A memorial service, without the body

Why separating the two parts works

In the week after a death a family is registering the death, finding documents, answering the telephone every twenty minutes and making decisions it has never made before. Holding the gathering in the middle of that week is possible — most families do it — but a great many of them afterwards describe the day itself as something they were present at rather than something they remember.

A memorial takes the remembering out of that week. The practical part happens on its own timetable, driven by the certificate, the permit and the cemetery or crematory diary. The gathering happens when the people who matter can be in the room and the family can hear it. Nothing is lost by separating them and nothing about it is second best.

When: a fortnight, a month, the spring

There is no rule and there is no deadline. A fortnight later is common. A month is very common. Waiting for better weather, for a school holiday, for a birthday or for the anniversary is all ordinary, and a memorial held a year later is not a late funeral — it is a different thing that families find easier to bear.

This is the one arrangement with no clock on it at all. There is no permit waiting on it, no cemetery diary and no crematory queue. The only calendar that matters is the one belonging to the people you want in the room.

The ashes, present or not

Either is normal. Some families put the urn on a table at the front, some put a photograph there instead, and some have nothing at the front at all. If the ashes are going to be present, do not fix the date until they are actually back — a crematory's return can slip by a few days and a memorial built around them then has to move.

If the memorial ends with burying or placing the ashes, that is a cemetery booking with its own diary and its own charges, and it should be made before the invitations go out rather than after.

The relatives who have to travel

A funeral gives a cousin in another country about four days' notice. A memorial gives them four weeks. That is the difference between somebody buying a fare at whatever it costs, or not coming at all, and somebody arranging leave from work and arriving without having spent a month's money to do it.

Say the date out loud early, even while it is still provisional, and say it in the notice. Anybody applying for a visa needs longer than that, and needs something in writing with a date on it. If somebody is in that position, tell us at the start.

The version we hear about afterwards

The arrangement described to us most often as the one a family would choose again is a direct cremation followed by a memorial some weeks later. It gets said twice: once about what it cost, and once about the timing. The timing is the part they mean.

We say that because it is what we hear and not because it is better for us. It is not. It is the least we are ever asked to do.