"Isn't it so strange to see some folks in the day light?" I observe to my husband, both of us standing at the back of a circle of mourners, who await the emergence of the coffin from the deceased publican's house. We have come, being fond of the deceased man and his mourning wife, to this inward facing circle of local people variously related, neighbouring and pub clientele, who wait patiently in the crisp cold day for the publican to come out of his house one last time. Time slows down as we wait, pick out people we know from the pub, until at last the coffin emerges high on the shoulders of the men. Three women walk pale and steady behind it looking neither to right or left, and the crowd fall in after on the short walk to the church. Every soul here knows exactly its place behind the soul departed.
"Are you going to look at the body" the Boss asked the evening before when we told her we were going to the wake. As we laboured to explain I thought of how this ceremony would have vanished by the time she grew up and must bury her dead. I remind her of how she had been brought when younger to my brothers wake where she and the other two had indeed clamoured up on the coffin to look at the body of my dear brother, who, reduced to his essence, was childlike and safe . "It's to say goodbye" I offered. "To offer sympathy to the living family" my husband added. "To.. to...um..um.. see that the person is dead.....".(to look at the body). Its all that, yes. .
"Do you think that's who he really was all along" I whisper as I clutch my husband's arm against the strangeness of being in the intimacy of someone's house, the bedroom, containing only this coffin, this man, whose face looks stern and fine, the care and the blurring of illness, age and trouble melted down, fallen away from his face . At my father's wake his coffin, lying high on the bed, was circled by our best sitting room chairs on which sat people, some solitary, silent, some in little groups, talking, softly laughing , drifting in and out over two days and nights, until at last they took him out to be put in the ground. The bringing in to the living breathing house of the lost one breaks the heart quite as much as his last going out. The graveyard in front of him, a mountain of used tea cups, empty glasses, residue of cake, sandwiches behind him in the gutted house.
a href="http://www.hotvsnot.com/Add-Site/Add-Site.aspx">submit site</a> t" You are not telling us he is dead..... I said" His wife stands, surrounded and isolated both by the mourners, and tells her tale for the umpteenth time. . "I mean, you know, they said he was better, could go home soon. So we left. And they phoned And they said we should come up so we did. And they called us into a room, and we knew. It was serious. But then they said..they said... they did all they could, And. And... We hugged the widow long and hard, and took ourselves off to the end of the bar, opened to cater for this crowd, clutching our proffered drinks, loosing ourselves in the soft voiced crowd.
"You know I'm being cremated myself" I tell my reluctant husband, on the way home. He tells me to shut up, and when I assure him that he can go first, he tells me firmly that he would not do that to me. As we gently argue this point I bat away a memory of my mother, alone, pale and quiet in her house, absently sipping a solitary cup of tea, where I found her that evening after my father's funeral. Crockery, glasses all washed and put away, floors swept, priest paid, her husband waked and most thoroughly buried, three miles down the road in the silent graveyard.
"Are you going to look at the body" the Boss asked the evening before when we told her we were going to the wake. As we laboured to explain I thought of how this ceremony would have vanished by the time she grew up and must bury her dead. I remind her of how she had been brought when younger to my brothers wake where she and the other two had indeed clamoured up on the coffin to look at the body of my dear brother, who, reduced to his essence, was childlike and safe . "It's to say goodbye" I offered. "To offer sympathy to the living family" my husband added. "To.. to...um..um.. see that the person is dead.....".(to look at the body). Its all that, yes. .
"Do you think that's who he really was all along" I whisper as I clutch my husband's arm against the strangeness of being in the intimacy of someone's house, the bedroom, containing only this coffin, this man, whose face looks stern and fine, the care and the blurring of illness, age and trouble melted down, fallen away from his face . At my father's wake his coffin, lying high on the bed, was circled by our best sitting room chairs on which sat people, some solitary, silent, some in little groups, talking, softly laughing , drifting in and out over two days and nights, until at last they took him out to be put in the ground. The bringing in to the living breathing house of the lost one breaks the heart quite as much as his last going out. The graveyard in front of him, a mountain of used tea cups, empty glasses, residue of cake, sandwiches behind him in the gutted house.
a href="http://www.hotvsnot.com/Add-Site/Add-Site.aspx">submit site</a> t" You are not telling us he is dead..... I said" His wife stands, surrounded and isolated both by the mourners, and tells her tale for the umpteenth time. . "I mean, you know, they said he was better, could go home soon. So we left. And they phoned And they said we should come up so we did. And they called us into a room, and we knew. It was serious. But then they said..they said... they did all they could, And. And... We hugged the widow long and hard, and took ourselves off to the end of the bar, opened to cater for this crowd, clutching our proffered drinks, loosing ourselves in the soft voiced crowd.
"You know I'm being cremated myself" I tell my reluctant husband, on the way home. He tells me to shut up, and when I assure him that he can go first, he tells me firmly that he would not do that to me. As we gently argue this point I bat away a memory of my mother, alone, pale and quiet in her house, absently sipping a solitary cup of tea, where I found her that evening after my father's funeral. Crockery, glasses all washed and put away, floors swept, priest paid, her husband waked and most thoroughly buried, three miles down the road in the silent graveyard.
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