My mom's funeral was pretty low-key, which is how she would have wanted it. She wanted to be cremated, but my dad wouldn't listen.
My husband and BFF have strict instructions: the wake is to have a keg of good beer. I am to have a beer and a cig in my hands instead of a rosary, and after the prayers there is to be music and dancing. After the funeral, they are to go to a bar and have a blast. I want my funeral to be the best party since my wedding reception!
When M's father died, we had a full funeral Mass. The homily was very short.
After the cemetery, we went to Mike Finks Riverboat on the Ohio river, in Cincinnati, his "hang out". We had the entire bar area, to start, moved to the upstairs dining room for a buffet, then back to the bar. It was definitely a "Celebration of Life"! Started about noon, and I think we left Finks about 6 and continued at another "hang out" still with about 20 people.
At Finks, Papa had a navy blue chair cushion to put on the bar stool, and they kept it behind the bar for him, so he didn't have to bring it with him. That afternoon, we got a vodka tonic - with a lime - in a water tumbler (his "standard" order), put it on a dessert plate, with an unlit cigarette, and a lighter.
We took the plate, and his cushion out onto the dock, and one of the guys knelt down and set the plate afloat on the cushion into the Ohio River. There must have been 30 or more friends of Papa's out on the dock with us, and we all did a toast to him as the cushion was set into the water.
The cushion floated off the end of the dock. About 8-10 feet away, it was suddenly surrounded by fish. Papa loved to fish. They circled around the cushion and would come to the top of the water and kind of "kiss" it. They were very gentle in their movements around the cushion. The fish drifted away.
The cushion...still with the upright, UNSPILLED drink, cigarette and lighter...continued to float about 10 feet away from the end of the dock.
Some people came by in a boat, and offered to move the cushion out away from the dock into the river's flow. The guy who had put the cushion into the water, got in their boat and they picked up the cushion and moved it out into the river, and brought our friend back to the dock, and left.
We all watched the cushion for a minute or two and went back inside to the bar. The glass was still upright.
Someone happened to notice a paddlewheeler coming down (up?) the river ...right towards the cushion!! We were all at the window, thinking this is it, the boat will hit it. The boat captain must have seen the cushion because he moved the paddlewheeler over, and the cushion must have moved some ....and the boat missed it!!
The glass was still upright!
By this time....the cushion was straight out even with Papa's barstool.....and everyone is watching it.
It floated a bit, then the glass tipped over.
The cushion floated off, and disappeared into the water.
He had one last drink with us, and was gone.
So many faces with tears on their cheeks. No one had ever seen anything like it. It was both spooky and comforting.
Papa was very special.