Things Went Wrong in the Funeral: Scenes from Funerals Remain Fresh in Our Memories

This is Part Four of a four part series in which friends and family members speak for themselves, by sharing their stories when things went wrong in the funeral. Families remember the day of the funeral forever.

Time seems to stop after we learn of a death, while time drags slowly in planning a funeral. As a result, we remember every detail.

Jodie Cormier King's father, Henry Cormier, passed away in 1998. "He had been getting frail and he had left some instructions with my mother if he should pass. While he was in a week long coma, my mother came to me with one of his wishes. 'Your father wanted you to read this,' she said as she handed me a poetic prayer. I took the prayer, read it, cried and put it down, somewhere. My father passed away and we planned to have a burial at sea. The burial at sea was his request as that was one of his favorite places to be and his father was a lobster fisherman. As we were getting ready to leave for the ceremony my mom turns to me and asks, 'Do you have the prayer?' 'What? Why?' I asked. 'To read it at the ceremony,' she replied. Needless to say, we were almost late for my father's funeral. Not to mention I had not prepared myself to read this tearful poem, out loud, before so many people," Jodie said. "I did as asked and proudly sent my father on his way."

"This photo of Dad in the white suit is how I remember him as having a good sense of humor. He wanted to take a picture in my brother's prom suit, what a laugh!" Jodie shared, "He was a kind man who always took the time to explain things as I was learning them. He wanted to make sure I could change the oil in my own car so I knew how important it was to do things for yourself. We rode dirt bikes as kids and instead of a car for my birthday, I got a three-speed scooter, front basket and all. To this day, I ride dirt and street bikes and owe it all to my 'dear old DAD.' Thanks, Dad!"

When Robin Nolan's grandfather died more than a year ago in mid-November, the funeral was memorable for several reasons. "At the funeral, the altar was covered with pumpkins, squash and gourds for decorations and the church did not want to take them down. It was a pretty setting for Thanksgiving, but for a funeral, it was oddly hilarious. The funeral was fine, just a little sad. He was 94."

In attending a funeral for a neighbor's child, Robin discovered that balloon releases are unpredictable. "They let the balloons go with little messages on them, except the messages were laminated and the size of a Hallmark Card. They were too heavy and instead of blowing away to 'Neverland' and into the hands of strangers, they all crashed into a tree and popped."

When Robin's brother died, she could not travel cross-country to attend his funeral because she had an 18-day-old baby. "My cousin stood up and read something I wrote on my behalf. She had me on speaker phone in the Mausoleum, after the funeral service, so I could hear the final preaching before it was over. Suddenly, she dropped her cell phone, it exploded on the marble floor into a million pieces, but miraculously, it still worked and we were laughing - and amazed, feeling my brother's spirit did that, as he had worked in telecomm - and I heard the rest of the service."

In helping other people, Robin has given away more than 100 copies of the book, "Never Say Goodbye," by Patrick Mathews, as she has found that his book provides clarity about the other side and explains how "life has changed, not ended." She believes the book is a gift that really helps with grieving.

While every farewell is different, Ellen Rossano's family had a distant cousin who was literally late for his own wake.

"This happened in January of 1989 or 1990 – I was actually on a business trip in New York City when this all started. Donald was a distant cousin on my father's side of the family and had moved from Massachusetts to California – I hadn't seen him in 25 years. He wanted to be buried in Massachusetts, so his family there asked my Aunt Marie to make the arrangements (Roman Catholic) in New Bedford, Massachusetts. The funeral arrangements were made, the obituary sent to the local paper, and the funeral home director made arrangements to pick up Cousin Donald at Green Airport in Rhode Island. Unfortunately, he had been 'bumped' from the flight – they were too full and took cargo off for the next flight. No one knew anything about this until the funeral director showed up at the airport in Rhode Island around 10 p.m. the night before the wake. To say that Aunt Marie was hysterical is an understatement, but if there was any good news, she was laughing and not crying," Ellen explained. "We decided that since it was a closed casket wake, it would proceed as scheduled, but with a closed empty casket. At that time, we didn't have email and instant messaging, and no way to reschedule. We all stood at the funeral home greeting people at what then was the traditional 2-4 p.m./7-9 p.m. wake, and watched as each guest paid tribute to the flowers on top of the casket. Every now and then, Marie would be 'overcome' and have to take a break – mostly because she could not stop laughing. Cousin Donald arrived at Green Airport that night, and was on time for the funeral the following day. The Father of St. Lawrence's Church in New Bedford performed the funeral and burial ceremony at the cemetery, and I will never forget the looks he kept shooting us, clearly not too happy that we were all still suffering from uncontrollable fits of laughter. My father had died in 1985, and Marie died about 15 years ago, and I am relieved to report that both wakes and funerals went off without incident."

When Jessie Terwilliger's ex-boyfriend died unexpectedly at the age of 25 in December of 2008, his family asked her to speak at the funeral.

"We were high school sweethearts who had dated for three years. I decided to write a wonderful speech about how I remember him in his younger days, as he was quite a character and certainly created some unique stories. But, he had gotten married nine months prior to his death and his bride was not happy that I was invited. In fact, she was furious. She refused to let me speak at his funeral, which I took sitting down because I was not about to argue or anything. In the way that she was acting, I sort of felt like I wasn't allowed to be upset or grieve. His family saw what happened with this as well, and as I sat in the pew waiting for the service to start, I saw the sympathetic stares from my ex's family who wanted to come say hello and be cordial to me, because truth be told they all really liked me when I was a part of his life. I even went on several of the family vacations and was invited to every gathering. But there were also the cold and violent stares from everyone on the bride's side who all knew who I was and wondered how I could even have the sheer audacity to show up. The part that went wrong was when every eulogy given was for a man that I did not know," Jessie remembered. "He had gone to live in another part of the state and picked up all of these new friends and such, and the funeral was centered around how he lived the past few years of his life. But nobody spoke about him when he was younger, the person that I knew, and the person that his family knew. Basically what was so wrong was that I didn't feel like I was there to grieve over my ex, I was there to grieve over some guy I hardly knew. His family did read the eulogy I wrote, and they liked it because they related to it. They were all very upset that I couldn't speak because they all really enjoyed what I said about him in my speech."

Jessie, who is an author, writes about life on her blog, including her recent loss. "Actually, it helps me to write about everything that goes on in my personal life on my blog, including this latest hardship of losing my ex, and how it affected me. I still occasionally mention it. But I was also able to work in a little bit about my ex's death into the latest book that I wrote 'Bombshell', which comes out this month."

Carolyn Zahnow's ex-husband died from a brain tumor caused by melanoma in 2002. The couple knew each other for 30 years and shared a son together. "I actually flew from Texas back to North Carolina with my son, 15 at the time, during his final days in the hospital. The funeral was quite an event as he was a respected musician and avid biker. The biking was something he picked up after our divorce. Bikers led the way from the town Community Center to the cemetery," Carolyn explained. "But, my chief complaint was during the eulogy, my ex's life only seemed to start after he married his current wife. No mention of myself, whom he was married to for 13 years or the fact that he served in the Navy and we lived in San Diego for 4 years. I was not the only one to notice this as I had most of my family, including my present husband, with me. Also, present, were band members from a band that he performed with for many years. They were not acknowledged either. And it did hurt at the burial service when they folded up the US flag, gratis of his military service, and they gave the flag to his current wife – HEY! I was the one who lived through the military experience! I understand that that's the rules, but it still bugged me."

Nicole Nascenzi was faced with many details in funeral planning when her mother died in 2003.

"My mom died unexpectedly from a heart attack at age 54. For various reasons I took the lead on planning funeral arrangements, making lists on the plane on my way home from Tulsa, Oklahoma, to Sharon, Massachusetts. Although I was probably the most 'together,' my dad, my sister and I were all grieving. Working from my notes we completed all the necessary preparations with the funeral director, including creating Mass cards for the wake and writing an obit for the paper. Now, for my entire life I have always screwed up my mom's birthday thinking it was a day earlier (June 6 instead of June 7). I don't know why – in past years I had even called her to wish her a happy birthday on the wrong day. It was sort of a family joke. To this day, I even get sad on the wrong day - it is just ingrained in my head. So, when filling out all the paperwork for my mother's arrangements, I gave her birthday as I remembered it and no one else caught my mistake because we were all distracted. As the family gathered before my mother's wake we looked over everything – the casket, the flowers and the Mass cards. It was all very sad, very quiet and sober until I heard a scream and some crying from the other room. I rushed in to see my younger sister holding a stack of Mass cards and yelling about how she was going to kill the funeral director because he screwed up my mother´s birth date. She lunged in the direction of his office and I grabbed her. I had to tell my sister that I am sure it was my mistake and although she was still upset at least she wasn't going to kill me," Nicole said. "I am sure my mother was somewhere laughing at me. Since the wake was about to start, we had to go with the incorrect Mass cards. A few people noticed the error, but at least no one brought it to my sister's attention. The funeral director was nice enough to have some corrected ones printed up for us."

For Betsy*, she dealt with a joint funeral at the family church when her father and stepmother were killed. Looking back, she wishes things were done differently. "The undertaker, a young guy from a funeral home, gave us instructions about when the coffins were rolled out of the church, but we didn't know that they contradicted the traditions of the church. He told those of us who were pallbearers to get to the back of the church to be ready to carry them to the trucks which were waiting, but in order for us to precede them down the aisle in the church it was very clumsy - and again, apparently not how the church would do it," Betsy* said. "I wish the church had worked to give directions instead of the funeral home."

Betsy* prefers to remain anonymous for this article.

Pictured: Henry Joseph Cormier, husband to Juliette Cormier, and father to Bob Cormier and Jodie Cormier King.

For Part One of this article series link to Things Went Wrong in the Funeral: Mistakes and Funeral Errors Affect the Healing Process

For Part Two of this article series link to Things Went Wrong in the Funeral: We Carry Funerals with Us for Life

For Part Three of this article series link to Things Went Wrong in the Funeral: Forgiveness for Funeral Mistakes While Facing Loss

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