The Perfect Ending

When I see posters and bulletins hanging in grocery stores and banks I don't think I ever really wonder about the person that hung them.  But today it was the opposite.  I saw a guy hanging one and it made me wonder about the poster a guy like him would be hanging.  So, I nonchalantly changed the direction I was walking to pass by him as he taped it to the 400-year old stone column in Piazza Liberta.  Fortunately, I didn't get too close before I probably not-so-nonchalantly changed direction again due to the embarassment of my nosiness.  He was hanging a picture of his dead mother (or aunt or grandmother or friend, or hopefully client of his funeral home).
In small towns in Italy when someone dies they hang an announcement about it in a few designated places around town. Every town has a place where lots of them are hanging, but you can also occasionally find one hanging alone in a different zone.  Maybe close to their favorite cafe.  They all have a picture and fortunately, the people are usually old.  Unfortunately, sometimes they're not.  I don't read those.

I don't know if we do this at home or if people still even read the obituaries in the newspaper. I guess we barely have newspapers anymore.  Which I suppose is why yesterday when the bus driver asked me how to say edicola in English, I said that I didn't know.  How did he know I spoke English?  I rode the same bus one time last month and he remembered me.  He'd barely stopped to pick me up, but when he did and I got on he told me that I couldn't just stand there but that I had to flag him down or he wouldn't stop.  Seemed strange.  I was at a bus stop.  Imagine if you had to flag a bus down while standing at a bus stop in Chicago.  Don't they just stop?  Anyway, this time the discussion of the edicola was because I didn't have a bus ticket.  The place to buy them in town is the bar and it's closed on Tuesdays.  It's the only place in town to buy a bus ticket.  So on Tuesdays, you get on, you ride to the other end and you buy your ticket at the edicola when you get off.  That's Italy.  A little backwards sometimes, but it works.  And by the time I got off I'd remembered that the word the bus driver wanted to know was newsstand.  Do we have newsstands anymore?  A couple, I guess.  But here they are still a way of life.  Which reminds me, this started out as a blog about death.
   
Back to the poster distributor.  What a strange thing to do.  If it were me, I think I'd sneak out in the middle of the night to spread the news.  I wouldn't want anyone to see me doing it.  Then again, like I said in the beginning, maybe it's the job of the funeral home.  And since the funeral home probably has a lot to do when someone dies, I've decided to leave some instructions to make things a little easier on everyone when it's my turn. Make a copy of this and keep it somewhere.  I really mean it.  What a cool way to say goodbye.
 

THE PERFECT ENDING FOR A NUT LIKE ME
If you come to my funeral
please bring one flower 
and put it in the giant vase at the front of the room.
It will be the best arrangement ever.

Wear bright colors. 
Stripes. Plaid. Polka dots.  Mix them altogether, if you want.
If I've interrupted your day at the beach, wear your flipflops.
Bow ties, optional.

Ride your bike, if you can.
Maybe even decorate it like the 4th of July.
You'll get a special parking place.
Imagine a funeral home with lots of bikes out front.

Run, if you want.
It's okay if you stink. 
The giant bouquet of flowers will help.

If you have a convertible, come with the top down.
Even if I die in January. 
Wear your winter coat and hat and put the heat in the red.
Just this once.

If you have kids, they're welcome.
If they cry, let them.
If they laugh, don't shush them.

There will be a big bowl of cool paper scraps to make a paper chain.
Write down one thing that you liked about me,
and one thing that you didn't (or two or three or four).

Come hungry.
They'll have cheese, ice cream, pasta, bread, french fries
and chocolate chip cookies, of course.

If you come to my funeral
learn to say goodbye in a different language
and say it out loud as you leave
my last party.