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Monday, October 1, 2012

Celebrations and Ceremonies

Today is my mother-in-law's funeral. It's also my brother's birthday. Both have me thinking about milestones and the way we mark them.

The older I get, the more complicated my feelings about birthdays. Remember being a kid? Your birthday was almost as big as Christmas. My parents weren't big on parties or presents, but I usually got a cake. My birthday was supposed to be my special day. Most of them were a big disappointment. We were either at a family reunion where I had to share my cake and candles with several aunts, cousins, and other relatives or something else obnoxious happened. I had my tonsils out right before my twelfth birthday. By the time I could eat cake, it was long gone. These days, each birthday is a reminder that I'm not getting younger.

Funerals are a tricky subject. For my husband's mother, it will be a celebration of a life well lived and a woman well loved. Because of my faith and my religion, death isn't a final ending. It's only another step in our journey of existence. But the funeral isn't for the deceased, it's for the family and the friends. It's a way to find closure. It's a necessary step in grieving.

Another common milestone in life is marriage. Many societies also have a coming of age ceremony to celebrate the passage of a person from childhood to adulthood. Without these milestones, we may become lost, anchorless. These help provide the framework for a social structure, the basis for many traditions.

What are some of your favorite traditions or celebrations? Have you created a set for your fiction stories? Are there traditions in fiction books that bother you? What and why?

4 comments:

  1. My condolences to you and your family. Those rites of passage do make you think. Don't they?

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  2. They are also emotionally draining. My kids are having a rough time and since most of them are autistic, it makes dealing with it trickier.

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  3. And now you know why I had a wedding reception. It was for my siblings, not me. Although I was happy with the way it turned out.

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  4. I've always considered the hoopla part of the wedding (the reception or ring ceremony or what not) to be mostly for the parents. It is even something of grieving, for the child that is all grown up, as well as celebration.

    As to others, I'd think maybe the first time behind the wheel of the car.

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