Our Answers To Big Questions

[ravfem]

Originally Posted by The_Lady_Snow

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Do you know why we eat after funerals?

it's funny, i was just talking about the rituals surrounding death & funerals recently.... when i was young, the body was brought to the house (and in the case of my uncle, a soldier who died in Vietnam, a soldier came with the body and stayed there at the house, beside the casket the entire time).

Everyone, whether they knew the family or not, brought food. So much that a lot of it was thrown out eventually.

i think that some of it is that, at least in the culture i grew up in, you offer food at any & all occasions, happy or sad, as a way to socialize, show respect, love & either sympathy or congratulations. i remember more than one occasion when a family member would say something like, "i have to fix something to take with me before i can go over there", and also, "did you see that so&so didn't even bring a store bought cake?!" It just wasn't done, especially store-bought stuff!

my granny fed us til we couldn't eat another thing & then kept trying to push food on us... it was her only way of showing love.