Me and My Funeral

A beginning

Photo by Jon Devo - Dance Me To Death Rehearsals

Over the years, I’ve made two films about death. One, Death Dinner, was created with Suzanne Noble and part of our Advantages of Age Arts Council-awarded OUTageous series where we looked at different taboos around death where a group of people who work/are involved in Death World sat around a table and feasted while discussing death and dying. It was stimulating, moving, and fun. It became an hour long film Death Dinner which is still touring festivals as a conversation starter around this still-taboo topic. Last year it went to Feast, Malvern’s Theatre Festival and I created a Death Café space in a circle afterwards where people could talk openly about death in whatever way they wanted. They did. From Jain ceremonies – put the bodies out to be consumed by the birds – to Assisted Dying to other personal stories around grief. . This year, it will be going to Silver Sky Festival from July 25-27^th in Horsham.

The second performance and film, Dance Me To Death, was my own project. A dance one. Again Arts Council-awarded. I gathered ten Over 60s non-professional dancers and we created a dance performance with direction from choreographers Rhys Dennis and Waddah Sinada plus musicians Fran Loze on cello and Mark on percussion. We leaned into death and dying through morning workshops which I initiated. We made an altar – for instance, we talked about grief objects that we brought in and placed them there. We wrote poems and read them. We talked about death. We used the feelings we’d uncovered in the morning to underpin and drive the movement we were making in the afternoon. It was a heady, challenging time. We performed it in Kensal Green Cemetery in 2021 (yes, Covid time and it was outside so allowed) and then filmed it separately . It too has been touring around festivals and will go to Silver Sky. I’m very proud of its beauty. And its daring.

Photo by Jon Devo - Dance Me To Death Performance

Making two films about death and dying did have an effect on me. After Death Dinner, I made a will. Finally. All of my worldly goods will go to my son but I’d like my friends/family to have a choice of some of my paintings, masks, rugs, objects found in strange places.

That part is relatively simple and I hope it is for my son, in organisational terms. I admired the way my mother made her will and stated what we three siblings would get. It was efficient and fair. Unlike other wills, I have observed in action.

What happens when I die? Well, that depends on where I am. And how I am. But if I’m at home – I have a little plan if I can afford it to employ someone – a death doula – over those last months. I like the idea of creating a new relationship of kindness right at the end of life. That feels like an adventure.

And I wonder about my body being in my living room for a day or so… perhaps in an open container/coffin/boat (something my friends and family have built with me and decorated beforehand) surrounded by flowers. I fancy laying in state in my front room and being visited. And talked to and cried over in the home that I love.

I’d like the whole dead affair to be as DIY as possible. Home-made this and home-decorated that. I can be washed – perhaps by friends or family who are willing – and laid out in one of my favourite piece of material. I have some red sari material that was used for my 70^th and my partner’s 80^th celebration and has just been used on the altar at my pregnant niece’s Goddess ceremony. I love the idea of items keeping on travelling to intimate blessings and weavings. And this sari material - which bought in Portsmouth on an Advantages of Age trip at Chantelle’s which was closing down – has a lot more travelling to do.

Are there any groovy mortuaries in West London? Well, I want to go to the freezer there. The funeral plan? There has to be a procession with the DIY coffin and close friends and family carrying something of mine, something precious, down Holland Road past the tennis club and then College Road to Kensal Green Cemetery with musicians, dancing, laughter, anger, crying. Book at least a double slot at the Crematorium – have readings, more tears, laughter. I’d love the dance films Dance Willesden Junction to be shown and Dance Me To Death (if not then then afterwards), I’d like everyone to dance to James Brown’s Get Up Off Of That Thing and Abba’s Dancing Queen and Prince’s Purple Rain. There will be an invitation to dress flamboyantly. Of course.

Photo Elainea Emmott - Flamboyant Forever AofA Bus Tour

And then, there will be a big dancing party. With a few more opportunities to get up and do a poem/song/song. And lots of photos. Not sure where. Maybe the Tabernacle.

And so I am going to be burnt not buried. I love the idea of Natural Burials and going to the countryside but the reality is my son will be visiting me so it seems best to keep some of me – at least some of the ashes – at Kensal Green Cemetery. By the canal. Places I love and have been to often. I’d like some of the ashes to go to Yorkshire and be scattered near my mum and dad. And then others to go to Wales to be scattered at Borth y Gest. And for my son and family to make the trips into little pilgrimages. If they want to. Of course.

And that’s as far as I’ve got. And I am open to changing my mind too. I mean if a wild woodland burial seems like a good idea . Go with that. I leave it to my son to decide. With a few of my friends. They know the spirit of what I’d like and I trust them to go with that. Knowing me, I’ll probably have a few more ideas before I go…

Photo - Mish Moon - Dance Me To Death Performance