Like many baby boomers, I watched wide-eyed and quiet in front of   "the big TV" as John Kennedy's caisson moved through the streets of Washington, D.C. from the Capitol rotunda to St. Matthews Cathedral.  The memory of Black Jack, rider less, with boots placed backwards in the stirrups can make me pause today.

But my perspective on funerals and tradition is closer to the bone than a broadcast.

Funeral traditions help make up my sense of history and place, and my own sense of self. I grew up in Springfield, IL. Our annual grade school field trips meant visits to the cemetery: to Oak Ridge, where Abraham Lincoln is buried, or to Camp Butler national cemetery, to view the Civil War dead.

To say I was steeped in the Lincoln traditions would not be an exaggeration. And since father's family is buried in Oak Ridge Cemetery and my mother's family is buried in Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis -- another site filled with historical associations - separating my family's history from funeral tradition is nigh on impossible.

My connections to funeral service are woven into the fabric of my life, a fabric that was created before I was born and one that will continue to comfort - like the Peanuts character Linus' blanket - through the lives of my children. As the blanket wears, new fabric is added, and if the sewing is seamless, the comfort and sense of stability and honor remain.

Charitable giving, too, can be a part of a personal pattern of tradition. If you're a "boomer" like me, perhaps you remember the UNICEF cartons at Halloween, MDA "carnivals" or Boy Scout paper drives. Did you help your mother or grandmother bake for a bake sale? Did your parents deliver Meals on Wheels?

Your parents may have focused their charitable giving on supporting their place of worship and an alma mater or two. Perhaps they were able to create a small family foundation through which their philanthropic goals could be realized. Or perhaps those "urges to give" have never been realized.

If giving hasn't become part of your own family's personal tradition, why not take a few initial steps together. If you have young children, you may want to start by visiting a local nursing home or senior center: consider volunteering to visit on a regular basis. Hook up with a food pantry or kitchen. Make holiday time a giving-to-strangers time. Send messages to our soldiers. Call your local humane society and learn how you can help as a family.

It's easy to begin to add a new tradition of generosity and compassion to your Linus blanket of comfort and stability. Or to continue the fabric pieced together for you by the "tailors and seamstresses" who have preceded you. Not only will you model a philanthropic orientation for those who matter to you, your own sense of history, place and self will be greatly enriched.

--Kathy Buenger