A funeral – at last!
Ed and I went back to the old parish to a funeral on Friday.
Remember the lady who was knocked down by a hit-and-run driver on Christmas Eve? The family had to take the agonising decision on Christmas Day, to turn off life support.
Then they had to wait for the inquest, and although the driver turned himself in, since then he’s been disputing the accident, so things are dragging on and on.
It was the funeral on Friday, and I’ve never seen the church so packed. It’s the biggest church of the six in the benefice, seating 350, but they were standing six deep at the back. Ed and I arrived half-an-hour before the service was due to begin, and managed to snag the last two seats.
It was a good service, led by Nigel the Curate and Meg, the local (retired) priest from that parish. But it was really sad meeting people again under such circumstances. There were many tears at the funeral, for she was one of those quiet, unsung saints. She was born in the village and had lived there all her life, so everybody knew her and loved her.
Yesterday we cheered up with a visit from the family. It’s Ed’s birthday on Tuesday week, but we’re off to Portugal next weekend, so they came to see him before we go.
Can’t wait to get into the sunshine! More sleet and snow today, and church was so cold I thought I might quietly die. We stayed to a Lent hunger lunch after the service – home-made soup with French bread, followed by rice pudding or bread and butter pudding (all the guys chose that, all the women chose rice!) Then we went home and filled up on toast and marmalade. Not sure that’s quite the point of a hunger lunch, but you have to keep the cold at bay somehow.
That’s my excuse, anyway.