We will remember them

Charlotte Metcalf is looking forward to Celebration Day in May – a new way of honouring loved ones who are no longer with us

We do death superbly in Britain. Nothing demonstrates that more than our state occasions. The Queen’s funeral showed that military precision and attention to the tiniest detail were no enemies of grand emotion, giving us a reassuringly reliable public framework for our collective grief.

On Remembrance Day, our connection to the veterans who fought so hard for our fragile democracy is resoldered by this well-rehearsed, structured display, soothingly devoid of surprise or change.

Even a small funeral in a country church, with its ritual of pleasingly familiar hymns and eulogies, conducted by a respectful vicar, reminds us all who we are and where we have come from. Our long line of traditions was forged by ancestors who make us who we are.

Funerals and memorials ultimately uplift us. Show me an oldie who hasn’t declared that a funeral can be just as enjoyable as a wedding.

In spring last year, a few friends gathered to wonder why it was that while military veterans are venerated and remembered annually, ordinary people are not.

Once we’ve dispatched our loved ones to the ground or the flames, we tend to set about ‘moving on’ in our ever-sopractical, British way.

Grief often frightens us because of its ability to ambush and disable us. Brits are not good at howling at the moon. We do what we believe to be sensible, and push grief away.

One of those founding friends was the grief therapist, author and podcaster Julia Samuel. She has long counselled her grieving patients that embracing the connection with someone we’ve lost rather than severing it is to emerge stronger. We will know more about who we are if we’re plugged in to where – and whom – we came from.

We are moulded by people we love.

Keeping their memories fresh and close, while sometimes being painful, gives our identities ballast.

So, last year, the friends launched an annual Celebration Day. On the day, we step away from our frantic, digitally demanding lives and rejoice in someone we have loved or admired.

The idea quickly caught on. The actor Richard E Grant said he was planting armfuls of his beloved wife Joan’s favourite lupins. Celebrity chef Prue Leith celebrated her younger brother, Jamie, by re-reading his hilarious book, Ironing John, about being a house husband.

Handbag entrepreneur and ecoactivist Anya Hindmarch said she was buying herself a large pair of sturdy underpants in memory of her aunt. Catherine Mayer, co-founder and President of the Women’s Equality Party, honoured her husband Andy by dancing under his picture in the kitchen.

Julia Samuel herself ate a large piece of chocolate cake to remember her friend Anthony Gordon Lennox, an image consultant who died in 2017, aged 48.

Celebration Day appeals to everyone, regardless of age, religion or background.

One woman cooked risotto in memory of her father. One man ate a Scotch egg and let off fireworks in memory of his son.

A school competition was launched via The Day magazine, and hundreds of children of all ages submitted written accounts of talking to the oldest people in their family about someone they’d loved and lost.

Moving and eloquent winning entries were read out by actors Harriet Walter, Gemma Arterton and Lennie James. The day showed how much the children had enjoyed learning more about their identities by delving into their pasts.

As someone whose parents both died relatively young, I often regret not having done more to find out about my grandparents.

In 2023, Celebration Day will be on Sunday 28th May. Another schools competition is underway, and there are plans for a painting competition and a celebratory run. The Home Choir, which began in lockdown singing on Zoom as the Self-Isolation Choir, led by the irrepressible enthusiast Ben England, is composing a joyous anthem and organising choirs all over the country to gather and sing it.

Perhaps we should all plant a tree or involve the parks. Ideas are plentiful as the concept gains momentum.

What united everyone who celebrated last year was a sense of joy. Focusing beyond pain to the reasons we most miss and love someone is exhilarating. We shouldn’t have to wait for a big state occasion to marshal ourselves into rediscovering our happy memories. This is a way of keeping a door open after the closure of a funeral.

Celebration Day can keep us from feeling bereft and isolated. The beauty of it is that it’s not prescriptive, allowing us to create our own rituals and traditions to pass on to those we’ll leave behind.

We are the sum of our parts. As a society, we would be more resilient and happier if we spent one day a year rejoicing in those long – or recently –gone figures who have shaped us.