Black humour

This puzzled me at the time, upset me somewhat later and now makes me smile. I used to drive to the windy South coast to take my mother shopping and do some chores and often called in at the cemetery to tidy my baby brother’s grave as Mother rarely felt emotionally ready to go near. Weeks after my father died I went to do my usual clean up and weeding. All around the grave and on top of it was pale grey powder, on the neighbouring grave and quite widespread. I got on with it and swept the grave clean and continued to my mother’s house, saying nothing, not to upset her. Some time later my eldest sibling was grumbling that the crematorium hadn’t notified us when they were depositing Father’s ashes on my brother’s grave and had just gone ahead and done it. I realised that in my efforts to leave a tidy grave I had swept poor Father off it. I still don’t know whether to giggle or shed a tear.

A colleague returned to work after attending his aunt's funeral. It was a rainy day and at the graveside many people had umbrellas. He was stunned to see a big green umbrella, emblazoned (in huge letters) with the words: "The Body Shop".......

My aunt had a church funeral, and as she had wanted to be cremated, we all stood around in front of the church to watch the hearse depart after the service. Suddenly the passenger door of the hearse opened and resisted the efforts of my DH and my one niece's DH to close it.

We, my nieces, nephew, sister and self burst into giggles wondering whether auntie had decided to stay, after all.

At my grandfather's funeral my mother burst into giggles, when the hearse drove off so fast that the cortege practically had to break the speed-limit to follow it. My mother's unseemly glee was caused by her recollection of the saying about people who are always late for any occasion that "that one will be late for his own funeral" Grandpa obviously was not intending that to be said of him!

Nothing to do with black humour, but the elderly Pakistani driver, driving my father, husband and sister immediately behind the hearse on the way to the cemetery from the church at my mother's funeral, turned to my father and indicating the hearse, asked, "Your wife, sir?" When Daddy nodded, he said, "I am sorry, sir". I will always remember that very kind remark, so few strangers think of offering sympathy these days. Perhaps not being European made it easier for this man to do so. Certainly, we all appreciated his kindness, but I don't think any of us was able to say so, at the time.

When my Dad died his nephew , who we haven't seen for years came to visit before the funeral , he was dressed in a big black coat and he was going on and on about various other people that had died and details of their illness and other things we really didn't want to hear, he was like something from a black comedy, , and he kept saying the wrong words, it was like one of the old Ealing Studios movies, the final straw was when he stood up and made a big statement saying, he didn't think people who were ill should be allowed to suffer, and that they should legalise Anastasia, (euthanasia ), my daughter choked on her tea and spat it all over the place , and ran out of the door, he said what is wrong with her, I had to pretend she was upset, when he left we were hysterically laughing and crying at the same time, I hid from him next time he came to the door.

At OH's aunts cremation, everyone sang along to a hymn following the verses in the printed pages. Came to the last line, all went silent... except the person at the back of the room playing the electronic organ. He carried on for another whole verse! Even the vicar struggled to keep a straight face. The aunt would of laughed too.

on the way to mum's funeral ... drive of 200 miles in some distress... after about 50 miles decided to stop for a coffee... looked down and had my slippers on... we JUST had enough time to turn round and go home for my shoes... and get to the funeral.... awful day but we smile at it still.....

When we buried my mother’s ashes, the vicar said my sister’s name all the way through the service instead of my mother’s. We didn’t know whether to laugh or cry!

My sister was a vicar and had a beautiful full length black cloak bought for her by her congregation. One day she was performing a scattering of ashes in the churchyard, - you've guessed it.... a gust of wind blew the ashes all over this beautiful cloak. She says she just looked down and realised she was 'wearing' their Mum!!!

At my step-mother's funeral the vicar played the wrong music. With the coffin on it's podium, all of us in serious state of mind, the music started with a massive and very deep sigh. It then continued to a very loud heartbeat. We all collapsed with laughter as it sounded as though the corpse was coming back to life.

My Grandad told a story about his time in the trenches in Passchendale during World War One.

Apparently the Troop he was with were all exhausted, and one bright spark plucked up courage to ask the Sgt. Major if they could have a few minutes rest.

"Rest ???? " he boomed. "What d'you want a bloody rest for, you idle sods ?? You'll be dead in half an hour !"

When my partner died 22 years ago we had a meeting with the vicar. I my haze of grief I proceeded to tell the vicar how Nick had appeared in living room wearing only an McDonald’s elephant mask (you can guess what the trunk was) while I was having a tense phone call with my mother. His sister sat there shaking her head mouthing no. Fortunately the. Vicar has a good sense of humour ?

I had an uncle who was a huge practical joker. As kids we loved his silly sense of humour.

When he died, we all gathered at our aunt's house for his funeral. Just as the hearse arrived, my brother's car alarm went off and proved difficult to silence. After the church service we prepared to follow the hearse to the crematorium but my car door wouldn't shut. Worried about being left behind we hurtled round Southampton with me hanging on to my door for dear life.

Cheers, Unc...

My aunt was a very glamorous lady who was in her 80s when she died, she wore very high heels and was never seen without them. When the hearse arrived and they lifted out the coffin there was her best tarty heels balanced on the top, my sister and I got the giggles.

My father had a church funeral followed by a short cremation service. I had asked that they play Land of my fathers (Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau) at the end, even specifying the singer and the CD it was on. We got some random version which was obviously recorded at a Rugby Match with lots of whooping and cheering. It was a shock, but it made us laugh and we knew our rugby loving Dad would have approved.

When my dad died we left his ashes with the undertaker for two years awaiting my mum's passing so they could be buried together. During mum's funeral as the vicar was giving the closing prayers there was an almighty gust of wind and all the windows rattled. It was beautiful summers day so it was a bit bizarre - my youngest son said that's Granddad saying where the hell have you been?!! Said son had given the eulogy for my dad who he was very close to and made everyone laugh as well as cry - it was the first time I've heard applause at a funeral.

The evening before my husbands funeral the coffin was taken to the church for that night. Male family members attended, I and my daughters were staying with my sister, her husband came into the living room in his dark suit, white shirt, and under the shirt he wore a white tee shirt, it was February, he took the jacket off to check it, he had put the tee shirt on back to front to hide the logo, through the shirt was - Gloom Can Be Overcome , my sister yelled get that off , I found it so funny had the giggles

My sister had a partial mastectomy and when the consultant came round he took the dressings off so she could view the result. He was obviously very proud of his handiwork so was a bit offended when she said "It looks like a Cornish pasty."

MissA and Merlot

My Father in Law died during the 1987 hurricane. The area was so badly hit there was a backlog of funerals as roads had to be cleared of fallen trees. Everything was chaotic!

DFil loved Ronnie Ronalde's 'In a Monastery Garden' so DMiL wanted it played at his funeral.

We're not sure what went wrong. The crematorium staff were under a great deal of pressure with funerals stacking up but somebody put the wrong side of the tape in the machine and DFil was sent off to, 'In a Persian Market!'

I can still remember trying in vain to control myself.

youtu.be/XCrdzcEwwWs

When my daughter had her first chemo, we went along to a hairloss session with volunteers from 'headstrong', where they let you try on wigs, headscarves, and so on.
They put what is like a flesh coloured, tight fitting hat on, so you can get an idea of how you'll look.
They had some hair pieces which were basically just elastic, with hair attached to it, so you could wear it with a hat.
My daughter tried one on and said "Oh my God! I look like the bloke in a wheelchair who says "I want one!" to David Walliams!"