I spent a portion of last week in Phoenix. My great-grandma shuffled off this mortal coil a couple of days before my arrival so most of my mini-vacation was re-arranged to accomodate the gaudy burial services that an old-fashioned Midwestern woman like Gramma Lilly stipulates in her will.
For example: A gold-plated casket.
See also: A Coors Light can (not bottle– that shit is for pompous Manhattan socialites) in her casket with her.
All sarcasm aside, she was an amazing woman and I was a bit awestruck to see how many lives she’s affected just by being warm and caring and also by holding a veritable monopoly on plus-size handmade muumuu dresses sold at the Phoenix Park ‘N’ Swap for thirty years. THIRTY YEARS OF MUUMUU-MAKING. That’s a shit ton of sheets sewn together, folks.
I’m not gonna share her whole life story with you but I will say that hearing stories I’ve never heard before– because my family is so goddamned humongous that it’s impossible to know each member in a way that requires more than remembering their name– did inspire me to try and be more like her. I mean I’m already pretty nice.
No, shut up, I really am.
But, I should be better. I mean, why not? I just saw firsthand the trickle-down effect that unending kindness and caring for your fellow man can have in this world and if being generous to the point of constant self-sacrifice gets me a gold-plated casket filled with beer at the end of it all… Then sign me the hell up.
sarcasmically 
Sounds like an interesting service! I’m glad you had such an amazing person in your life, and that you got to see a gold plated casket and Coors. If it isn’t too crude of me to say it (if it is, feel free to dump the comment) that will keep you in jokes for years.
Sorry for your loss, of course – I understand some of it, especially at the moment.
Oh, no, it’s not crude at all. Have you met me? It was a sight to see and there was laughter even through the tears. Not mine though, because I don’t cry.
Unless someone spills a Coors.