Usually available within a day
If you are reading this in the first few days, I'm sorry. There is no rush from my end and there is nothing you need to prepare before we speak.
I write and lead funerals, memorials and ash scatterings across Sussex, at crematoriums, woodland burial grounds, village halls and gardens. The service is built around the person who died: what they were like, what they were impossible about, and what the people in the room need to hear.
We sit down and you talk
I come to you, usually for a couple of hours, with a notebook. Bring whoever wants to be there. There is no form to fill in and no order of service to choose from. People worry they will not know what to say, and then they talk for two hours, and that is the service.
You read it before anyone hears it
A full written service comes back to you, usually within two days, and I change whatever needs changing. Names, pronunciations, the bits that are not quite right. If someone in the family wants to read and then cannot manage it on the day, I will take it from them and read it myself. That happens often and it is never a problem.
Or a celebration of life, later
More families now have a direct cremation and hold the service weeks or months later, somewhere they would actually choose to be. A pub, a garden, a sailing club, a hall with a tea urn. It costs less, everyone can get there, and nobody is watching a clock on the wall.
Most families reach me through their funeral director, and that is the easiest route. Ringing me directly is just as welcome. 07700 900236.
Evenings and weekends included. I keep time free for this and I do not take a wedding and a funeral on the same day.
Sent to you to read, changed as many times as you need, and printed for the day.
Billed through your funeral director in most cases, so it appears on their account rather than arriving separately.
Readings, music, a grandchild saying one sentence, a minute of nothing at all. I will brief everyone and stand close by.
A printed copy afterwards, and a second one for anyone who could not be there.
Usually within a day of your call, including evenings and weekends.
No. As an independent celebrant I can include a hymn, the Lord's Prayer, a psalm, a blessing, or nothing at all. Families are often part religious and part not, and a service can hold both without anybody feeling awkward.
Not at all, and it is the normal starting point. You do not need a plan before we meet. We talk about the person, and the shape of the service comes out of that.
Yes. Woodland burial grounds, village halls, gardens, function rooms, a beach, a cricket pavilion. I have done all of those. Your funeral director will tell you what is practical for the coffin; everything else is open.
£295 for a funeral or memorial anywhere in Sussex, including the visit, the writing, the rewrites and leading the service. It usually goes on your funeral director's invoice.
Yes, and these are often the services people find most comforting, because the first few weeks are over and there is room to think. £295 for those too.
There is nothing to prepare and no decision to make first. If I am not free the moment you ring, leave a message and I will come back to you the same day.