Yesterday was my grandfather's funeral and as he had no particular religious beliefs a humanist ceremony was held. This was the first time I had attended such a ceremony and I was impressed by the tone of the whole occasion as well as the brevity which lasted about 15 minutes although there was a relatively small gathering at the crematorium. That is not meant to sound flippant as there was no lingering waiting for the next stage with grievers adding boredom to their upset and is the kind of ceremony I would gladly have for myself. My mam and her step sisters had wrote the details of his life that the wished mention of with contributions from others and a member of the Humanist Society read out this tribute. http://www.humanism.org.uk/ceremonies/humanist-funerals-memorials
 
   In total three songs that he liked were played instead of the usual hymns with two top and tailing the service and a third played midway through whist we were encouraged to reflect on our own personal reflections.
   The thing that struck me were when the person conducting the ceremony confessed that he had never met Bob but that he sounded like the sort of person he would like to meet. Leaving the compliment of the second part of that, the honesty of the former part of that sentence was a contrast to the number of vicars and priests I have heard talking about the deceased as if they knew them familiarly despite them not attending church.
   No flowers had been requested with a collection for Parkinsons UK http://www.parkinsons.org.uk/ set up on the way out for those who would like to make a donation. The only thing that felt slightly off was as we made our way back to cars to go back to my parents was the next party of mourners waiting to go in as we were leaving. This is more a problem of the layout of the crematorium meaning that we had to walk back up past them to get back to our cars which got a bit crowded.
   We only stayed a short while as we had to pick Bethany up from nursery having only put her in for the morning and Alison had to get ready for work. There was a bustle of activity in the kitchen with three kettles on the go around the house, not helped by my parents only having half a kitchen as they are getting a new one. This meant that there was no power and quiches were being warmed up in a microwave plugged into an extension cord along with two kettles. This did not take long to blow a fuse and gave my Dad and Stan the perfect excuse to run to the garage for more fuses and extension cords. This mini drama certainly helped lighten the mood and allowed people to reflect fondly as they browsed specially prepared photo albums.