The reactions to my last blogs about death made ​​me aware that I apparently broke a taboo. So let's go to break it even more.

When you reach an advanced age and when the approach of death no longer scare you (yes, I'm afraid of dying, afraid of suffering during the final moments, but death itself does not afraid me). Either there is nothing after the it, and nobody cares because it's the absolute end, or the life of the spirit continues (if you prefer to use other words for it, it's up to you) .

If I listen to "specialists" such as Carl Gustav Jung in his latest memoir ("Memories, Dreams, Reflections",New york 1965), I have some reasons to believe that there is an afterlife, as dangerous and tumultuous as life itself, but also with the same joys and the same satisfactions.

In my situation and my age, soon (maybe a few years !) near the end of a tempestuous life, I'm confident in the future, and if you want to know more about me, read my former blogs.

My purpose is not here to talk about death as such, but about death as a "social fact".

The ceremonies which accompany and follow the death are always characterized by a sequence that struck me: the sadness always alternates with other feelings: pride, satisfaction and even pleasure. It is as if we needed to "wash off the grief" and get back to a "normal" life, with alternating laughters and tears.

I experimented this sort of feeling very soon and very often

Just an example :

It was during the winter of 1943 (in the middle of WWII), we had strict restrictions imposed on heating and we endured all the cold in our homes. I attended as a young boy (I was 13) to the cremation of the father of one of my friends. It was very cold in the crematorium. When the door of the furnace opened, someone in the audience said, "what chance he has, he at least will be warm". Unfortunately the person who spoke was deaf and she said these words out loud without realizing it. Everyone heard and everyone laughed. What a joyous ceremony!

Another example :

It was summer 1955, during one of my periods of military service. I was on call with my platoon and we had been called as a guard of honor for the funeral of a fighter pilot fallen during a reconnaissance flight. When the coffin is lowered into the grave, the honor guard fires a salute, guns raised to the sky in tribute to the dead. It's a very emotional moment. At first, the music band plays the funeral march and in the end, they leave at the sound of a rousing military march, followed by the detachment of honor.

Like all participants, I was very moved. We then gathered in a banquet in honor of the Air Force.Like all others,we toasted many times to the health of our friends pilots died for our country. At the end of the meal, we were all imbibed under the tables, all grief forgotten. What a great banquet !

And another one :

One of my co-workers comes from a mountainous region, inhabited by farmers and shepherds who have a hard life but who love to eat and to empty good bottles with friends. Funerals are often a pretext for meals that last until the first hours of the next morning.

I dont remember the exact day, but what I remember very well was the crowd of old people, friends or parents of the dead and particularly the large dining room, filled with this huge crowd of people I didnt know. A few hours later, I didn't even remember the name of the dead which we celebrated the funeral, but I had a lot of new friends and above all the memory of a wonderful meal, with all the jokes I heard about the dead and his friends.What a deep friendship !

Life is funny, isnt'it ?