I want to be remembered, do you not?!
Eulogy:
A eulogy is a speech or writing in praise of a person or thing, especially one who recently died or retired or as a term of endearment. Eulogies may be given as part of funeral services. They take place in a funeral home during or after a wake. -Wikipedia
By definition, a eulogy should be expressed upon death.
I get it.
It's a formal part of our culture that helps the living deal with death; a way to pay our respects and remember all the intricacies of what made that person human. What made them tick.. What made them reach your heart. To share in their greatest achievements and value their character and spirit.
The problem is.. Funerals aren't for the dead, they're for the living.
So I had this crazy idea. If anyone is remotely into, let's call it science, you know that black is simply the absence of color. It's not a color at all. (A black object absorbs all the colors of the visible spectrum and reflects none of them to the eyes)
Then I got to thinking, maybe that's why we wear black to funerals, to honor the absence of someone in our lives.
Naturally, this seemed pretty far-fetched to me. Why? Because the color or lack of color you wear to a funeral really makes no difference. But it brought me around to my original point, funerals are for the living, not the dead. So we must wear black, we must create heartfelt eulogies in our greatest time of grief, and we must come together in one ceremony to announce and celebrate and mourn the loss of the one we love.
Now this will probably bite me in the ass when I die, but I don't want a eulogy at my funeral. I don't want someone to stand up at a podium with a broken heart and create words that are supposed to neatly tie up who I am as a person.
My being is so much greater than that. I don't want you to be able to tie a bow around the person I was. I don't want my love to be that neat and straightforward.. I don't want commemorated in a tidy speech with the utmost affection and kindness, because that's not who I am. Even today. I hope my presence to be fierce in your life, for better or for worse. To love not with a great width, but a great depth. I will never live up to those words that you share when you grieve over me. I will never live up to the memory of me. I can only be me, and that's simply enough.
I want you to live my eulogy every day.
It's a selfish endeavor, truly. To ask that the most sincere thoughts and feelings are expressed all throughout my life being alive, instead of when I have passed on.
It's selfish.
I don't want you to save the words about me. I don't want you to save that feeling of missing me horrendously and wanting one more moment with me. I don't want you to pack a lifetime of feelings into a paragraph on a folded up napkin at a dimly lit church.
I just can't have you do that.
I just can't spend my whole life living, and then pass on to know what you thought.
So with all due respect to those planning my funeral, please burn the speeches. Don't let any person stand in front of the congregation and pour out their heart.
Let it sit with you. Let my eulogy be in the memories we have made. Let my eulogy be a silent celebration of all that I was and all that I am.
And because I will be an angel, I have no qualms about haunting you if you don't follow my wishes ;)
I want you, loved ones, to write my eulogy in each moment we share, because I will do the same for you. I won't wait to cherish all that you mean to me and all that you are.
My eulogy is for the living. My eulogy should be shared in all the moments I am alive.
So when I take my last breaths, may it be tomorrow or in 104 years, I hope your heart is filled with my eulogy of love.
I'm asking to be loved as if it was my last, to be valued as though I wouldn't be on this Earth again.. And if you're thinking that's crazy? I think it's crazy not to. I can't live my life half way; and I'm asking you do the same.
Write my eulogy in the texts you send me. Write my eulogy in the hugs we share. Write my eulogy in the kisses we give. Write my eulogy in the laughter that hurts our stomachs. Write my eulogy in the depths of our greatest sorrows. Write my eulogy in the gifts you buy me, and the cards you write me. Write my eulogy in the trips you plan with me and the adventures we go on. Write my eulogy in the way you hold my hand. Write my eulogy in the little surprises that make me cry with happiness. Write my eulogy in the way you look at me in the morning. Write my eulogy in your invitation to spend time. Write my eulogy in all the moments we can ever wish to share together..
Just don't write my eulogy at my funeral.
What should and is going to be remembered is the love we shared and the moments we had; that's what is going to matter. Not a speech dressed in black, standing at a podium with tear soaked eyes.
Live my eulogy every day before I pass. My funeral is for the living.
I plan to live this life writing a thousand eulogies every day with the ones I love; I ask selfishly you do the same for me.
