I thought that my father's funeral would overwhelm me with sadness and I wouldn't be able to see the joy, conflict and laughter but I was wrong. I'm not someone to cry in front of people and my family are naturally funny.
We were all nervous: up early, stressing about not being able to find the right cardigan, shoes or whether we had enough tissues. There was anxious biting of lips, fingernails and hair twiddling (and that was just the Long Suffering Husband.) When the cars arrived we all privately wondered if we could do it but kept our heads down, shuffling our feet until we found ourselves sitting inside. As we drove up the hill we marvelled, silently, at the fitness of John, the funeral director, who walked in front of the cars, without stopping, at a speed of about 10 mph. At the church, we saw there was a queue to get in. The silence was broken as we struggled to recall names.
"Poppet," my sister said.
"Hello, Poppet, how you doing? Haven't seen you for ages." She instructed us how to greet people.
I didn't think I could pull off the 'Poppet' trick.
Mum agreed, "I couldn't call anyone Poppet who was older than about six," she said.
My sister continued to instruct us and we laughed.
We were in a funeral car, behind the hearse with my dad's coffin in, outside the church, laughing about poppets.
Recorded music in the Church has never worked properly for me. I always thought it was some trick to make me use live music; make me practise so that I didn't bring Les (Dawson, whose piano playing I seem to channel) to every school service. For the funeral, we wanted the orchestra to play Children's March but it had to be a recorded version. I had been to the church earlier in the week and we had gone through it, to make sure it worked and everyone was confident. We stood at the back, behind the coffin and waited. I looked up and saw the familiar look of panic, as the technology failed. Usually, when I see that look I get the choir to sing unaccompanied. The vicar apologetically asked me if I would sort it out and just as I started to walk over it sprang into life. I had a sudden panic, as I nearly tripped rushing back to my place, that the piano and music stand weren't ready for the only live bit of music. It was and I was able to regain my composure.
The service was lovely. There were hundreds of people there. The tributes were perfect and even the piano was in tune and seemed to behave better than it normally does.
After the service we went to the crematorium for a quick, private cry, while everyone else went to The Purple Pig for a beer. Funeral cars drive slowly and everyone looks at you. At first, we found the journey difficult. We sat in silence until Mum offered us a polo. Mum likes a polo and it would have been rude not to accept. It is traditional in our family to have a polo sucking competition on long car journeys.
We took it very seriously, poking our tongues out to check at regular intervals. The driver won. On the way back the funeral director tried really hard to equal his employee's acheivement but couldn't beat my sister, who is a world champion polo sucker and still had hers, intact, as we turned onto Limebrook Way, which at funeral car speed was about 45 minutes.
We had laughed and were ready to greet everyone. I even hugged people!
"Hello Poppet, thank you for fighting that dog of a piano and winning," I said to my friend who had accompanied my version of Stardust. We laughed.
Funerals are still funny things and I'm glad about that because life wouldn't be bearable without a little bit of laughter.
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