Come out Virginia, don’t let ’em wait
You Catholic girls start much too late
Aw but sooner or later it comes down to faith
Oh I might as well be the one
Well, they showed you a statue, told you to pray
They built you a temple and locked you away
Aw, but they never told you the price that you pay
For things that you might have done
Only the good die young
That’s what I said
Only the good die young
Only the good die young
You might have heard I run with a dangerous crowd
We ain’t too pretty we ain’t too proud
We might be laughing a bit too loud
Aw but that never hurt no one
So come on Virginia show me a sign
Send up a signal and I’ll throw you the line
The stained-glass curtain you’re hiding behind
Never let’s in the sun
Darlin’ only the good die young
Woah
I tell ya
Only the good die young
Only the good die young
You got a nice white dress and a party on your confirmation
You got a brand new soul
Mmm, and a cross of gold
But Virginia they didn’t give you quite enough information
You didn’t count on me
When you were counting on your rosary
(Oh woah woah)
They say there’s a heaven for those who will wait
Some say it’s better but I say it ain’t
I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints
The sinners are much more fun
You know that only the good die young
I tell ya
Only the good die young
Only the good die young
Well your mother told you all that I could give you was a reputation
Aw she never cared for me
But did she ever say a prayer for me? oh woah woah
Come out come out come out Virginia don’t let ’em wait
You Catholic girls start much too late
Oh sooner or later it comes down to faith
Oh I might as well be the one
You know that only the good die young
I’m telling you baby
You know that only the good die young
Only the good die young
Only the good
Only the good die young
I think we must all at some point ponder the philosophy that only the good die young. Well, obviously if that were the case, then something would have to be setting that in motion, which would imply a meddlesome divinity poking its fingers into the business of life and making this happen.
But.
It has raised the question to me of late, if only the good die young, is that a punishment or a reward?
The folks who live to their old age are “blessed” to live more, take in more of life, see more of their younger generations born, if they ever procreated a life in their life, and experience the wonders of life for longer than those who do not.
Those who die young, on the other hand, may have done so traumatically without feeling the long deterioration of their body as they grow into weakness, or know the feeling of their minds beginning to slip. They are less likely to have had to bury a child, and they do not have to watch all of their contemporaries succumb to disease and death, slowly wiping out their generation.
Life is cruel and punishing. We are lucky to have every minute that we enjoy, and I doubt that death is a better option to many of the situations we find ourselves in. Our mortal lives cannot be expanded on, especially after we have gone, and the light in our eyes has been snuffed out once and for all.
So it poses the biting question, is it better to be the good, and to die young, or is it better to live long, take in more of life, but with that, more of suffering and death in those we love?
I think that one of the factors that make this conundrum more problematic is how we view life and death. In the early 1900’s American culture made death less personal than it had been before. You see it in the language we use. We used to identify a room of the house as “the parlor.” That room was the one in which we would lay our dead out for a wake and a final viewing before interment in a cemetery. Then someone got the idea that we needed to stop that, so we started holding this ceremony in a “funeral parlor,” and the parlor in our home became “the living room.” It was made into a space for the living. I think that with this must have come a brighter sense of optimism, as well as a multi-billion dollar industry, and a certain separation between us and the ones we have recently lost. No more sitting up all night with the departed to make sure a cat didn’t feast, or that they did not awake from deep unconsciousness (the kind of burials that lead us to bells on graves, and “the graveyard shift”).
By putting our dead into the funeral home, quite often the responsibilities of preparing the dead for burial are also delivered to the service of the industry, from dressing and making up, to embalming, which is not even necessary to begin with, as the decay of the body is a perfectly natural occurrence. What benefit is gained by trying to pickle a body that is put into the ground to never be dug up again? What benefit apart from the profit of the funeral home, that is? Then there are the seemingly impregnatable coffins, complete with a rubber seal that will be blown out soon after internment by the gasses produced by the decomposing corpse within, much like a soda can shaken hard. An extra fee and a lie will get your loved one this feature. There is also the vault, which is only needed to prevent the ground from collapsing in at the cemetery, which is just to save them the efforts of filling in the indentation on the graves. It is not a cost saver! It is just deferring the cost to you, and making it more expensive than it needs to be, too! How much cheaper is it to put on a little more dirt than to buy a hulking vault that then needs to be positioned in the ground?
I condemn the industry because its lies and fabrications for profit all make death truly impersonal for the living. Then it tries to close the gulf it creates by taking the care for our dead away from us with more and more unnecessary items it can sell to us. When seen for what it really does, it is an appalling industry!
If I see my death coming, I would be happy to build my own coffin from pine, and when I die, I would much prefer to be laid in the parlor of my own home, then taken by a horse drawn wagon down to the cemetery. There, a hole can be waiting, and the coffin lowered into the hole, and the dirt put back in on top of it. I would like a marker so my children know where to find me if and when they want to feel close. May the marker last long enough for three generations or so to find me, to know a little bit about who I was, and that I was real. But beyond that, I will lay there and wait just like the rest of the dead, for the sun to finally expand and absorb the earth into it, then finally explode into a nebula. For all of that, it does not matter the state my corpse is in in the ground. And it is just silly to pretend that the decay of death can or should be stopped or slowed in any way!
If I do not see my death coming, then know that I am happy for the very minimums, spend as little as possible. a Wooden coffin is fine, and natural. Please don’t put me in one of those awful gaudy metal caskets with the ugly color choices and the hideous chrome handles, as those things are not natural! Wood is beautiful, and it suggests that life is temporary by the very idea that it will decay around me in the soil. No vault, no embalming, no make up, for if I am too ugly to bear, just close the lid. If I smell too bad, a can of air spray is cheaper. Let nobody convince you that anything will be better for me in the grave, for I will decay like everything in this world will do eventually. But I am much happier to request that I get to do it as nature has provided, and am recycled into the soil naturally, while still having some of the traditions that make us human.
For the big event, put my coffin in the parlor, let anyone pass who wishes to pay respects, gather my loved one close around and let them say the words they need to, then load me in that wagon, or the back of a truck will do, then slowly drive down to the cemetery, and put me in the northwest corner.
What you do after that is up to the living, not the dead. Although, I quite like the Poe tradition of a bottle of cognac appearing on his headstone each year on his birthday. A rose will do. Be mysterious! It’s fun!
Follow these wishes. Make death personal. Remember that we are all old enough to die. Then live life fully! There is nobody to pray to on my behalf. Don’t let the Mormons baptize anyone in my name. I had enough of them during life.
There is so much wrong with how we live life, and so much wrong with how we process death, that maybe saying that only the good die young is just a part of it all, and it is time we reassess it all.
Kelsey James Bacon
Fairview, Idaho