Eulogy

[DanaC]

The biographical style eulogy I think works better when the departed was elderly. The eulogy for my grandfather was like that and it really helped contextualise his life and who he was for those of us who hadn't known him as a young man. I found out things I didn't know about him and about my family (the fact that the Coombs family went out to India in the late 18th century for instance, and that they were, to quote the euology 'the last of the great Indigo plantation families'). I knew he'd been chief auditor of the Indian railways and seen some small service in the war - and that he had brought his wife, young sons and nephew back to the motherland in the turbulent days of partition - but I don't think I ever realised how hard he found it to leave behind his ancestral home. And how hard he worked to make a new one.

When people leave us at a younger age, I think it helps to focus on who they were and what they meant rather than biographical details. Odd little anecdotes that demonstrate their personality and importance - fro your perspective that would more than likely be that you have a shared history and her importance as a mother.

Not sure how helpful that is though. When my Dad died, i bottled out of a proper euolgy and wrotea short poem on behalf of my brother and I. The person who officiated at the funeral put together a brief bio with our help and delivered that before I read the poem.