h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I intend to post at least one posting to this journal every day during the month of November. Rather than starting a new conversation each day, I'll keep it all in this one conversation so as not to flood my friends' spaces with junk.

Day 1 - 1st of November

I'm going to start by talking about death.

Today I sang at a Humanist funeral. I'd never been at one before. The person whose funeral it was was a stranger to me, but a prominent man - a research scientist and professor of neurology in a Dublin university. He apparently was the first to show that when the brain stores a memory, the nerves actually grow and make new connections (this is not the way that computers store memories: the circuits are all laid down already and it is electric charge, current of magnetism that is stored in the circuit). He was also an accomplished sculptor, making many bronze statues.

Humanists are agnostic - they either don't believe in a God or if there is a God, he is not important. They think that our value is what we do while we are here on this Earth, and they don't say that we are going on to any sort of afterlife. So this was the first funeral I was ever at where nobody said that the deceased had gone on to a better place or that he had suffered but was now at peace. No consolation was offered his grieving family that he was now getting his reward, no thanks were offered to any supernatural being for having put him into this world or given him the talents he obviously had. Instead, we listened to poems that made us think, we heard tributes to the man, to the work he did and how he passed on his knowledge. It is through his effect on the rest of mankind that his spirit lives on.

All of this is very much in tune with my own thinking on life and death, but it was the first time I had encountered it at a funeral.

A member of my small choir was a friend of the man, so we were asked to sing a song at the funeral - we sang Autumn Leaves, which is a sad song about someone who has departed, but has consolation to be drawn from the memories.

Tomorrow I'm going walking in the mountains if the weather permits, so tomorrow's posting should be about walking.
At the end of most funerals in the Crematorium, the music of Dvorak is played while the curtains slowly close in front of the coffin. The song to this music is 'Going Home', but humanists don't believe death is a return home. Something more appropriate was used - Waterloo Sunset by the Kinks.

[Amy P]

That sounds like the kind of funeral I'd like to go to whether I walk in or am carried in.

Me too, BG.

Over here, a lot of people who are not religious still choose a religious funeral because there aren't many other options if you want a ceremony.

Waterloo Sunset is a fascinating choice for a funeral. I heard once that Ray Davies wrote it during a spell when he was bed-ridden at St Thomas's Hospital, London, and was inspired by the view of the dirty old river from the window.

Although I'm a great fan of the Kinks, I think I've heard that one too many times and in too many situations now for it to inspire me to think or remember.

Did you actually sing the lines "But I miss you most of all, my darling.."? Or were the lyrics adapted for the event?

We didn't change the words at all. The son of deceased was in tears at that point.

that's a great description of a humanist funeral, Gnomon. We held one for my father when he died, his friends performed a comic musical number, they also held a "pop quiz" about him, which was a rather good way of working the things that he had done in his life into a celebration of it - of telling people who didn't know about them what he had been about.

I'm definitely having a humanist funeral and I'm going to plan it for myself.

My Dad's Friend had something quite similar, instead of a vicar, he had this lovely man talk about his life and how everyone should celebrate the joys which he brought instead of focusing on the sorrow of the day, it was lovely

Waterloo Sunset sounds like an excellent choice. Had the person chosen it himself? Or do people conducting these services have a list of suggestions for the family?

Reddit

I've attended several humanist funerals now and I think they were all more focused on the person's life and achievements than the religious funerals I've attended.

My husband's funeral was performed by a humanist and it was lovely because it was all, 100%, about him. We had tears, laughter, and singing along to Lesley Garrett's Jerusalem - although I'm not sure why that was allowed as it's technically a hymn.

Deb

Well, it's a William Blake poem which people have interpreted in many different ways. It could as easily be a humanist anthem as a hymn.

Oh, interesting. That would explain it.

Deb

Sunday 2nd of November

Today I went walking in the mountains. It was a glorious day, as predicted by the weather forecasters. Mrs G and two friends, E and H, have been going out walking over the last six or months or so, and have clocked up more than 100km of pleasant walks, mainly on Summer evenings, but also at weekends.

Today I joined them for the first of the Winter Walks. We walked along a marked route from Glencullen to Tibradden Car Park in the Dublin Mountains. We started with a little car shuffling, resulting in a car left at each end of the walk. Then we set out. The first kilometre is along a road, but then the path goes into a forest and the rest of it is either in forest or on open hillside.

We picked up a young German, Philip, who was trying to find a route to the top of the mountain. He joined up on the marked route. The first thing to see was an old tomb- this was built in 2000 BC by the Bronze Age people. It is known as a wedge tomb: there's a square stone enclosure at one end, about a metre square, then a passage about 5 metres long with walls on either side. In some wedge tombs this passage widens giving the tomb the wedge shape, hence the name. The whole used to be covered by a low mound about 1.5m high, but this is long gone. In ancient times the view would have been great from here with rolling countriside, hazel and oak forests lower down and the sea in the distance. Now the tomb is surrounded by dense conifers and there's no view.

At the top of the first mountain, Three Rock Mountain, there are three enormous rocks which you can climb on, and a fabulous view over the whole of Dublin, which is about 450m below. Unfortunately, there are also many mobile phone transmission towers - the mountain top is littered with them. But without these we couldn't continuously talk, text and browse. So we need them, eyesores though they are.

We said goodbye to our German friend at this point. He needed to head back down the mountain, while we going higher. The path leads from Three Rock up to the higher Two Rock Mountain. At the top of Two Rock Mountain is a giant cairn built by prehistoric people, with a smaller cairn built by modern hill walkers on top of it. The big cairn is actually a tomb as well, but it has never been excavated. It is known as the Fairy Castle, although it doesn't look like a castle. We were now 537m above sea level, and it was really windy - despite the sun, the air was cold and we all needed to put on extra layers to keep the wind out. We were now about half way along our 10k walk.

The second half was less eventful - the route came down to Tibradden Mountain which is a long ridge - we walked the length of this before descending into the forest. Almost at the end of the walk we came to Zipit, a zip line adventure in the trees. We watched people climbing across nets, wobbly rope ladders and zip lines between the trees, all high up in the air. It was all perfectly safe as they wore elaborate safety harnesses.

Back at the car, we drove to a nearby pub in Glencullen hoping for food but the place was packed and there was a wait of an hour. So we drove back towards home and found a lovely meal in Stepaside. According to my phone I'd used up 837 calories in the walk, so I felt justified in tucking in to a lovely pasta with mushrooms and bacon, and a pint of beer.

Altogether a good day. Facebook friends will already have seen some of the photos.

Sounds lovely. It was indeed a glorious day - I enjoyed a walk on Cannock Chase.

Deb

[Amy P]