Congratulations on your marriage! I don’t find your way of thinking morbid at all: an important event in life naturally makes us look to the future.

Your question combines two different questions: what happens to your body after you die and what your surviving loved ones will do to remember you. Because they will remember you, you understand that, right? Funerals and memorial services may not be meaningful to you, but they are to the vast majority of people, including, most likely, the people who love you very much. If you really don’t want to be a burden on your grieving family and friends, don’t force them to produce and direct a show without guidance. When people don’t know what a loved one wants, that is not considered liberating but stressful. People want to do the right thing and shrugging their shoulders and saying “whatever” doesn’t help them. It feels like hanging on them.

(And, bluntly: So what if you don’t like fanfare? You won’t have to wait to hear it.)

Regarding your body, if you really don’t care about its final disposition and your family does care (if there’s a family plot or something) then logically their wishes should take precedence. But if you really have a strong desire to donate your body, by all means do it. My mother donated her body to science and I felt immensely proud and grateful for it. In fact, it saved us considerable expense and, more importantly, it was the ultimate expression of her desire to help the people around her and be helpful in any way she could. It’s been seven years and I still get emotional when I think about it. He always had the ability to make a good first impression and a better final impression.

My mother also had the sad luxury of dying after advanced decline, during which she was able to tell us the things she wanted us to know, to shape how we would remember her. You may not have that privilege: death takes some of us early and by surprise. So write down at least a few ideas on paper. If there are images you want them to see, a song you want them to hear, a thought you want them to take with you (and how could it not be), write it down.

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Miss Conduct is Robin Abrahams, a writer with a PhD in psychology.