Yesterday was Aunt Janet’s memorial service and it was really, really lovely. I hope mine is as nice – peaceful, high vibration, just wonderful.
And yours truly cried her way through the speech I wrote. Dammit!
That was not how I planned any of it. You know I have a thing about words and how I want to say certain things and emphasize others, right? Blew that all out the window.
I went after my cousin’s son gave his speech and seeing him get choked up got me choked up even though I wasn’t sad.
(I’ve only ever been sad about Lauren leaving because … well, you know. Mostly, I really get that they are in a place free of pain and sadness and of immense joy and while I miss them in the physical, I know I’ll see them again.)
I wrote the eulogy from my point of view but there were certain sections that Aunt Janet wrote and that’s where I lost it.
Like, seriously, let me crumble into a ball right here on the altar.
It was so weird, you guys. SO WEIRD.
Pretty sure she was speaking through me and trying to express her sorrow at being mean to those who loved her. (She was known for being a huge shithead at the end of her life to just about everyone. She put on a good face for me but to those who were with her often, no good face.)
Here’s what she asked me to say:
“She told me that when you’re sad about something, it can turn to anger and unfortunately, she took that anger out on those whom she loved and who loved her at the close of her life.
If she could take back the unkind words, I know she would.
If she could take back any pain she caused to anyone but especially her family, I know she would.
In her heart, there was and is only love. And for you to remember her with that love is all she’d ask of you now.”
I’ve had that experience before where I got all emotional relaying a message to someone – maybe just once or twice, a handful at most.
What I know to be true is this:
When in service to Spirit, I am willing to do what is asked of me. Even if my Lisa ego-self feels like a dumbass doing it, I do it. My ego self is the one who is all “you didn’t do that right” but my higher self knows that I conveyed the emotion of what she wanted to say even if the words didn’t come out the way I intended.
I hope I did right by her. My family was very supportive (some of them knew what was going on re: her speaking to me) and said it was a great eulogy. My cousin Michael (who didn’t know) was really effusive – came running over to hug me twice and said it was amazing and truly awesome. I take heart from that and trust that what needed to be conveyed to them was done well.
Dear Universe, next time, can I convey the emotion without the near-collapse on stage? :) I’d be ever-so-grateful!
I’m so sorry it didn’t go as you’d planned. But it was a time for tears. You may have given other people the permission they needed to shed tears of their own. You know how I admire JBKO, but by example she made stoicism at funerals a tribute to the departed. (There have actually been research papers written about how mourning in America changed as a result of JFK’s funeral.) Some people just feel better after they cry. So you may have gifted those who love Aunt Janet with what they needed at that moment, and what she wanted you give them.
I absolutely believe it was wonderful. We are very poor judges of ourselves …. perhaps because judgment is beside the point? Bravo, Lisa.
I don’t even know how you do it in the first place. I was asked – 10 minutes before – to say something at my Mom’s service, I was pregnant, and just no. I have no clue what I said up there. By the look on my Dad’s and husband’s face it was pretty pathetic. So I sympathize with the falling apart unexpectedly, but when our loved ones in spirit give us messages, and all of the emotion swirling around the joint, it’s really no wonder you had a sad, you know?