I realize the high school curriculum is already overloaded, and teachers are overworked. But why don’t they teach us to plan a funeral while we are in high school? Sooner or later, we all need to know how to do it.

My 87 year-old mother passed away last week after months of suffering. She had been under hospice care for some time and her death was not unanticipated. Nevertheless, I was at a loss when it came to the details, even though she had a pre-planned funeral.

I am an only child and my mother had handled my father’s funeral. At least with mom’s funeral, she had already chosen her casket, written her obituary, and selected what songs she wanted played during the service.

Along the way, I discovered a pre-planned funeral does solve many issues. I also learned nursing homes often require residents have a pre-planned funeral before they can be admitted.

What I did not know – and what should be part of our high school education – is all the devilish details. Like who do you tip and how much? Who buys the guestbook for the visitation? Who contacts the newspaper and arranges for the obituary to be printed?

It just added to the stress of all this was trying to make arrangements from 100 miles away. I kept realizing how much I did not know about funeral arrangements.

I found this really practical website with information about how much to tip called What2Tip. The funeral director asked for a recent photo of my mother, so I scanned one and emailed it. In the meantime, they emailed me her obituary which I proofread, corrected, and returned via email. The funeral director submitted the obituary and the photo to two newspapers for me.

I thought things were going too smoothly.

Two local newspaper published the obituary. The obituary also appeared in the online version of one paper without the photo. That would cost another $2.95. Both newspapers spelled my mother’s name wrong in the heading, but they did get it right in the body of the obituary.

Sunday morning, the funeral director called to ask where her gravesite was. The gravedigger had called to say he couldn’t find it – but he had started to dig anyway! Thank goodness for hamlets. Someone knew what church someone from city hall attended and got them out of the service to identify the right gravesite. It turned out, the gravedigger was at the wrong place.

My mother’s pastor was out of town. The pastor who did the service pronounced her name wrong.

On the plus side, my cousin told me he would drive the pall-bearers in his car. At first, I didn’t understand why he cared. Then he told me the funeral home would charge more for the extra limousine. The whole idea of the pre-planned funeral is you pay for it ahead of time and eliminate burial insurance. So there was no money left for extras.

The reason that was important is mom was in a nursing home. If there had been any money left, it would have gone to the nursing home long before we needed the limousine. As it was, there had barely been enough money to pay for her health insurance and medications prior to her death. She didn’t even have money left for a gravestone.

My feet still hurt from standing at the visitation for three hours. It still doesn’t seem like mom is even gone.

But, all in all, things turned out relatively well. Lots of family attended and were incredibly supportive. It certainly made me contemplate my pre-planning my own funeral.

Trying to pull it off when you are in shock from your parent’s death just is not a good idea. Why didn’t anyone teach me how to do all this? Add it to the curriculum!