Death is something we all think about. Unfortunately, unless we are getting old it tends to only be when we are depressed and not thinking rationally. Instead we are imagining how great it would be to have all our worries taken away, and how nobody would notice or care if we were dead anyway. Ridiculous of course, at the very least whoever got to clean up our bloodied corpse would care. Not necessarily what you want to hear when dreaming of warm, comforting oblivion though. Like anyone I've toyed with the idea at times. I've walked the line where all I had to do was take a step forward and it would all be over. Fortunately for me either the call to life, or cowardice, or making my Mum cry holds me back.

The question that gets me though is, after I die what remains? I don't mean in a meta-physical sense, I have no intention of getting into religious or spiritual debates. What is left of us in this world besides a rapidly cooling corpse? If you've had children then they hopefully remain but that is not a near-future prospect for me, so we'll discount them. Beyond that is your legacy. What you did and more relevantly how people remember it.

There is a seemingly a tradition in funerals to recount only positive aspects of a person. Turning them into something they weren't. If you look at a life, it is our mistakes and failures that tend to shape us more than our successes. People in an effort to assuage their grief, and perhaps placate angry ghosts, have a tendency focus on the purely positive.

Orson Scott Card suggested an interesting approach to getting around this rewriting of history. In his novel ´Enders Game´ he proposes the profession of ´Speaker for the Dead´. The basis of this profession was that they would tell the story of a dead person from that persons perspective. They would explain the persons desires and goals, their successes and failures. The belief behind this was that nobody sees themselves as evil. When you truly understand a person, at that point, you can't help but love them.

Can you describe me without including my extremes both good and bad? I can't. Every person is after all, a creature of more than two dimensions. It seems a touch unlikely that anyone could lead a life of complete perfection.

My desire to have the truth told and secrets revealed, is not one that will necessarily be shared by a lot of people. In my opinion there are probably few people who would want an honest telling of their life, whether they are dead or not. It could be comforting to know that when you're dead people will say good things about you (in public at least). It could be argued that there is something intrinsically wrong with wanting people to know about sins long past and buried. I can see this point and respect people who believe it's choice not to attend my speaking.

I went to the funeral of my grandfather and a priest who had some vague connection to him spoke. I don't remember what he said but, what I remember though is that this man knew significantly less about my grandfather than I did. It annoyed and upset me at the time and these days I find it offensive. How dare he stand up and talking about this man who, through the respect and admiration he inspired in my Mum, from a very early age influenced me in absentia. This man knew only good tings that people had told him, nothing concrete, nothing important.
How dare he.

In the end, I actually like myself. If you know me then you are aware that I have faults. The ones that I recognise, I try to remedy. Interestingly though some of my faults are simply my good points overdone. The concept of someone stripping these characteristics away is disturbing. I'd end up being someone else. If at all possible I want to avoid that.

My mind, however, turns to practical matters. If not a stranger who may not have the time, access to information nor perhaps empathy to understand you. The speaker needs to have known you or have good access to people that did. Preferably a person that has known you and your life well enough to ask the right people appropriate questions. Someone who can abstract themself from both good and bad feelings to find out how you saw yourself, what you did and why, then report it. A person that can tell the difference between gossip and important information. Someone who cares enough to follow through with the queries. Someone who above all can be trusted to be thorough and truthful. Fortunately for me this most difficult part is a simple choice, my sister.

Then there is the matter of delivery. Most people spend most of their lives in one area and so a funeral is an appropriate time to deliver this true eulogy. It probably isn't the best place though. I don't think that a lot of people would necessarily appreciate a funeral being extended from the normalish half hour of a Christian society to the length such a speech might take. Especially whoever is paying for the funeral as they are generally held in hired premises. I would therefore suggest that the wake is held at a location chosen by the person who is to speak, perhaps in accordance with your wishes. Personally I can see mine held in a set of botanical gardens in the city where I grew up. Under the trees that annually host a picnic for teddy bears.

The speech would then be delivered to whoever chose to attend. No food, drinks or other enticements should be provided. There is no reason to encourage people to come, if they want to they will. Nobody should be turned away either. It should be a group of people who probably knew you listening to your story.

Everyone has people in their life that may not be able to attend such a gathering. Effort should be put into accommodating these people. Depending on a persons lifestyle the number of people in this category may very well be significant.

A couple of options spring to mind. An audio/visual record of the event might work. In the case of a public figure this would probably be the preferred medium. I would argue that sales and popular appeal aside this is actually an extremely counter-productive method for two reasons:
1. It shows the crow reactions.
2. Focus is placed on the speaker.
Both of these things remove attention from the only part of this whole procedure that should really matter, the story.

Further to this, enhancements such as music or visual aids are inappropriate to the event. The speaker should be visible and audible to those attending. No attempts should be made towards glitz or glamour. There shouldn't be any attempts to pull emotion from the audience, you aren't trying to make them love or hate anything, just to understand. They should draw their own conclusions. Jokes and other attempts at levity are not appropriate. This is not about speaking ability or any kind of entertainment it is about a person being remembered for who they were.

It seems to me that the only way to really cover the story without distraction is to write it down. This has the added benefit of allowing the story to be presented in a more detailed and better referenced format than would be possible in the initial speech. Depending on how long/involved the persons story was it would be possible to write anything up to a small book in size. It is still important to keep in mind the goal even when having the luxury of producing so much information. This is the persons story and is there purely to promote understanding of who they were and why they acted as they did. Detailed information that is not relevant to this should simply be left out. It is necessary to keep in mind that this is not a biography it is an aid to understanding. The history is there because it is an integral part of the persons story but why is more important than what.

Sensationalism in all its forms should be avoided. It is not enough to avoid spicing up the delivery. Content is also important, in fact for this exercise it is vital. In the pursuit of your story it is likely that the speaker will discover secrets about you. The speaker has an obligation to decide if this has a direct bearing on your life. To give a really simplistic example. The speaker may discover that you kept a dirty magazine under your bed. This by itself might be of interest to various parties but does not affect why you lived a certain way. If however it turns out you couldn't let people get close because you were scared they'd find out, then it becoms relevant and should be included.

How do you get all this information about a person? In some cases it is easy. Some people talk about what they think a lot, others confide in certain people, still others keep diaries. What if it is not that simple? It might take time to find out enough information to speak the death. then perhaps the speaking will happen later, a year on or however long it takes after the death. There will be no funeral to draw people from afar, just the story. In the end those to whom it is important will either come or puruse the book.