HAPPY BIRTHDAY WISHES TO .........

Cheryl Isaak ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

It's so true that kids are taught everything about sex at an early age when throughout life they might or might not have sex, and yet there is a silence about death which is the one certain thing we will all encounter.

I notice too a great reluctance to refer to coffins, bodies, death, there are euphemisms for everything rather than call a spade a spade. It's weird in a way.

Yep. I did a temporary job at an office that sold pre-paid funeral plans. While I was there, we were rewriting the telemarketing script, trying to come up with new euphemisms for "in your time of need". The challenge was to see how far into the script we could get before saying "funeral".

Die/dead/death were all absolute no-no's in this script, and the only reason we were allowed to say funeral once (and only once) was because people couldn't figure out what the heck we were talking about "in your time of need". So we did, just once, have to explain what "need" they would have for "pre-paid services" and what sort of "ceremony you plan yourself" we were talking about. Too many of the older folks they called told them "we already had a wedding ceremony 50 years ago" and hung up, so the script had to be clearer. Or heard "pass over" and said "I'm not Jewish, we don't celebrate Passover" and hung up, so that euphemism had to come out, too.

That reminds me of my first job, at a hospital near home in England ( Windsor, actually). I was a rookie Med Tech in my first year of training. I went to find a patient one day in order to draw some blood. His bed was enpty, so I asked Staff Nurse (all starch and fancy cap). She informed me that Mr X had passed on to higher service. I think I just looked blank, and she had to explain to me that he had died.

That goes back 50 years or more!

Gillian

Our new minister (Rev Dr Jennifer George) up here is from California where death is something that is dealt with very clinically - the graveside is covered in "astro turf" and the coffin (sorry, casket) is lowered into the grave on an hydraulic lift - all very unemotional. Imagine her surprise when she officiated at her first funeral on Stronsay where not only did she have to watch the bearers lower the coffin into the grave using canvas straps but she had to scatter real, damp earth onto the coffin during the ceremony (and all this in a Force

6 wind and driving rain). Fortunately she is a redoubtable lady who soon adapted to the more realistic funeral rites as practised in the UK.

Do you remember the Mitford book, eons back (maybe 40 years), which I think was named "The American Way of Death"............or something like that. Being so very much older than Sheena, I cannot remember everything LOL, DR&H

Gillian

Not going to happen to me, straight to the crematorium and then in good time, the kids can put me in the sea when the moment feels right to them.

As the elder statesman, me being so much older than that kid in Nova Scotia, and a bit older than you, I remember that book and I do believe you've got the name right. Of course, an aging brain can remember way back when, but ask it what it had for breakfast and that's a whole different story.

Lu

Gill Murray ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

Aaah I will let you lean on me old friend ! Yes I remember that book. What great women the Mitfords were, I met one of them in the early 70s at a party in London.

"Lucille" ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

We defer to your seniority, since you're correct lol

As always, kiddo!!

Who me--not by a long shot.

Lucille, Please remember you ARE the senior one here. By three weks IIRC!! JUnior Gill

And don't you forget it !!! ;*))

I just answered Sue Privately , not realizing this was also here on the Ng .

My reaction was to something in the post i reacted to. It might surprise all of you , but the idea that kids should be protected from the relaity of death , although being culturaly attached , isn`t `only` an American Cultural thing. It is Quite Common and spread all around the world . Even in societies where terror, war etc , are more close geographicly and happen more often. And as to the `nuclear` families , Tjis has been around in every country to which people migrated to ..... in the centuries before us... If you think you should expose them to death , or if you think you can protect them? don`t forget that most children see the Media, in some way or other, and those who don`t Hear it from their friends, Thus i believe parents should talk with their kids about life about it realities, and listen to their questions.

In the post i reacted to , the writer wrote that after a death that affected her she went to work , and nobofy noticed anything , but the black dress she was wearing .... To tell you the truth, i felt that Even though she wanted to portray this as a Being prepared to live with the reality od death, i will cal it Denial, but my opinion is of course Cultural Biased. mirjam

Alas, the nearest crematorium is quite some distance away (via two ferries and a lengthy road trip). However, the cemetery on Stronsay looks out over a beautiful, wide bay with an almost white, sandy beach; there are worse places to leave your bones

Gill Murray ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

"Junior Gill" hee hee hee lol

I could go with that - the main problem with other places is they may at some point want to build a building or parking lot over where you are ! Safer not to be there but I expect one is safe from that on Stronsay.

I'm quite confident that Stronsay won't suffer from urban sprawl during this century

And I don't really suppose you would care by then anyway lol