My dear grandfather passed away two weeks ago from Covid-19 and we held his funeral yesterday. Under the current rules, obviously numbers are limited and restricted to immediate household/family members and a celebrant, unless no relatives can make it and then very close friends are allowed. The crematorium we used allowed 10 people and we had to be sat spaced out by household. Fortunately our immediate family is very small so we were all able to attend - my parents, me and DH, my sister and BIL, and my brother, so 7 of us.
Two days before the funeral I got a message from my dad (whose father it was that had died) saying "By the way, "Mike" wants to come to the funeral so he'll be attending too". Mike is a friend of my dad's, not a super close friend or a friend from childhood, so not someone who knew by granddad really well, but a neighbour who my parents have got to know over the last 15 years. He probably saw my granddad once a year for the past 8 years, at gatherings at my parents' house. He was definitely not in any way emotionally affected by my granddad's passing. As it happens, I've never been a big fan of Mike's - he's very loud, attention-seeking and tries to muscle his way into things. He also makes plenty of insensitive comments. He has also got my dad involved in some bad business deals in the past so I'm generally wary of him and his "friendship" with my dad.
I felt strange about it when I got the message - it didn't make sense at all for him to be there. We all knew that this wasn't the proper funeral we would have planned under normal circumstances, it was very much just an intimate family event and my dad is planning a larger memorial service when things open up again, that everyone who knew my granddad will be invited to. It's also obviously been a very horrible, stressful time for us all, as we weren't able to visit my granddad in hospital, haven't been able to visit each other to grieve together since the news of his passing and hadn't seen each other for 8 weeks before the death either, due to physical distance and the lockdown. So this funeral was going to be the first time we'd met as a family in 10 weeks and the first time we'd been able to all mourn together as a group. Obviously we've been speaking on the phone and video calls but it's completely different in person. So it felt really intrusive to me that a guy who most of us don't know very well and some of us don't like was going to be there too.
I messaged my dad back to ask if Mike knew this was just a small gathering for immediate family only and was also against the rules for random friends of relatives to be there, but he didn't reply. So I arrived at the crematorium yesterday to see Mike standing there with my parents. I'd arrived in tears, just wanting to be comforted by my family and to comfort them too, but bloody Mike was already there, cracking jokes and making small talk. I felt so angry that he was taking this time from us a family and changing the atmosphere in such an inappropriate manner. Thankfully we got called in for the service quickly and were then all sat separately (which was difficult in itself) and then after the funeral the vicar encouraged us to spend some time in the grounds, reminiscing together. But we couldn't because this random bloke was there, talking about the weather and the venue. I just walked off with DH and left as I couldn't hold back my tears and wanted to just be left alone with loved ones to grieve.
The immediate family all then went back to my parents' house to spend some time together in the garden, so I did get time with them all, just us. But since the funeral I've been feeling really really angry that what should have been a peaceful, comforting event where I said my last goodbyes to a much loved family member was turned into something stressful and awkward. When I first got the message from my dad I didn't push things too hard as I felt my dad deserved the most sympathy as it was his father who had died, and I didn't want to cause him any extra stress on what would already be a difficult day. But to be honest, my dad was actually fine on the day and it was me that needed comforting and I now feel a bit bereft and almost like my parents let me down a bit by allowing Mike to be there, if that makes sense? If any of my close friends had said they wanted to come, I would have thanked them for their thoughts but told them it wouldn't be appropriate, and I'd love to catch up with them separately on another day, rather than just impose them on the rest of my family.
My dad is not someone who confides deep feelings in friends or relies on them for support so he definitely wouldn't have asked Mike to come (especially as Mike was in no way close to my granddad!). I also question Mike's motives for being there - it definitely wasn't for the wider family benefit and he knows we're a tight-knit, loving family so it wasn't like my dad wasn't going to be completely supported by us if he needed it. I think it honestly just made him feel important, like a "special chosen" friend to be the only none-family member there.
I'm not sure how to get over this anger or what to do about it? I probably see Mike once a year and he's the type of insensitive man to say something like "you weren't very friendly to me at your granddad's funeral, were you!" next time he sees me. For that reason I want to tell my parents how annoyed I am that he was there and that I don't want to see him again in future, but I also don't want to cause them any stress.
AIBU?