Was the Funeral Fun?: A Novel

Anne Russ and Nancy Russ

Format ISBN Price   Paperback (6x9) 9781403372024 £ 9.75

“Was the funeral fun?”

He asks the same question about every funeral, and he always phrases the question just that way. He claims there is no appropriate way to inquire about a funeral, so it’s easier just to be inappropriate.

He’s right about that one. What are you supposed to say when, on your return from the funeral of a loved one, someone asks, “How was the funeral?”

Don’t you just want to scream “It was really, really sad, you moron! Someone died. How do you think it was?”

Conversation between Lu Gibbs and her boyfriend.

Yes, funerals are sad. Almost always. Because they mark the end of relationships on this planet. But funerals can also be a celebration of life. And they bring out the best (and sometimes the worst) in the people they leave behind. People cry a lot at visitations and funerals, but they also laugh a lot. And, in the south at least, they eat a lot.

Hilltop, a small southern town, is fortunate to have a funeral director who has buried several generations of its families. Now he has the help of his vivacious thirty-year-old granddaughter who has given up her social work career to help her Grandpa direct funerals. One of the bonuses of returning to her hometown is discovering that the very ordinary young man she went to school with has returned to run his family’s drug store. And there is nothing ordinary about the tall, innocent-looking pharmacist who prefers “healthy” women to skinny model types. (A good thing, since Lu is 5’ 8”, and wears a size 16).

This unlikely heir to the business of burying the dead learns a lot about dealing with death; but she learns more about life as she directs funerals for the wealthy and the poor, the young and the elderly. She learns that even though death is inevitable, how people deal with death is completely unpredictable. She also learns pretty quickly that no one knows more about everybody's business than a small town funeral director.

The book is peopled with interesting characters. Gossipy but benevolent Miss Maddie knows everything about everybody in town. A prodigal daughter who ran away with the circus when she was a teenager returns as a middle-aged matron with a secret past. The Episcopal priest, the town’s first female minister, wins everyone over in spite of the fact that she and her husband have different last names. And one minister who does a great job of helping his parishioners through the grief process often goes to bed with a migraine headache after a funeral.

Lu learns from the ministers and priest and the Ladies Auxiliaries who know how to offer comfort when people are grieving. She sees the gratitude for a long and healthy life and the unspeakable pain of a young life tragically ended much too soon. She sees the bitterness left by unfinished business and the greed that can divide families and make the grief more difficult. She thinks she has mastered the art of dealing with death—until it hits too close to home. Then everything she thought she knew flies right out the window.

Was the Funeral Fun? is a funny, poignant look at life and death in the small town South. For everyone who has ever lost anyone, this book has something to say.

Following in her mother’s footsteps, Anne has worked as a writer and magazine editor. She now lives with her husband and daughter on a seminary campus in Massachusetts where she is preparing for the ministry. Because they are abundantly blessed with wonderful relationships, the Russes have attended and even conducted (with the help of their husband/father) more than their share of funerals.

I had just about decided to take the afternoon off to enjoy a beautiful Arkansas fall day when Beulah Terwilleger and her husband, Ed, came in and announced that they were ready to pre-plan. They didn’t have an appointment; but there was no other pressing business, so I ushered them into my office. It had just recently gotten cool enough to turn off the air conditioning and let the open window provide the cooling system. My office smelled fresh and clean—more like spring than fall.

Beulah’s sister had recently passed away in Texas with no arrangements made, and her three children had quite a row about how the funeral should be handled.

“She’s been gone for six months, and they’re still not speaking to each other,” Beulah said. “I would just die if that happened to my babies.”

Beulah and Ed always remind me of the nursery rhyme:

Jack Sprat could eat no fat
His wife could eat no lean
And so between them both, you see
They licked the platter clean.

Her portly frame has a good 50 pounds on his; and when her jet-black, drugstore-dyed hair is at its peak, she stands at least five inches taller than he. Ed’s a small, quiet guy. I imagine he still has hair, but I can’t be sure since I never see him without a John Deere cap on his head. I assume he takes the cap off for church on Sunday; but since the Terwillegers are Baptists and I attend the Methodist church (when I can drag myself out of bed), I’ve never seen his pate sans chapeau. The Terwillegers really are a bit cartoonish looking. I had little doubt as to who would be deciding these arrangements.

Here at Gibbs Funeral home, when we pre-plan, we go the whole nine yards—casket, burial plot, type of flowers, music. My grandfather, Ernest Gibbs was actually one of the pioneers of the pre-plan concept back in the 30s, and he prides himself on leaving no stone unturned.

All the plans went smoothly until we got to the music part. You see, Beulah is our town singer. It’s not an official title, but over the years people have been known to refer to her by that moniker. Beulah grew up in Chicago. She got “drafted” into a USO troupe during the Korean war right out of high school and had visions of a dazzling career in show biz. But she met Ed on one of her tours, and after the war she married him and they came back to Hilltop. Ed inherited his father’s farm equipment and repair business and did well even after farmers started going bust. No matter how poor a farmer is he’s got to have equipment that runs.

Anyway, Beulah’s visions of fame and fortune got a little fuzzy after five kids, and she became quite content with being Hilltop’s premier song stylist. Though her voice is not quite what it used to be, she still belts out a rendition of Because at most of the weddings in town and provides her version of Abide With Me or Amazing Grace at all the town funerals. For those who want something a little more highbrow, she can sing The Lord’s Prayer—it fits either occasion. Basically, it’s not considered a ceremony in Hilltop unless Beulah sings.

So you can see the problem we were up against. Who would sing at Beulah’s funeral? Ed’s too. Beulah claimed she would be far too grief stricken to squeak out even one little note if Ed were to beat her to the Pearly Gates. (I could almost hear Ed lift up a silent prayer at that statement). Now, of course, Beulah is not the only person in Hilltop who can carry a tune. There’s little Mary Margaret at the high school. She has a beautiful voice and stars in all the community theater productions. Beulah nixed Mary Margaret for her funeral because Mary Margaret is Catholic, and Beulah was afraid she might sing Ave Maria.

“Over my dead body,” Beulah said, without a trace of irony in her voice.

Finally Ed, who had remained silent for the last half-hour spoke up. “Why don’t we make a recording of you singing, Muffin? Then you can sing at both funerals.”

The look on Beulah’s face was that of a person who has just realized she can have her cake and eat it too.

“That’s a wonderful idea, Ed,” she cried. “I’ll just borrow Amelia’s karaoke machine and make a tape! That way I don’t have to settle for a second-rate singer at my funeral. You either, Ed.”

Ed looked relieved. Whether it was because he felt assured Beulah’s voice would be heard at his funeral or because our meeting could now conclude I’ll never know. I was just happy to have solved yet another potential “funeral obstacle” for the folks seated in front of me. I’m starting to get pretty good at this.

Grandpa has run Gibbs Funeral Home in Hilltop, Arkansas for 70 years. No, that’s not a typo. He’s 92 years old and still comes to work every day. The only time he ever even missed a funeral was back in the summer of ‘90 when we were having that awful heat wave. That was the summer the Humane Society got all up in arms because the favorite activity for boys between the ages of five and 14 was to dig for earthworms and then set them out on the pavement to watch them fry. Anyway, right in the middle of one of the worst of the worm-frying days, Grandpa had a graveside service to preside over. Doc Green told him if he went out in the 100-plus temperature, the next funeral he attended would be his own.

Since I came to work for Grandpa, people in Hilltop have had to adjust to the idea of a “girl” funeral director. Actually, folks here still call us “undertakers.” It’s probably the most descriptive term for what we actually do, but I must say I prefer the more modern, politically correct, title of funeral director.

Not that I’m anything like what people see as a “typical” funeral director. Besides being female, I’m a little more than a year away from turning 30, and I carry a long mane of flaming red hair with me everywhere I go—somber looking, I’m not.

I was born here, but I left Hilltop after high school to go to college. I decided I hadn’t learned enough in four years (actually I couldn’t find a job), so I went on to get my master’s in social work. Armed with impressive credentials, I headed to the big city of St. Louis to seek fame and fortune as a counselor for disadvantaged and disturbed youth. These kids had seen and done enough to last ten lifetimes. I lasted two-and-a-half years, which is a year longer than the average program employee in that job.

When I’d had my fill of the big city and the daunting problems of today’s urban youth, I decided to come home and go into the family business. I couldn’t have given Grandpa a better present.

Dad and his brother Billy never were much interested in the dead. Actually, Dad hasn’t been interested in much of anything since Mom ran off with the music minister from Calvary Baptist Church when I was eight years old. Dad went into a funk, and I went into the refrigerator. Neither of us has ever really come out of our refuges. Dad holes up at the local Mercantile Bank doling out loans to the few people who come in requesting them; and when he’s not in his cell, you can find him digging in his gardens around the house. At 5’8, I am a zaftig size 16 and am coming to terms with the fact that I will never be a supermodel.

I have to thank Rosie for the fact that I’m finally OK with my less-than-svelte figure—Rosie O’Donnel, the comedienne turned talk show host. I feel like we’re kindred spirits. Her mom died when Rosie was about 10, and she says she turned to food for comfort. I know that her mom died and my mom left, but gone is gone—doesn’t much matter to an eight-year-old.

I don’t actually do anything to the bodies. My cousin Mo handles that. A few years back, he went over to the community college at Haven to get his mortician’s license. Mo was born Maurice, thanks to my Aunt Letitia. Letitia is the daughter of a wealthy rice farmer. She has a degree in French from William Woods, an all-girls college in Missouri. After college, she came back to Hilltop and set her cap for my Uncle Billy. She named her children Maurice and Francois. Maurice has settled down in the family business, and Francois makes a very good living as a designer of high-end bathrooms in the Dallas/Ft.Worth area.

Funerals are a very touchy subject, and pre-planning is even touchier. People don’t like to think about their own mortality, much less talk about it. Making all the arrangements ahead of time is actually a very selfless act. It gives the people left behind a little less to worry about while they are dealing with their grief.

One of my first funeral pre-planning cases was Mrs. Michael McCafferty (Mary Mac to her friends). She wasn’t really thrilled with having to deal with me. She thought anyone involved in planning a funeral ought to be “old enough to die themselves.” I assured her that any of us could die at any time. (I think I made a crack about life being a terminal illness, but it didn’t help the situation. Death jokes don’t play well in a funeral home.) Like most of our funerals, Mrs. McCafferty’s service would be held at the church of her choice. For Mary Mac, this was the First Methodist Church on Main Street where she has taught Sunday School for so many years everyone has lost count.

She wanted an open casket, unless her demise was brought on by a disfiguring accident. We keep a hair and make-up stylist under contract (Emily down at the Beauty Box), but Mary Mac made plans to have her stylist from Plainview come over to do her hair.

“Nobody but Joel knows how to do it.”

Mary Mac is from the old school. She gets her hair shampooed, rolled and set every week and doesn’t touch it until her next standing appointment. I figured as long as her passing didn’t involve a tumble down the stairs or some sort of boating accident, her hair would pretty much remain intact; but I didn’t bring that up.

My grandfather taught me that we must do our best to honor a funeral request no matter how bizarre it is.

“Death is a sacred and a scary thing,” he says. “By assuring people that their wishes will be carried out after their death, we give them a little extra peace in life.”

Today, I hoped that the Terwillegers were leaving our office with a little extra sense of peace—especially Ed.