, that even he visited his mother’s grave after that unless his brother or sister came into town and wanted to visit her grave. He knew that his mother was not in that grave. His memories of her were the most important thing to him, and to me.
Comments