Friday, August 5, 2016

Friday and to Parsons for the Funeral

Today will be pretty hectic. After breakfast, when it gets light, I will take Missy out to the carport for awhile and do my watering. At 8:00, I think the florist, Green Acres, opens and I will go get some flowers for the funeral from the church. We will take them with us and take them to the funeral home before we go to lunch.

At 8:40, I will pick up Bob for exercise class. Afterward, we may go to Utopia for coffee and a cinnamon roll.  Then I will take Bob home and we will change our clothes and pick up the folder with the service and the flowers and leave for Parsons. When we get there, we will take the flowers to the funeral home and go eat lunch. We will go back to the funeral home at 1:00 and the funeral is at 2:00.

Following the funeral we will go to the cemetery for the last few remarks and a song. It should be very hot by then!

It will be quite a day.

More later...

Well, I was right  about one thing. It WAS quite a day! I picked up the flowers at 8:25 and took them to my apartment and then I picked up Bob for exercises.  After exercises, we went to Utopia for coffee and a cinnamon roll.  Then I took Bob home so he could change his clothes to dress clothes and I cam home to do the same.  Then we drove to Parsons and left the flowers at the funeral home and went to Ernesto's for lunch. Afterward, we went to the funeral home for the family/friends gathering at 1:00.

I don't believe I have ever done a more disorganized funeral. It's as though the funeral director did not know what he was doing.  I had offered him a copy of the order of service on Tuesday, when he called me. I thought he might put it in the bulletin. But he said I could bring it to the family/friends meeting at 1:00. I did that. He quickly made a couple of copies of it and gave them to the two folks who were going to sing. I had no idea when he was going to seat us or even where. He didn't introduce me to the singers so I hunted them up and introduced myself to them myself.

Finally after the first hour, he began to seat the family in preparation for the actual funeral at 2:00.  I have done dozens of funerals over the years but that one was the most unorganized. Bob read the obit after welcoming everyone and I said a prayer.  Then I gave my funeral sermon beginning with relevant scripture and then telling some of the amusing stories the family had shared with me on Tuesday when I met with them.  Finally I got into my message. It went fine. Then we drove to Thayer for the interment.  It was 98 degrees out there. It was a military service at first and I got Bob under some shade before he was overcome with heat.  After my poem and a prayer, we finally finished at 3:30 and drove home. We got home about 4:15 and I took Bob home. He was exhausted. He is used to a nap. He wanted to go with me though. He didn't think I should go by myself. I appreciated that.

He came over at 5:15 and we watched the news. At 7:00, he left. He was very tired. He had sat down in his recliner at home after I took him home and immediately had fallen asleep. It was a huge day.

I've taken my bath and now will watch TV with Missy until 9:00 when we will go to bed. 

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