Someone has to stand up and hold a whole person in three minutes, and it's you, and the funeral is Thursday. Here's the secret that makes it possible: a eulogy is not a biography. It's a portrait. You're not summarizing a life - you're letting the room feel, for three minutes, what it was like to be near them.
A shape that works
- Open with one true, specific sentence - not "we are gathered" but "my mother never once let a waiter leave without learning his name"
- One story, told properly. Small beats big: the Tuesday-ness of them outranks the CV. Pick the story you'd tell a stranger to explain them
- One thing they gave you or taught you, said plainly
- Close by speaking to them, not about them, if you can bear it: "Thank you. We had the best of you." Then sit down. Short is strong
Permissions
- Crying at the lectern is allowed and expected. Pause, breathe, carry on - the room is entirely on your side
- Reading it word-for-word from paper is allowed. Nobody improvises this
- Handing it to someone else to read, with you standing beside them, is allowed too. Writing it was the tribute; the voice is optional
- Humor is allowed. If they were funny, the laugh honors them more than solemnity does
Write it in one sitting, badly, then fix it the next day. The first draft's job is only to exist. And keep it afterwards - a eulogy is the first story you save of them, and this journal has room for it.