A funeral service is being
held in a synagogue for a woman who has just passed away. At the end of the service the
pallbearers are carrying the casket out, when they accidentally bump into a wall jarring
the casket. They hear a faint moan. They open the casket and find that the woman is
actually alive. She lives for ten more years and then dies. A ceremony is again held at
the same synagogue and at the end of the ceremony the pallbearers are again carrying out
the casket. As they are walking the husband cries out, "Watch out for the wall!"
An old man and woman were married for years even though they hated each other. When
they had a confrontation, screams and yelling could be heard deep into the night. A
constant statement was heard by the neighbors who feared the man the most. "When I
die I will dig my way up and out of the grave to come back and haunt you for the rest of
your life!" They believed he practiced black magic and was responsible for missing
cats and dogs, and strange sounds at all hours. He was feared and enjoyed the respect it
garnished. He died abruptly under strange circumstances and the funeral had a closed
casket. After the burial, the wife went straight to the local bar and began to party as if
there was no tomorrow. The gaiety of her actions were becoming extreme while her neighbors
approached in a group to ask these questions: Are you not afraid? Concerned? Worried? that
this man who practiced black magic and stated when he died he would dig his way up and out
of the grave to come back and haunt you for the rest of your life? The wife put down her
drink and said. . . "let the old man dig. I had him buried upside down."
WHEN my grandmother died, we traveled to a tiny country
cemetery to bury her beside my grandfather. Among those attending the funeral was a
shabby figure in a dark, crumpled suit - too hot for the blazing August day. A
dilapidated felt hat was clutched to his chest and tears followed the furrows of unshaven
cheeks. His name was Billy, and he had lived on the farm next to my grandparents.
It was poor land. His family often went hungry, but they were proud and Billy
used to carry an empty lunch pail to school rather than let anyone know there was no food
at home. He called for my father some mornings, setting his empty pail on the
kitchen table where Grandmother was busily filling the family lunch pails. She would
slyly fill his pail, too, and at school my father never noticed that Billy's lunch was the
same as his. She never told of the empty lunch pail and neither did Billy. But
he tramped the eight kilometers to her graveside, still poor, still hungry, but determined
to pay his last respects to Grandmother, who had filled his lunch pail but left his pride
intact.
WHILE walking along the sidewalk in front of his church, our
minister heard the intoning of a prayer that nearly made his collar wilt. Apparently
his five-year-old son and his playmates had found a dead robin. Feeling that proper
burial should be performed, they had secured a small box and cotton batting, then dug a
hole and made ready for the disposal of the deceased. The minister's son was chosen
to say the appropriate prayers, and with sonorous dignity intoned his version of what he
thought his father always said. "Glory be unto the Faaaather. . . and unto the
Sonnnn . . . and into the hole you goooo."
OUR priest suddenly became ill and asked his twin brother,
also a priest, to fill in for him and conduct a funeral Mass scheduled for that day. His
brother, of course, agreed. It was not until the brother was accompanying the casket
down the aisle, however, that he realized that he had neglected to ask the sex of the
deceased. This was information that he would need for his remarks during the service. As
he approached the first pew where the deceased's relatives were seated he nodded toward
the casket and whispered to one woman, "Brother or sister?" "Cousin,"
she replied.
A MUSICIAN had given orders that when he died, his flute was
to be buried with him. "What did you think, madam:" a friend asked the
widow. "Well," she replied, "I thought it a blessing he didn't play
the piano."
ONE evening my husband and I were talking about our wills.
I asked him, if he should go first, what funeral arrangements he would like.
He told me he wanted to be cremated and have his ashes scattered over Catalina
Island. "Why Catalina?" I asked. "Why? Because I've never
been there before."
MORTICIAN Dale Russon tells what happened to him on his way
to one funeral: When I pulled up to a curb, my rear wheel dropped off the edge of
the road and into a drain, causing the car to become stuck. Since I was already late, I
rushed over to the trunk, got out my jack and started to raise the car out of the drain.
At the motion of the jack, the trunk lid snapped down, catching me square on the head.
At that point I decided I'd better call the funeral home and have them start the
services without me. Blood was running down my face, dripping on my suit, and I was going
to have to change my clothes. I stepped into the nearest building and asked the
receptionist to call the Russon Brothers Mortuary for me. She looked at me and said,
"Buddy, you're hurt, but you aren't hurt that bad."
SHORTLY after I opened my own flower shop, a woman came in
and ordered a funeral wreath. She wanted it for that afternoon. I made the wreath to her
specifications and was finished by the time she returned. She thought the wreath was
beautiful, just what she wanted. "Now wire it to Houston," she said.