Last Wishes

Maybe this is morbid, but I seem to feel like there is a need for this.  Publicly posting the non-negotiable “last wishes.”

I know that I am still relatively young, but you never know and I am certain that I have said to different people at different times something along the lines of “make sure that is(n’t) done at my funeral.”  So, rather than forcing those who love me to recall all those things, I figures that I would place them here.  Someplace public and accessible – where I can jot things down or delete things as my whims come and go.

So, here it is:

NOTE:  I do have life insurance.  Allstate.  If Dave needs assistance, our friend Paula knows our agent, it is one of her relatives.

1. Direct Cremation.  (Please use Elkhart Cremation Services – unless my friends at Bubb want to offer this service to my family at the same cost!)

2. No visitation of my dead body for anyone other than my immediate family*.  I do not want people looking at my corpse and that being their last memory of me, not to mention I do NOT want people snapping pictures of my dead body.

3.  Location of Service:  If the Chapel at GCC is complete, that is where I would like to have it.  If it is not…and the weather is warm, I love Beutter Park in Mishawaka, if the weather is cold Bubb Funeral Chapel.

4.  Memorial service to be performed by a member of the GCC Pastoral Care Team.  Preferrably Mark Waltz if he thinks he can overcome the sadness of losing such a dear friend as myself.

5.  Ashes…I am still pondering the disposal of them.  Ideas include:

• digging a hole, dumping them in and planting a tree…but I don’t know where that tree would be.
• tossing them into an ocean area currently occupied by bioluminescent plankton…at night.  (on contact the little critters will light up….and therefore, so would I!)
• find a local pottery to turn the cremains into small vases for anyone desiring a “touchstone” memorial of some sort.  Every July 4th stick a daisy in the vase.  That would be cute.
• Dumping them into the St. Joseph River…Beutter Park would be a nice place to do this.  Not that I have a connection to the river, it is simply someplace where people I love can go “visit” rather than a cemetery.

6. Music: this is important.  NO DIRGES!  (Breanna, I changed my mind about the Mardi Gras Jazz Band).  Songs that MUST be played (live or in the background…whatever, it matters not):

• Happiest Girl In the Whole USA by Donna Fargo
• Free For All by Ted Nugent (highly inappropriate but I won’t care.  This song got me through a lot of angry moments!)
• I Love Rock N Roll by Joan Jett
• Amazing Grace
• Jesus Paid It All by Kristian Stanfill
• All Fired Up by Pat Benatar

…and probably in that order…it tells a story of my life.

Oh, and one last thing.  Refer to this post on my blog:

https://dawnlovitt.wordpress.com/2009/02/04/dogs-can-write-long-post-warning/

The rest, if there is anything left to plan, is in the hands of those surviving.  Care well for each other.  Remember, no arguing.  Harmony is important to me!

*Immediate family (defined by me) includes my husband David, my two children Breanna and Paige, my parents and siblings.  And if there is a question about this…it is not necessary for these people to visit my corpse, I only want to honor their possible need for some sort of “closure” or desire to say farewell and need a face in which to direct their last words.