Interview with my Grandfather: Over the course of his life he has attended many different funerals that vary from formal to informal. Perhaps the deaths that he held closest to him were the deaths of his parents. His father was a marine in WW2 and was given a veteran burial plot because of it. Both him and his wife were buried in the same place, which is something my grandfather finds sweet because he has the opportunity to visit them both together. They were both Jewish, so their funerals were very formal and religious. They had the Kaddish read allowed at their funerals which is a Jewish prayer for the dead. My grandfather does not have any preference of funeral service and no religious influence on them. He believes that over all, "a funeral is an opportunity to pay your respects regardless of your religion". When I asked him how he would prefer to be "taken care of" after he passed away, he told me that he had no solid plan and that that would be a decision made based on whatever is best for his surviving loved ones.
My grandfather made it clear that all the ceremonys that he has attended have been respectful no matter how formal or informal. That seemed to be all that was important to him when it came to funeral services. I agree that religion doesn't really matter when it comes to respecting an individual life (in most cases) because it is important to seperate the values of an intierer reliogion from a specific person. Especially when it comes to ceremonies in America because there is a huge veriety of people don't necessarily agree on religious stances but live harmoniously regardless and still appreciate one another.
Interview with my Grandmother:
My grandmother has had to deal with the death of her parents as well, but she had an experience fairly different from my grandfather. Her mother had died when she was 11 and she died at home while she was there. My grandmother said that this was actually a good experience for her because she was able to feel resolved with her mother dying. This is also partially why she believes it is so important to die at home rather than in a hospital because being surrounded by loved ones in the comfort of your own home also affects how your family comes to terms with your death.She then began to bring up a very interesting point that part of the reason why funerals are so emotional is because people don't always have closure with the person dead. She feels that this makes funerals "for the living, not the dead".
Having built up emotions and guilt with no resolution can definitely cause emotional distress, and not being able to ever know how the deceased feels adds to the grief of the mysterious aspect of death.If your connection to whomever is deceased is weak (or has been weakened) it is very easy to begin to focus on yourself and how you feel about the situation, which isn't necessarily a selfish. It is only human to feel unbalanced when you are handling unresolved hardships, but this reminds me how important it is to always express how I truely feel to people and always look for closure in different circumstances.
I really liked your last paragraph, because you said what you learned from talking with your grandmother ("Having built up emotions and guilt with no resolution can definitely cause emotional distress, and not being able to ever know how the deceased feels adds to the grief of the mysterious aspect of death")and stated how it affected you ("It is only human to feel unbalanced when you are handling unresolved hardships, but this reminds me how important it is to always express how I truely feel to people and always look for closure in different circumstances").
ReplyDeleteI also thought that this was a really good insight:
"If your connection to whomever is deceased is weak (or has been weakened) it is very easy to begin to focus on yourself and how you feel about the situation, which isn't necessarily selfish."
You acknowledged the fact that people don't always think about the deceased person - they will focus on themselves, and the situation they are in, and how they have to act.
I liked this blog post because you decided to use your grandparents instead of friends, cousins, parents or something like that. I feel like this is one of the more unique blog posts because it has the point of view of a grandparent who has obviously been alive longer then a parent, a cousin, or a friend. The only thing that that I would suggest for you to have done would have been list the questions. I kind of wanted to know what you asked them because you said "Perhaps the deaths that he held closest to him were the deaths of his parents. His father was a marine in WW2 and was given a veteran burial plot because of it". I just wanted to know where this came up in the conversation it is something that I wanted to know more about because "insight" is overused in this course. Interest is what I think everyone should go for, and i enjoyed reading this however I thought with a few minor things it could have been very interesting.
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