Funerals, Part Deux

Reading Faith's post today about her Mamma's passing made me feel so much better about my previous posts on funerals, death and dying. I know that sounds strange, but you'd have to read her post to understand. I have soooooo been down that road.
She has this aunt, much like one I have, who is the epitome of why I detest funerals. Not her aunt, mine.
As I've said before, here in the south funerals are a social event. It's the rare week when there isn't a funeral/wake or two which one might attend. As a child I was subjected to 3 furnerals (my PaPa's, my other aunts stillborn baby, and a cousin) where my Aunt Susie was in attendance. Aunt Susie took the drama queen roll to Acadamy Award levels. To say she made a spectacle of herself would be a serious understatement. The weeping, the wailing, the fainting this woman had them down to a fine art. At first it was frightening but as time went on it became embarrassing. Sadly she was not alone in her 'show' of grief, albeit she was always the star. Over the years I came to realize every funeral/wake has an Aunt Susie or two. It's always women and their always consumed by their grief (one can only wish this were true). When I reached adulthood and could decide for myself, I made the decision to simply not attend any funeral I didn't positively have to. Thus the I don't do funerals attitude.
Intrestingly I also share Faith's feelings about death and dying. There's that nagging little doubt that burrows it's self into the depths of my mind. What if there is no life after death? What if we simply cease to exist? Which I guess shouldn't be so scary. After all if we cease to exist then we don't know we've ceased to exist, right? And if you've led a pretty questionable life and your not heaven bound, wouldn't ceasing to exist be better than hell?
Another thing about dying that really bothers me is , it has to be the ultimate experience. Regardless of what happens afterward the experience has to be the top of the spectrum. To have such an experience and not be able to come back and write about it in my blog, well that just sucks. And if there's no life after death and I can't funnel my thoughts through to oh say Mary Lou, so she could write about it for me, that would be the ultimate of suckology!