Paying For It

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Funerals make my eyes water. Don’t get me wrong, not in the ‘Oh, he was a lovely fellah taken from us too soon’ sense. That stuff, I can handle. Old ladies with waterbag legs shoving egg-mayonnaise sandwiches at you, I can just about manage. Slipping them in the pocket beside the scoosh bottle is no problem for me. That type, they never listen to a word you say anyway. Fire out ‘Is that right?’, or ‘Really? No, really?’, and they’re happy as Larry. Just don’t stray into the ‘And how’s your Finlay doing in New Zealand?’ minefield. Uh-uh. That can spell catastrophe.

It’s details like cause of death that have me filling up. Send me reaching for the twelve-year-old Macallan they roll out for such occasions. And hitting it hard. Not just because that’s what drinkers do. But because I know that, in my racket, it doesn’t look good to be moved by things like funerals and death.

It’s when death comes so close to home, stamps on your doorstep, then invites itself in that I wince. Really wince. I mean, who wouldn’t wince at something like this?

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