21 January 2018
Please be warned this post contains a lot about death. This being the case, if you see death as the spectre of doom and something you fear each and every day I suggest you read no further.
If however you see death as the culmination of your glorious existence and when it finally arrives you intend to laugh in it’s face, read on.
As many of you will already know my Father ‘Bought the farm’ in early January.
He made it to the 25 December, came to us for Christmas dinner and while a little quiet there was no sign of him being about to ‘throw a seven’.
On 27th December he went to hospital for treatment, then was called back on 29th and admitted. He went downhill very quickly after that and once they withdrew feeding and treatment it was clear the end was in sight.
On 3 January he was transferred to Stracathro hospital as it was much closer to their house and easier for us to take my mother to see him. They also have a fantastic restaurant that’s open to the public. Every cloud.
We got the phone call to tell us he had died early on the morning of Saturday 6th. I nearly didn’t answer as I woke up quickly, got the phone confused with the bedside alarm and spent 20 seconds trying to snooze it.
It was at this point that we entered a world unfamiliar to anyone who has never had to deal with a death and what for me was a world full of the darkest humour.
There was nothing we could do at the weekend, so on the Monday we went to my mothers to start sorting my fathers affairs. We sat at the dining room table and my mother staggered in carrying five of those big rectangular ‘bags for life’ you get at the supermarket. They were full to the brim with bits of paper.
“There you go!” she said “I’ve collected all this from around the house”.
Once we got started we realised the task would be on a par with clarifying the financial affairs of Enron. My father’s lifelong aversion to order was going to take weeks to fix.
To break the monotony of shredding bank statements from 1994 we had several exciting trips out that week.
First we went back to Strachro hospital to get the death certificate. The care he received there was beyond excellent so we took a bag of goodies for the ward. As we walked in the more experienced staff spotted the gift in hand. As we passed they stopped what they were doing and followed us surreptitiously. I began to feel like an injured gazelle being followed by a pride of lions. Once on the ward we made our way to the nurse’s desk.
“These are for you” I said as I put the bag down.
“No really, you shouldn’t have” they said in unison as they whisked the bag away and locked it in a big cupboard full of patient records.
As we left we walked through a ward of elderly patients that were still in the land of the living. One character, looking at his soup, shouted in a broad Glaswegian accent
“Hey, sweetheart, your gonna have to get me a straw. Else the only way I’ll be able to suck this up is through me arse!” Life in the old dog yet.
Next we went to the undertakers. Housed in a large sombre, single-story building next to the Co-op, it had half drawn net curtains and lots of frosted glass. The appropriately named Blacks Funeral Directors were charged with making the arrangements. As we approached in the car I noticed a poster stuck to the glass front door. It seemed to be advertising a scheme of some sort.
“Looks like they do a loyalty card Mother!” I said, trying and failing to lighten the mood.
We were greeted by a very sollom looking man in a long black coat and very shiny shoes who ushered us into a small meeting room. There was a faint wiff of something unusual in the air. Later Alice said it was probably potpourri to hide the smell of the bodies, but I think it was probably embalming fluid employed for much the same reason.
After a minute another man in a black frock coat, black tie and black waistcoat came into the room as if on wheels. He was the double of Captain Birds eye, albeit after he had spent 20 years eating nothing but his own fish fingers.
At this point things got unexpectedly interesting. This meeting was our host’s only chance to sell, to maximise the opportunity with extras and add-ons. How would he go about it given the nature of the meeting? I was agog.
Like a class professional was the answer. He knew his offering inside out. What type of coffin? What type of handles? Do you want flowers? Do you need cars? Do you need somewhere to go afterwards? He under promised, over delivered and made my Mother feel very special.
For me the best moment was right at the end, when out of the blue he said
“Do you shop at the Co-op next door?”
“I do” replied my mother.
With a practiced flourish he reached into his top pocked and pulled out a Co-op dividend card.
“Do you have one of these? If you do I can take your number. You get 5% of the value of the coffin and 14% of the value of the extras.”
After that my mother couldn’t fail to go home happy.
Next we had an appointment at the registrar’s to register the death. This was done by a very jolly and efficient lady at the town hall in Montrose. She was very good but something about her irritated my mother. As time passed the irritation seem to turn to mild anger and she nearly exploded when Mrs Jolly asked
“Do you receive housing benefit?”
“Oh no, no, no, no, no, never!” retorted my indignant mother. The inference being ‘Do I look like the sort of person that would receive benefits? Well really!’
Then Mrs Jolly asked “And do you live in a council house?”
“NO WE DON’T! We have always lived in private housing! We have never lived in ‘social’ housing!”
She was almost apoplectic. I had to put my hand over my mouth and the Domestic Manager had to look away as we were both consumed by mirth.
Finally we made a visit to the bank in Montrose to start sorting my father’s finances. We turned up unannounced and were pleased to be told the branch manager would see us shortly.
A lady wearing a name badge that said Lisa appeared and ushered us into a room. It had one of those massive locks that all bank doors seem to have and that can’t be opened from the inside. I hoped there wasn’t a fire.
Lisa settled herself behind the computer and listened intently while my mother rudely and patronisingly explained why we were there. She didn’t like bank people and believed the girl in front of her was cut from the same cloth as Fred ‘the shred’ Goodwin.
Lisa was an interesting character. Sky high heels, very tight uniform and nails that had been done for Christmas but were now well past their best. Her blonde highlighted hair had been piled on top of her head and secured with a large crocodile hairclip, but some had escaped and now framed her face on each side. Not in an alluring provocative way. More in a dragged through a hedge backwards way.
Despite all this I decided I rather liked Lisa then remembered the DM was there. Best keep it professional.
Lisa turned out to be excellent and could not have done more to help. She was the complete opposite of the traditional bank manager. At one point while on the phone to another bank in England Lisa said
“No, the customer is elderly so can’t come to you”
at which point my mother gave her the ‘death’ stare. A little later on Lisa asked my mother a question. She was not listening so Lisa turned to us and asked
“Not deaf is she? If she is we have a special system”.
At which point to the ‘death’ stare my mother added ‘slow and painful’.
As we left we made an appointment to return. Lisa took myself and the DM to one side and with a face full of concern asked
“Is she coming on her own? It would be good if one of you could come as well.”
Her relief was evident when we confirmed one of us would also be there.
The funeral was booked for 16 January and I was dreading it. I had only ever been to one before and that was under duress. A few days before I had tried on my white shirt – a garment saved for occasional use – and discovered I had put on so much weight I could only fasten the collar if I used great force and had no need to breath.
We made an emergency trip to TM Lewin where I learnt that the shirt I needed, with an 18” collar and in a ‘slim fit’, was special order only. They only stocked regular fit. As time was of the essence I said I’d take one of the regular ones.
The immaculate chap serving us was moved to say
“It is going to be very big on you. Really. Very big”.
And when I put it on the next day I discovered he was right. It was like wearing a smock, so I decided to wear a black jumper on top to hide it. Be fine as long as we went nowhere warm. And the collar fitted a treat.
Luckily the temperature had not got above freezing for several days and on the way to pick up my mother to take her to the funeral it started snowing.
When we arrived at the crematorium we were joined by people that had worked with my Father plus a number of people from their village. The was the lady from the Spar where they got their paper and I met a cousin I had not seen since the 70’s who had driven 500 miles to get there.
Most amusing were the relations of my parents next door neighbour, who were waiting outside when we pulled up. Both in their 70’s they live in Edinburgh and I am sure they only made the trip for a day out and a free feed.
When the hearse arrived it stopped at the gate and Captain Birdeye, now resplendent in a top hat and black gloves, lead the car slowly up the drive. We all filed in, watched them bring the coffin in then all looked away awkwardly while the captain and the pallbearers tried to stop it sliding backwards off the rollers.
The ceremony was humanist as my father despised religion. A large lady with a bad chest spoke eloquently and described a saintly man I struggled to recognise. While she did so Alice and I had a whispered conversation about whether the coffin was going to go down into the box, or would slide backwards and disappear behind the curtain. She also expressed her disappointment that they weren’t going to play the James Bond music as the coffin disappeared. I knew it was a mistake to let her watch Diamonds Are Forever the week before.
As my father was a serial gardener my mother opted for a display of vegetables rather than flowers.
At the end of the ceremony we all trooped out and stood around shaking hands and whispering condolences. The people from Edinburgh asked me to confirm where we were going to eat then promptly went to their car to ‘get it warmed up’.
As we were about to leave the Captain rolled up to us, pointed at the vegetable display and said
“Make a lovely stew that. Or drop of soup. Why not take it with you?”
So we did. And very nice soup it was too.
Eventually we departed the crematorium for the Bell Rock restaurant in Arbroath. As I drove the people from Edinburgh were never less than 10 feet from my rear bumper, gripped by the fear that they may miss something.
We were just about the only people in there at 2.30pm on a freezing Tuesday afternoon, but the sun was out and the atmosphere very jolly as we ate our fish suppers, bread and butter, extra mushy peas, any more tea in that pot? pass it here, thank you. It was exactly what he would have wanted.
Tomorrow I start the first full week at the fun factory since 10 December. I definitely feel very different, but I am certainly not overcome with emotion, grief, or a sense of loss.
Nor am I troubled by whether he is in heaven, hades or that unattractive pot on my mother’s sideboard.
What I am troubled by is how I am going to sell the mountain of tools, wood and other shite I am now tasked with sorting out.
Who needs a dozen rip saws? Really – I ask you!
Murrays Musings 