The Two Funerals

Military Funerals

As a First Lieutenant in the Marine Corps, I had the honor of conducting military funerals for deceased former Marines.

In these ceremonies, a group of Marines carry a flag draped coffin down the aisle.

Upon reaching the front of the congregation, they place the coffin on a pedestal, remove the flag, and fold it into a triangle.

As the officer in charge, I marched up to the Marine holding the flag, saluted it, and received it. The Marine passing it off saluted the flag once it was in my hands. I did an about-face and marched slowly toward the widow (or next-of-kin).

I took a knee in front of her, and said,

Then, I stood up, and in slow motion, saluted the flag for the final time.

The Two Funerals

I must have done this a dozen times but two funerals in particular stand out in my memory.

The First Funeral

In the first one, the coffin was unusually wide. Where six Marines normally carried a coffin, this one was extra heavy and required eight Marines.

There wasn’t much of a ceremony at all. There were only a handful of people in attendance - maybe five - including the officiant and the estranged wife of the deceased. When it was time to start, she finished off a cigarette (this was outdoors in Florida), stamped it out, and reluctantly took a seat.

The officiant, probably a representative of the funeral home, said a few generic words but there was nothing else. No music, no speeches. The whole thing lasted less than 15 minutes.

When our turn came, the wife was busy on her phone as the Marines struggled up the aisle with the immense coffin. Normally, there isn’t a dry eye in the house at this point. With this group, they looked like they wondered why we were moving so slow.

When it came time to hand the flag to the next-of-kin, she snatched it out of my hands without a word.

Funeral Two

The next weekend, there was another funeral to attend. It was in the same funeral home as the first.

From the moment we pulled up in the parking lot, things were very different. The lot was overflowing.

In the pre-ceremony brief to the next-of-kin, she was attentive and dressed for the occasion. This was in contrast to the wife from the week prior dressed in jeans and a Guns n’ Roses t-shirt while focusing on her cigarette.

When we got out to the ceremony, every chair was occupied and dozens of others stood around the perimeter. Easily forty to fifty times the amount of people as the week before.

In the staging area, friends of the deceased came back to shake our hands and tell us what a great guy their friend was. Most of them had served in the Marines with him and had been in our shoes a few decades before.

The ceremony was long. Family members, friends, and work colleagues stood up one after the other to share a memory. They talked about his sense of humor, his kindness, and his generosity.

When it came time to hand over the flag, I was almost in tears myself seeing how sad everyone was. The widow graciously took the flag and choked out a ‘thank you.’

One? Or Two?

I did not know the two men whose funerals I attended.

I know they were both Marines.

I know they both served honorably in the Vietnam War-era.

Beyond that, I can only speculate about the types of lives they must have lived once they left the Marine Corps.

I do not write this to pass judgment on either of them.

I write this so you can ponder, as I have over the years, will your funeral be like the first? Or the second?