Yellow is my favourite colour! Sunshine colour - it suited my mum well. This funky little 2CV was her hearse, which took her casket as far as it could before we had to go by foot. We walked a muddy track past cow fields and pig troughs and then into the woods where we climbed over branches and roots down a hilariously awkward path to get to a wonderful spot of sunshine where her body now lies. After the ceremony, we climbed back out of the woods and had a glorious party in a giant tent where hundreds of people danced and sang and celebrated her wondrous life. What a day! In the woods I was to give my tuppence, which I have copied to this post. It's tricky giving your tuppence at a funeral. Everybody is bound to have a different experience of the person you are there to mourn, and the person you are there to mourn cant give their own, so it feels like quite a responsibility. Every person there has a right to mourn in a way that feels right to them, (including you) but this should also ideally be in a way that doesn't interfere with the next person's right to mourn. To cut a long ramble short, there's a lot to think about when writing a speech that is to be spoken over a dead body. Here is mine:
What a strange situation to be in: speaking to mum around a picnic basket that cradles her empty shell. The shell she took wild swimming and abseiling and waitressing in New York; with hands built for catching babies, feet that danced her all around the world and a belly that stretched so beautifully whenever a new Stephenson was planted. As far at the human form goes, Mum you were a master piece, and although today we must say good bye to that part of you that has passed away, I know that every day you will be celebrated and present in some way, purely by the virtue of the lives you have shaped.
You've taught so many so much. You've taught me mosaic making, skinny dipping, silk painting and feminism. Given me a lust for learning, an appreciation of the sky and all its contents; you've taught me to believe the world is beautiful and that it is my oyster. I think most importantly you have taught me to be loved by others but first by myself.
I could go on for hours about all the things you have allowed me to learn from you, and I am just one person. What I'm trying to say is that this is not final, you have not gone. You live in all those you have loved and taught and touched, and we are so grateful. So yes. Yes you are 'watching over us,' yes, you will 'always be with us' because you gave us all that you were when you could, and we will keep and share that invaluable gift with gratitude and love. Your thoughts and wisdom and perspective now beat through our veins. So thank you, for the incredible fortune of letting us know you.