Death can be unexpectedly devastating or simply age taking it’s natural course.   Whatever your circumstances, I meet with you and your family and together we select the wording, music and the direction you want the service to be conducted.

Here are a few examples of readings for you to read....

Moving On

You can shed tears that she’s gone
Or you can smile because she lived.
You can close your eyes and pray she’ll come back
Or you can open your eyes and see all that she’s left you.

Your heart can be empty because you can’t see her
Or you can be full of the love you have shared.
You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday
Or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.

You can remember her and only that she’s gone
Or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.
You can cry and close your mind
Be empty and turn your back

Or you can do what ……. would want
Smile, open your eyes.  Live and go on.      

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That man is a success who had lived well
Laughed often and loved much;
Who has gained the respect of many and the love of children
Who has filled his niche and accomplished his task;
Who leaves the world better than he found it,
Who has never lacked appreciation of the earth’s beauty
Or failed to express it;
Who looked for the best in others and gave the best he had

This reading is well known.   It reminds us that life must go on, that the passing of the life is a natural function, that it is our duty to move forward, remembering the past, with concern for the future.  It's called

"Solitude":

 
Laugh and the world laughs with you
Weep, and you weep alone
For sad old earth must borrow its mirth
And has trouble enough of its own.
 
Sing, and the hills will answer,
Sigh, it is lost on the air
The echoes bound to a joyful sound
But shrink from voicing care.
 
Rejoice, and men will seek you
Grieve and they turn and go
They want full measure of all your pleasure
But they do not need your woe.
 
Be glad, and your friends are many
Be sad, and you lose them all.
There are none to decline your nectar'd wine
But alone you must drink life's gall.
 
Feast and your halls are crowded
Fast, and the world goes by
Succeed and give and it helps you live
But no man can help you die.
 
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a large and lordly train
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain