Ramblings Of A Silly Old Man - CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

MY FUNERAL MUSIC

When you get to my age, an old man like what I, am it is not silly to prepare for certain eventualities.

A little while ago I was privileged to tour our local crematorium. To quote the manager it is built on a leyline of love.  Indeed it is.

We have a tradition in my family that we run our own funerals and funerals are fun happy times, not solemn. During that tour of the crematorium I was told that families  could change the seating arrangements and have any music they wished included. "Please," I said, "can I have a disco ?"

One of my life mottos is Life Is A Disco So DANCE !  Why stop dancing when the curtains draw across the coffin ?

I have put certain things into my will for the management of my funeral. Hopefully this book will become a best seller so I am telling the world of my plans and the requirements for my funeral.

I want a poem read - Desiderata, desired things.

I am going back to October 1971. The teacher training college I attended was part of Oxford University. These days students have Freshers Week !  We had just a single day - Freshers Day. A long boring day with speech after boring speech.  We were addressed by the vice-chancellor Allan Bullock, world renowned authority on Adolf Hitler. His book Hitler - A Study in Tyranny is a classic.  I do not remember much of what Vice Chancellor Bullock said that day in Oxford but I do remember him smiling at we naive young undergraduates.

There was also a service where some pontificating vicar preached a sermon around the subject of King Lear. My mate put his head against a tomb in the chapel and went to sleep.

The service ended with a benediction in the form of a poem read by four of the university's more senior students. Desiderata.....

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Those words gripped us all, even my mate woke up.  We all took that poem away with us.  It has remained important to me throughout my life. I have quoted it to so many different people. In particular I quote:

You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

and...

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

I want that poem read at my funeral.

Also going back to my student days, it was impossible to walk round the hall of residence without hearing somebody playing Simon and Garfunkel's album Bridge Over Troubled Water.  I love every song on that album.

The title track from Bridge Over Troubled Water, I believe, is the greatest piece of music ever written.  If you divorce the words from the music you are left with a haunting melody.  Take only the words and you have a beautiful poem. Put the two together and you have the greatest piece of music ever written.

When you're weary, feeling small

When tears are in your eyes, I'll dry them all 

I'm on your side, oh, when times get rough

And friends just can't be found

Like a bridge over troubled water

I will lay me down

Like a bridge over troubled water

I will lay me down

When you're down and out

When you're on the street

When evening falls so hard

I will comfort you (ooo)

I'll take your part, oh, when darkness comes

And pain is all around

Like a bridge over troubled water

I will lay me down

Like a bridge over troubled water

I will lay me down

Sail on silver girl.............

I want that played at my funeral.

I have tried all my life to live my life like a bridge over troubled water. I hope that in some ways I have succeeded.

At the end of my funeral I want played The Radetzky March composed by Johann Strauss Senior. This was composed in 1848 for Field Marshall Radetzky von Radek. When it was first played officers clicked their heels and stomped their feet in time to the music. At my funeral those there can clap their hands to say either: Well he wasn't so bad was he ? Or: Thank God that old sod has gone.

Finally everyone can leave to Ottawan playing D I S C O.

Well life is a disco so dance and I have no intention of stopping dancing when I move to that great disco in the sky !