Klaassen Family Funeral Home

11/22/2025

"There are some who would vow that life isn't fair. They believe the worst is yet to come, that evil will always conquer good, and that we have no control over our fate. It's true, there are storms that shake our foundations and monsters that threaten to tear us limb from limb. We will make terrible mistakes. We will fall short of our expectations. No one is exempt from pain and fear. But life, and what comes after, is a beautiful mixture of darkness and light, sacrifice and salvation. There is no fine line between the two, for both are needed. Where there is grief, there will be joy. Where there is heartbreak, love will follow."
- Rebecca Harris

Life never feels fair when you have lost someone you love. Have you ever thought that life is unfair when you experienced joy?

Our lives are all a mix of the highs of joy and the lows of grief. As hard as that is to hear right now, the feelings you are experiencing are as inevitable as the elation you felt at other times. Trying to cope with these lows is a struggle for everyone. Take time today to acknowledge that although this is a hard time, the great times will come again to create balance in your life.

11/21/2025

We were so thrilled to see such a great turnout at the "Soup for All" event yesterday at St. Patrick Church of St. Patrick-St. Anthony Parish by Homeless Prevention Partners! Thank you to everyone in the community for coming out to support homelessness prevention and partnering with our local agencies who are making change for good in our community and beyond.

11/21/2025

"Yet that grief and this joy were alike outside all the ordinary conditions of life; they were loop-holes, as it were, in that ordinary life through which there came glimpses of something sublime. And in the contemplation of this sublime something the soul was exalted to inconceivable heights of which it had before had no conception which reason lagged behind, unable to keep up with it."
- Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

Grief and joy are the extremes of emotion. Although we think we seek joy, that is actually just a fleeting feeling. What you miss most right now is contentment, the feeling that all is calm and well. You may not be able to achieve that right now. Grief, the other extreme, is a forceful presence in your life. Although it may take a few weeks or months, contentment will return, and it will feel far sweeter for having lost it.

11/20/2025

"I picture Cully tromping through that high, deep snow. That's how I feel physically from all of this. Moving through grief like it's a thick drift, exhausting but enlivening. It makes your muscles ache. It makes you feel you've inhabited your body completely."
- Kaui Hart Hemmings, The Possibilities

Grief can truly feel like an endless winter. Like the actual season in colder climates, however, the sun will eventually melt the snow and the beauty of spring will be revealed. Try to have hope today that the spring in your heart will come again as well.

11/19/2025

We’d like to congratulate our funeral associate and team member, Chuck Fuller, as the 2025 recipient of the “Tri-Cities Historical Museum Historian of the Year” award!

Chuck’s hard work and dedication (for decades) to memorialize those buried in Potter’s Field at Lake Forest Cemetery became a reality this summer with the placement of plaques with over 850 names of those laid to rest there.

We also extend our appreciation to the outgoing board members for their years of dedicated service to the Tri-Cities Historical Museum and warmly welcome the newly appointed members who will continue supporting the Tri-Cities community.

11/19/2025

The Celebration of Life for Michael Anthes will take place at 1:00 p.m. this Saturday, November 22, 2025, at United Methodist Church of the Dunes. Visitation will be held one hour prior to the service at the church. Please click below to sign his online guestbook and for full obituary.

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11/18/2025

We wish to express our sympathies to the family and friends of Albert "Al" DeHaan.

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11/18/2025

"People grieve in different ways, some silently, some in anger, some in spite. Rarely does grief bring out the best in people, despite what local historians like to tell you."
- Joanne Harris, Five Quarters of the Orange

You may miss the "real you", that person you were before you started to grieve. Don't worry...that person is still there. You will return to a more caring, compassionate version of yourself on the other end of the grief process.

11/17/2025

"There is greater clarity in the still waters of sadness, something not found in the babbling brooks of more sought after emotions."
- Shaun Hick

Feeling sad is your new normal. That emotion has permeated every part of your life for weeks such that you almost don't have to be reflective and consider how you are feeling. The emotion is always sadness.

Take a break from sadness today. Put your face in the sun for ten minutes or go for a walk in a local park. Take a step away from feeling down. You'll be glad you did.

11/16/2025

"We live and we die, but we are made of sterner stuff. The carbon atoms in our fingernails, the calcium in our bones, the iron atoms in our blood -- all the countless trillions of atoms of which we are made -- are ancient objects. They existed before us, before the Earth itself, in fact. And after each of us dies, they will depart from our bodies and do other things. Forever."
- Keith Heyer Meldahl, Hard Road West: History and Geology along the Gold Rush Trail

Physical bodies are of this earth; you learned about their components in school. Somehow death does not seem as grounded. Your loss is forcing you to face what you think happened to the essence or the spirit of your loved one. This experience is actually compelling you to look at not only your religious or cultural beliefs, but what you personally believe now that you've experienced loss. This process is as much spiritual as it is emotional.

11/15/2025

"Sometimes when we are drowning in our own loss we lash out--anger is momentarily easier to cope with."
- Anne Perry, No Graves as Yet

You may find yourself being impatient or aggressive with close family members or friends. It's like putting on a suit of armor. In a strange way, being angry is easier than loving someone we are suddenly afraid to lose. Recognize this emotion, and make the conscious effort to lead with kindness and compassion.

11/14/2025

Like many people whose lives had formed around a particularly painful incident, she had grown used to providing ellipses around the event of her brother's death to keep conversations comfortable. At some point the subconscious logic of this had spread to the rest of her life so that she rarely talked about things she had been deeply affected by. It wasn't hard to do."
- Mira Jacob, The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing

You may feel like you are operating on autopilot so often that you are forgetting how to really connect. It can become a hard habit to break. Take the time today to nourish one relationship carefully. Reconnecting with others continues to be an important part of your recovery process.