Funeral on a desert island

A few weeks ago, Bob asked me to look up the Robert Louis Stevenson poem, "Requiem," for him:

Requiem

Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:
'Here he lies where he longed to be;
Here is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.'

He said he wants that read at his funeral, or actually, have it read as his ashes are flung -- I guess I'd better check where that's supposed to take place. I think partly into Bennett Spring, and partly into some body of water near the Duck Club? Not sure. Not that I think it's going to be necessary anytime soon, but I guess I should find out and pay attention.

Coincidentally, I had just read this article in the Guardian: Curtain Music

Supposedly the ten most popular songs at funerals in Britain are:

1. My Way - Frank Sinatra
   
2. Wind Beneath My Wings - Bette Midler
   
3. Angels - Robbie Williams
   
4. My Heart Will Go On - Celine Dion
   
5. Simply The Best - Tina Turner
   
6. I Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston
   
7. You’ll Never Walk Alone - Gerry and the Pacemakers
   
8. Over The Rainbow - Eva Cassidy
   
9. Time To Say Good,bye -Sarah Brightman
   
10. We’ll Meet Again - Dame Vera Lynn

There are a lot of good--and more interesting--suggestions in the comments under the story.

I remembered that I'd made a post about funeral songs, and found it, way back in February of 1999: At my funeral . . .. At that time, I made several lists, and I thought it might be interesting to see if my tastes were still the same.

These are the lists I made in February 1999:

Desert Island Albums

Lips Against the Steel - David Knopfler
Lifelines - David Knopfler
Marc Cohn - Marc Cohn
Jack's Crows - John Gorka
Pet Sounds - The Beach Boys
Rumour & Sigh - Richard Thompson
Man of Colours - Icehouse
Fruitcakes - Jimmy Buffett
God Shuffled His Feet - Crash Test Dummies
Robbie Robertson - Robbie Robertson

Desert Island Books

Ladder of Years - Anne Tyler
The Stand - Stephen King
Four Past Midnight - Stephen King
Someplace to be Flying - Charles de Lint
War for the Oaks - Emma Bull
Reservation Blues - Sherman Alexie
365 Tao - Ming-Dao Deng
Ahead of All Parting - Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by Stephen Mitchell)
Winnie the Pooh - A. A. Milne
Living Juicy - Sark

Songs to play at my funeral:

At My Funeral - Crash Test Dummies (from "The Ghosts that Haunt Me")
I Will Always Be - David Knopfler (from "Lifelines")
What a Crying Shame - The Mavericks (from "What a Crying Shame")
or maybe

There Goes My Heart - The Mavericks

And something from Richard Thompson, but there are so many that would be appropriate that it's hard to choose one. Maybe

At the Dimming of the Day - Richard and Linda Thompson

But definitely
Saving the Best for Last - Marc Cohn

You can go a hundred miles a second
Don't have to drive no lousy cab
Got everything you want and more, man
and the King picks up the tab.
You walk around on streets of gold all day
And never have to listen to what these customers say, and I know
They're saving the best for last . . .

~ Marc Cohn - "Saving the Best for Last"

And now? Much the same, probably, but a few differences.

Desert Island AlbumsCurrent Favorite Albums

(My musical tastes change so often, I would really have to think long and hard about what ten (or so) albums I could listen to over and over and not be bored by them. So instead, these are my current favorites.)

Marc Cohn - Marc Cohn
O - Damien Rice
The Giver - David Knopfler
Our Eternal Ghosts - Deadman
Love Songs - Paul Young
Ship of Dreams - David Knopfler
Los Lonely Boys - Los Lonely Boys
Elsewhere - Mack Starks
Paramour - Deadman
When the Telephone Rings - The Silos

Desert Island Books

(This is really hard, too. I almost never re-read books, but these are the ones that have stood re-reading, at least once.)

Ladder of Years - Anne Tyler
American Gods - Neil Gaiman
Timeline - Michael Crichton
Ahead of All Parting - Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by Stephen Mitchell)
Doomsday Book - Connie Willis
To Say Nothing of the Dog - Connie Willis
Enough Rope - Lawrence Block
Mendoza in Hollywood - Kage Baker
The Cat Who Went to Paris - Peter Gethers
The Sheltering Sky - Paul Bowles

Songs to Play at My Funeral

"Angels and Ordinary Men" - Wendy Lands
"Hallelujah" - Allison Crowe
"Whistled a Slow Waltz" - The Silos
"Love Will Guide You Home" - Deadman
"Heaven" - Los Lonely Boys
"I Will Always Be" - David Knopfler

(And I know I don't have to worry about it right away, either, but Bob, you know this is just for fun, right? You don't need to write it down or anything.)

And since it's just for fun:

Desert Island Knitting Supplies

Opal sock yarn and Noro Silk Garden. I keep coming back to these two yarns, and I think if that's all I ever had to knit with, I'd be happy. They're both variegated, which keeps me interested, and being variegated, I can knit big swathes of stockinette and a) not get bored and b) have it still look interesting. I wouldn't even really need any patterns--I've got my basic sock pattern in my head for the Opal, and I've made probably a half dozen multidirectional scarves in Silk Garden and have yet to get bored with either.

I suppose neither would be very practical if I were on an actual desert island--neither wool/silk scarves nor wool socks would be necessary--but it would keep me happy. Oh, and I'd need needles--a set of 5 - 5" doublepoint Size 1's and a pair of 10" Size 7's, both wooden.

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Maybe this year

I was looking back over some previous years' resolutions, and what stands out to me is that I tend to make this whole list of things and then just basically completely ignore them. I write them, and that's (mostly) the end of it. I suppose a good resolution this year would be to not only keep my resolutions, but to actually even read them.

I did (sort of) stick to one of my resolutions from last year. I resolved to make more of my Christmas presents. I did make a lot of my Christmas presents--I knitted a few scarves and I made handmade soap--but what I ended up doing was buying Christmas presents anyway, and giving the handmade things as additional presents. I always tend to feel that my handmade things aren't nice enough, aren't good enough. I never really feel like the gifts I give people are good enough, basically. It's partly a matter of money, but more a matter of time. I end up running around constantly over a couple of weekends and a few nights after work and buying things that I think people would like, but really, how do you know?

I sometimes feel like I don't know anyone well enough to know what they would really like, so I settle for something safe, like candles or bath products -- and really, of course, I love to get candles and bath products, so maybe that's a good tactic . . .

Anyway, this morning I woke up with ideas for knitted things in my head, and maybe this year I'll really do it. Maybe this year I'll look for a source of affordable fragrance oils and make some nicer soap, not using the soap fragrance from the hobby store like I did this year, because my soap making frenzy occurred about a week before Christmas. Maybe I'll actually keep my momentum going and not knit four scarves in January and no more until the second week of December.

I was reading this list the other day, and liked the end, where she says, " I do hope you'll make a list, not so much Resolutions as goals and hopes and your own To-Do and To-Don't pile for the coming year."

So instead of resolutions, maybe I should make a list of goals and hopes. I like that. And I also read someone who wrote a list of things that she'd accomplished the previous year--I can't remember now where it was--and I like that, too. Sometimes it's good to be reminded that I did good things this year, too. It isn't always about "forget everything that happened before, this is a complete new beginning." It is a new beginning, but there were good things about this year, too.

Stuff I accomplished this year

• I did a lot of work this year. I don't have a list of the projects that I completed or the websites that I built, but man, I did a lot of them. I built good relationships with clients, and I did a lot of good work.
• I learned how to work in PHP. I didn't learn how to write PHP, but I figured out enough to do what I needed to do. My boss told me that sometimes I cry wolf too often, and I admit that I do--that's a defense mechanism, obviously. I'll try not to do that so much. That goes in the next list.
• I took my lunch to work almost every day. I bet there were less than a half dozen times when I didn't. I'm not completely sure that's a good thing as far as socializing or whatever, but it's good for my pocketbook and it's better for me in a lot of ways. It's better not to have to try to think of a healthy (or even acceptable) place every day, it's better not to have to get in the car and drive somewhere, it's better not to spend $5-10 a day on lunch.
• I let go of some things that have historically been very difficult for me. I tend to want to always be in control, to do everything myself. I still find it hard to let go of that control at work, but I've finally been able to do it (mostly) at home. Bob cooks me dinner almost every night, and I have finally been able to relax and let him, and not feel guilty about it. He also does a lot of the laundry--almost all of his almost all the time, and sometimes mine, and I've been able to accept that, too, and not feel guilty about it. There's only so much I can do, and I deserve some free time, too.

Stuff I want to accomplish next year

• I'm always willing to try new things at work, and I never refuse to learn something new, but I should probably go into it with a more positive attitude personally. I tend to say, yeah, sure, that's fine, but inside I'm thinking, oh man, I hope I can do that, I don't know whether I can or not. My history shows that I can. Maybe this year I can finally convince myself of that.
• Not only make most of my Christmas gifts, but accept that they're good enough. I can't control whether people like what I give them or not. All I can do is give things from my heart, and hope that they're acceptable, so it follows that if I make things with my hands, they're even more from my heart. (From the heart doesn't mean cheap, though--yarn is expensive, and the soap-making supplies are expensive--it just means that I'm trying to make something meaningful rather than grabbing something off a shelf at a store.) I also kind of like the idea of giving things that can be used up, like soap, so I think that will be my biggest concentration.
• Continue to take my lunches to work, but try to put a little more planning into it, so I'm not scrambling around in the morning making tuna salad or something. Maybe make a list of things that I like, and that are also healthy, and keep that list with me so I have a roadmap when I go to the grocery store.
• Try to worry less. This year was a hellacious year as far as loved ones having major health issues, but obviously worrying isn't going to change that one bit. Worrying isn't going to make anyone healthier. Praying might, and I did a lot of that, too. So--worry less, pray more?
• Read more. I've kind of gotten out of the habit. I spend most of my free time on the computer; I should try to spend more of that time reading. Not that I ever read anything even remotely educational, but that's okay. It's my recreation, I don't make any excuses for it.
• Take more pictures. I got a wonderful new digital camera, and I've been carrying it with me every day, but haven't taken many pictures. Get into that habit. It's not like film--if they're bad, or boring, they can be easily deleted with no cost or worry.
• Write more. I'm not going to try to make a resolution to write fiction, or to write for publication -- maybe I will, maybe I won't, I don't want to put that pressure on myself right now -- but write more online. When I'm bored, I'll go online and read blogs and journals, and two things happen, well, really, just one result. One, I read good writing, and it makes me feel inadequate, and I don't write. Two, I read bad writing, and it makes me feel self-conscious, like what I do here is stupid (projecting someone else's stupidity onto myself, I guess), and I don't write. So really, the "resolution" is--pay less attention to what other people are writing, and write for myself.
• Work on the tarot deck, or at least work on other graphic/artistic ideas. In fact: Make more art. And an adjunct:
• Think about redesigning this website. Yes, I know it's perfect for me. I like it, too. But I haven't changed it for over three years. Isn't it probably time for a change? No promises on this, but: Play around with new designs, see if I can find something I like better, that excites me.

More later, maybe.

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Merry Christmas!

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The Twelve Trees of Christmas

Orlando airport:

Pop Century Resort Food Courtt:

American Adventure, Disney World:

Disney's Animal Kingdom:

Disney Pop Century Resort Lobby:

Disney's Floridian Resort:

Walt Disney World Magic Kingdom:

Epcot:

The Christmas tree at our Christmas lunch (at "The Bulldog"):

The tree on my desk in my office:

Tree on top of Jeff's computer at the office:

Our tree at home:

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Covered in cats

Last night's activity--after getting home, heating up a can of soup for dinner, then going to Target and the grocery store with Bob--was wrapping soap. I had picked up some large sheets of scrapbooking paper at the craft store over the weekend with the idea of cutting strips to wrap around the soap bars, then sealing them with a Christmas seal, and that part worked fine. I was less sure of how to label them, and ended up just writing the name on the paper strip with a Sharpie. They're not terribly attractive, but I just ran out of time. I had thought about creating some kind of a cool looking label on the computer, but at this point, handwritten Sharpie labels are better than nothing, I guess.

It ended up being terribly time-consuming--I had to cut the strips to the right length and width, then wrap them around the soap and seal them, then label them, then wrap them in tissue and then bag them, and mark on the bag who they were for. A few got placed in tins lined with tissue paper. It was kind of fun, actually, until I cut my finger with the scissors and had to go find a band-aid. Then when I was finally finished and cleaning up the kitchen, I was loading the dishwasher and stabbed myself with a fondue fork. Not badly, just enough to say to myself, "Enough! Time to go to bed."

Tonight I need to wrap a few things for John and his family--Bob's going out to see him tomorrow--and hopefully get a start on wrapping everything else. The dining room is a complete disaster, with bags and boxes and wrapping paper and mail all over the table and floor. But one way or another, it will all get done by Saturday afternoon when we go over to Bob's folks' for Christmas Eve.

The table is covered with stuff; Bob is covered with cats.

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