I moved to Oregon three weeks ago.

It was rather sudden, really. One Saturday, toward the end of May, I was unemployed and increasingly dejected, with nothing on the horizon. That night I dreamed that a monk I didn’t know, but who I was going to hear speak in a few days, told me, “Christina, your answer will come tomorrow.” I promptly forgot about it. But Sunday evening, my dad had a message from his sister that their cousin was looking for someone to take care of her mother, Dad’s aunt. Monday and Tuesday were a flood of phone calls discussing details and informing the necessary people. Wednesday night, while I was at the monk’s presentation, my flight was booked. I said goodbye to my home parish on Sunday and flew out early Monday, Memorial day.

And the following Sunday, my grandma died. In my hometown. This would be the older sister of the great-aunt I’m looking after. So, after being in Oregon for not quite three weeks, I found myself driving back into California last Wednesday.

For as long as I can remember, any time the subject of death came up, Grandma made whomever happened to be present promise that we would sing a certain song at her funeral. We always responded with the smile and nod. “Sure, Grandma.” Not one of us ever found out why she wanted this, but she made sure we knew she wanted it.

The trouble is, how on earth do you sing “Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead” at a funeral, without it being thoroughly tacky and dishonoring of the departed?

My brother, the musician of the family, had been mulling this over, pretty much since Grandpa died in 2004. In the days following Grandma’s death, though, Scott and I shot a number of emails between us, and we made it a song-within-a-song. Once the words were basically settled, he wrangled some music together, and the final product was pretty decent, based on the responses from the rest of the family.

Most of the jokes in our little song would mean nothing to those who didn’t really know her, but they were the stuff of legend for our family. On the trip home, I sang the song for some relatives who could not get to the funeral, and they knew most of the stories referred to, which led to a few moments of laughter. I think both Grandma and Grandpa would have rather enjoyed it.