The Show Must Go On

My roommates and I have a lot of parties. We have a lot of friends and have a lot of acquaintances and we've done a lot of camping and cottaging and partying with a lot of different kinds of people over the years. Some are really good friends, some are passing acquaintances, some are just a lot of fun to have at parties. Today we had to go the funeral of one of these people, and it was hard.

I'm going to try to not get too sentimental about it, as I must admit that I didn't know Dave all that well. I don't think I had too many long, heartfelt conversations with him, but I do remember that every time I saw him come in the door to our parties I was genuinely glad to see him. He was such a funloving, outgoing guy. He was the kind of guy we love to have at our get-togethers, the kind you don't have to babysit and who will actually get himself a beer out of the fridge after you told him to make himself at home. He loved to dance and rock out. And he loved to get dressed up in goofy outfits, too (another plus with us), especially at Halloween.

Anyway, last week English Dave (as we called him) was killed and, as I said, his funeral was very hard to be at. Dave came to Canada a mere five years ago and left his immediately family and most of his friends in England. At his service today there were four rooms filled (one to standing room only) mostly with friends he had made in that short time.

Funerals are always a drag, but this one wasn't too bad. It had a lot of good speakers and funny memories and they played his kind of music (they ended the service with Queen's The Show Must Go On). And they didn't harp too much on the god stuff, which always has the exact opposite of the intended soothing effect on me.

And we found out that Dave was an organ donor. We were told that seven families' lives were changed as a result of that fact. Having just had a friend's mother get a much needed kidney last month from a similar situation, I understood better just what that means. I felt a little better about the apparent senslessness of his death after that.

My donor card has been signed ever since I got my driver's license, and I would encourage anyone else who might be sitting on the fence about it to seriously consider it, too. Of course all of our deaths will be tragic and untimely, but if we can help some poor schlub out there to not have to pee in a bag for the rest of their lives, maybe our deaths will not be (will not have been?) in vain.