Do you still have that dress? You know the one I mean. Elegant, satiny, a little bit revealing. I was always asking you about it — even though you hardly ever wore the thing. Tell me it’s still in your closet.
Well, you can’t really tell me, of course — because I’m asking you here to wear it to my funeral. So I’m just going to assume you still have that dress. And that it still fits the way I remember.
I probably died in some unfortunate but mostly blameless way. Accident, heart attack, honest misunderstanding with a debt collector. I’m not the kind of person who would hang on indefinitely. I was never what you would call persistent.
And I’m sure I passed fairly young, too. Although I’ll bet most folks didn’t expect me to hang on much longer anyway. I didn’t really have the skills you need to live a long life. Pretty much everyone understood that about me eventually. Of course you knew it right away.
But be prepared: A hell of a lot of people are probably going to turn up at my graveside. I knew a bunch of ridiculously kindhearted souls. For some reason they decided to invest a little bit of trust in me, now and then. And they never seemed to notice it when I let them down. They were so different from you in that way.
As for music — nah, there shouldn’t be any music at this thing. Of course some country cousin of mine will want to sing “Amazing Grace”; and some goth hipster with an out-of-tune acoustic will probably offer to play some emo dirge. But I gave clear instructions to keep that from happening. If anyone looks like trying to pull that stunt anyway, just tackle them and stuff their mouths. You have my permission for that.
But with my last wish I must insist: Please, please wear that dress. I know red isn’t a color that people often wear to funerals. But I want you to stand out. Which you always do. There isn’t a background in the world where you ever blended in.
I’m just trying to guide folks’ last recollections of me. I don’t want them focusing on the other memories from this day: my stoic family, various hesitant speeches, the smell of turned earth and purchased flowers. Instead I want these folks to remember the very best thing about me. And it’s a known fact that all the best things I ever did…were decisions made by you. Including the times when you wore that dress.
So don’t be afraid to expose some cleavage. Show some leg. Wrap your hips as tightly as you can. Startle everyone who bothers to look. Shock them. Make me seem like the luckiest guy who ever lived. I realize I asked you for a lot of things in this life — but I promise that this, now, will be my last request ever. And this is one promise you know I won’t break.
Image credit: Public domain image via Pixabay.
