At the UUCM retreat (and earlier, after the Sunday service on Easter Sunday) I offered a workshop on Death, Dying and Preparing Your Own Memorial. This workshop mostly focuses on how you can participate in making some choices regarding your own memorial/funeral service, as a way to assist family, friends and ministers in the planning of a service to commemorate your life. At the workshop, I handed out two forms. One is familiar to some of you-it is a confidential form that includes your instructions in case of emergency and your instructions in case of death, listing such things as people to contact and whether or not you have an Advanced Medical Care Directive on file at a hospital. The UUCM office keeps these forms filled out by members in a locked file. They are used to help with contacting people you choose in the case of emergency or death. The other form I distributed is one I have recently introduced at UUCM, which includes space for you to indicate your wishes regarding your memorial or funeral service-such as music and readings you would like included, if and where you would like ashes scattered and other details. We will also keep these forms in the file for you, to help your loved ones and the minister plan a fitting memorial or funeral service for you.

Both of these forms are available in the Community Room, in a wall file just to your right as you enter the room. You are welcome to take and fill them out, and bring or mail them back to our Administrator, Janette Morrow, to be filed safely in the office. I would also recommend that you keep copies with your important papers and give copies to loved ones.

Some of you have asked about the latest Advance Health Care Directive for the State of California. You can find this form and the information you need here:   http://ag.ca.gov/consumers/pdf/ProbateCodeAdvancedHealthCareDirectiveForm-fillable.pdf  

Indicating our wishes regarding our care, disposition of our bodies, our preferences for final services and other end-of-life issues is a way to care for those we love, who will need to make decisions about these details after we are gone. Doing it while we are alive is a blessing to those we leave behind, and is a way for us to think about the meaning of our lives.

The choir I sing in, Contra Costa Chorale, is performing music set to the words of Shakespeare from many eras at two UU venues--The UU Church of Berkeley this Friday night at 8 PM and the UU Church of Walnut Creek on Sunday, May 2 at 5 PM.  

Fondly, Joy

Supervisor Damon Connolly will introduce a panel discussion on shared housing and aging in place:
Panelists will include:
Debbi La Rue, Marin County Community Development Agency
Steve Saxe, Marin Environmental Housing Collaborative
Christine Ness, Home Share Marin
Sue Steele, Marin Villages
Rachel Ginis, Lilypad Homes
David Levin, Legal Aid of Marin

"Food is our common ground, a universal experience." James Beard. Get to know other members of the congregation eating dinners in their homes through Dinners for Eight (or Six).  We would love to have more participants for the last dinner of the year on June 2nd.

Dinners for 8 (or Six) is a coordinated potluck. We meet on the 1st Saturday of the month, October through June. Each month a volunteer host will offer a main course and guests bring appetizers, salad/soup, dessert, and wine and good conversation. Contact Sher Sheldon at 415-892-1727 or   shershel@comcast.net  for details.

UUCM Readers' Theater invites members and friends to join our fun-loving group. We meet twice a month, on the second and fourth Monday of each month, from 11:00 am to 12:30 pm at UUCM. Most of the time, we read short plays aloud when we meet, but every 6-8 weeks we rehearse and then present short prose or poems during a service. No memorizing required, but you should be willing to ham it up and be silly. Information: Jan Seagrave ( janseagrave@gmail.com ).

General Assembly Kansas City,  Missouri

General Assembly is the annual meeting of our Unitarian Universalist Association. Attendees worship, witness, learn, connect, and make policy for the Association through democratic process. Anyone may attend; congregations must certify annually to send voting delegates. The 2018 General Assembly will be June 20-24 in Kansas City, Missouri. Most General Assembly events will be held in the Kansas City Convention Center. GA will offer more than 175 programming selections over the course of five days. Major worships this year will be lead by UUA President Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray and Rev. Sofia Betancourt.