My first funeral

I guess I've been lucky in not having occasion to attend a funeral early in life.  My mother only died when I was over fifty (and she was over ninety), and my father is still with us, as are my two brothers and two sisters. (Frankly, I'm glad that Mother was the first to go:  losing any one of us would have been very hard for her.)

The first funeral I went to happened when I was in my late forties, I think.  It was for Catherine Cashore, one of the singers in my opera group and Italian choir.  She succumbed to cancer and the funeral was at the Holy Rosary Catholic Church just east of St. Clair and Bathurst. Just a month or two before I'd been telling my shrink that I'd never been to a funeral. (I wish I'd knocked on wood!)

I didn't know Catherine that well, but a lot of my singing group went to the funeral and I did too. I'd been talking with her once and she'd mentioned that she enjoyed the British Carry On comedies. She also liked the sitcom Happy Days, especially the character Ralph Malph.  It seems somehow important to remember those things about someone. (What you find funny shows a lot about you.)

When I go, I think I'd like a Chinese-style "tree burial," where they cremate you and plant a tree over your ashes.  And maybe I'd like jazz played at my funeral, though I don't listen to it much. Some of the earliest jazz music was played in New Orleans funeral marches! (It goes back to an African tradition of celebratory funeral music.)