The Best Funeral Ever; With a Dwarf

    This was perhaps the most unique and strange funeral I have and probably ever will see.  It started when I was sent to the coroners to collect the body.  We arrived to find our paperwork was incorrect.  Long story short we had to wait about half an hour to get the correct papers faxed over to the coroners.  Once that was settled we headed in to collect the body itself.  Once inside I see the ID tag sitting neatly on top of the body bag.  Now this was a bad sign indeed.  To explain, the ID tag is a wrist tag with the deceased's name so one can never confused the bodies.  And it is always tied to the wrist.  So for it to be outside of the body bag meant the body was in a bad condition.  Not a bad condition as in injured but as in 'ripe'.  Rotted in other words.  The coroners see a lot of this sort of thing regularly, so for them to be hesitant about touching the body is a really bad sign.

    I opened the bag and yes, the poor body was quite ripe but not unbearable really.  Definitely not suitable for viewing (as the family had asked) but not too bad to the experienced funeral director.  The deceased would not even to be poly bagged (a special vacuums sealed body bag to keep fluids, smells, etc in).   Back at our mortuary we find that he is covered in urin.  And the deceased would need to be dressed.  Just wonderful. However this did not really matter as I would not be involved in dressing the body.  Which I was honestly most grateful for.

    Now for the funeral itself.  There would be just three of us on a direct to the crematorium.  Upon arriving at the crematorium we find that our contact family member was a dwarf.  Not just a dwarf but also a strange person.  Just a little odd, the way they moved, talked, interacted.  We took the coffin into the crematorium before the service was due to start.  The dwarf and celebrant then followed the coffin in and locked us out so they could perform a private service.  We naturally went around to the office where, little did the family know, there are monitors watching everything that goes on in the crematorium.  What we saw was really strange, leaving the funeral staff and the crematorium staff glued to the screen.  The dwarf and celebrant changed into long flowing white robes, which honestly looked more like thin sheets than clothes.  They then performed some ritual, which involved dancing, before turning the coffin on the catafalque three times and finally dancing again.  They finished with some briefe words and then opened the doors for the rest of the family and us.

    By now the conductor was fascinated.  The conductor and I inside and sat up the back by the sound system.  There were not many family and friends, perhaps 15 people at the most.  They were all nice people and most gave eulogies, some of the better eulogies I have heard.  The service itself started with a prayer from the celebrant.  Neither the conductor or I could pick the religion.  It was Christian with Anglican and Catholic imagery as well as something Germanic and some Druidic/Celtic themes.  The celebrant then asked what the family and friends liked to call the deceased, their nick-name in other words.  The celebrant then went on to ask "so what was the deceased last name" obviously having no idea who the descend was or what they were called.  One younger guy was giving his eulogy halfway through the pack.  He said how he had watched the deceased becoming less mobile and in more pain.  Life was becoming very difficult and uncomfortable for the deceased in the final days.  The speaker then went on to say how he was glad he had helped the deceased "on the final journey".  Both the conductor and I looked at each other, unsure what to make of this.  Had the guy helped the deceased to die?  Had the guy helped the deceased while they died?  It was quite surprising and yet none of the family, friends, or even celebrant batted and eye.  On went the service, unhindered by the ambiguous statement.  The last speaker was the dwarf, who gave their eulogy ty interpretative dance.  I will never again see a dwarf give a eulogy at a funeral solely through interpretative dance while wearing a white sheet.  And it was actually quite a good eulogy, better than many others I have seen.  It surprisingly conveyed their happy relationship and sadness at the death.  This will probably be by far the best eulogy I will ever see.  Not only was it different, a dance rather than speech, but it was very descriptive and well done.

    Later we discovered that the dwarf was the sole inheritor of the deceased's estate.  Not a massive inheritance, but a decent amount all the same.  So obviously the guy who had 'helped the deceased on their final journey' had nothing to gain financially.

    I will say that I am not alway the most politically correct.  But I do not mean any harm or disrespect by this, or any other post.

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