A Family Failure - Part 2: On Wills and Jumble Sales

Now no-one expected me to die, it just happened when nobody was looking, which meant there was a bit of a rush to get a funeral sorted and all the other things you have to do when someone dies.
           I died on a Monday; a sad case in itself for Monday is such a dull day already. The weekend snow was turning damp and slushy, everyone was trying to get back into a work routine after the Christmas break, feeling thoroughly miserable, and I went a died.
          My family spent the next day and a half crying a lot before realising I wasn’t going to bury myself and that I was starting to smell. This all led to them rushing to get my funeral prepared. They booked a church for Friday, but found that no-one could come because they all had parties to go to already. So then they moved it to the following Monday. Great, so I not only die on a Monday, but I get buried on one too!
          Just because my family will be late to my funeral doesn’t mean you can get away with it. I expect you to be there on the dot. I will try to give you a little time to get seated before I begin the ceremony by making my grand entrance.
          Actually these days it’s a little more humiliating. There once was a time when six pallbearers would carry you shoulder high down the aisle in a slow, mournful yet dignified fashion, while the organ played and everyone respectfully stood to watch you pass. Now they dump the coffin on a trolley and roll it up to the front to the tune of ‘Always look on the bright side of life’, while everyone sits back and pretends to cry into their tissues (in fact their just hiding their noses from the smell). Most of them are only there to hear if they’ve been left anything in the will. Well I can tell you now that they will all be disappointed at my funeral. I died so quickly and unexpectedly I didn’t have time to write one. (Unless you count the thing I wrote aged 6, leaving my jar of two pence pieces to Dad and my book on Monster Machines to Mum).
           I often wonder why they call it a ‘Will’. Was it because someone called Will wrote the first one? Or is it to say that you are willing to let other people have you stuff? It would be interesting for someone to write a ‘won’t’ of all the things they don’t wish to have handed on to another person, who would probably only sell it at a jumble sale anyway.
          Talking of jumble sales, I went to one once. Just bear with me here. They are crazy places, where you can go and take all the stuff you don’t want or need, and really free up your house (everyone has too much stuff). But then you make the crucial error of wandering around to look at all the other things on sale. Most of it’s chipped or worthless, but your eyes spot the cheap price tag and you start emptying your wallet. Then you get home and you realise, that you spent more money than you made and you have more junk than you left with.
          Anyway, as I was saying, I went to one once, just to have a look around, and I came across this chap selling weird bracelets. They had a selection of pretty stones on them and the man said that I should wear them when I died and they’d help in one way or another when I passed on to the next life. That all sounded ridiculous at the time, but they looked so nice that I bought one and wore it for a long time after. I even started thinking it would help me when I died. Of course what I forgot was that when you die you can’t really decide what goes with you into the coffin. Mum just chose a nice outfit for me and my stone bracelet was left behind in a draw. Although as it happens they wouldn’t have been any use anyway as I am almost stark naked, so it looks like I left everything bar my body, and one useful item of clothing, in the coffin.
            But I am getting ahead of my self, I am neither dead nor buried as far as you are concerned for I am yet to describe the events to you. But please be patient, I will come to them soon. Besides it will be a while yet before my family reach the funeral so let me go on.

A Family Failure - Part 1: The nature of names

They’re going to be late, I just knew it. Well I suppose you can’t blame them. We were all born late, every one of us in my family. In fact I was the least late, only three days, whereas Uncle Andy was more like three weeks, or so I’m told. And now they’re going to be late again, they can’t even manage to get to my own funeral on time.
            Dad has always been one of the worst. He almost missed my birth because he was trying to catch a fish. He did actually succeed, but when he pulled it off the hook, it wriggled out of his hand and back into the water. Then there was my wedding. He actually came in after the service had begun with his tie all loose; Mum had given up waiting for him. But now to be late for my funeral? I suppose I have to take some of the blame, because dying in mid-January, when Britain shuts down after 3 flakes of snow, was a bad idea, but still!
            My name is Rufus, which is utterly ridiculous, because far from having red hair (Rufus means red-haired, in case you hadn't guessed) I have none, I never had much, and even worse what I did have was bright blonde. But my Great-Great Granddad had been called Rufus and so of course we had to keep it in the family. Not that I mind Rufus, I find it quite cool. It certainly helped me out in my youth. It put me head and shoulders above the tallest kid in school whose parents had named him Clancy. I saw him many years later by which time he’d managed to make people call him Lance instead.
            Names really are funny things, you can’t choose your own (well you can go and change it if you’re really that bothered. Generally it’s the sort of thing people say they’ll do, like; “I’m going to change my name when I’m older.”
            “Really, what to?”
            “Oh, I don’t know, I hadn’t thought about that bit.”
            “How about Alexander the Great?”
            “Yeah, that sounds awesome.” But of course they never do it). Then once you’ve got your name you never use it. Instead everyone else uses it for you. In some cases they wear it out completely. Or else they just forget it, and every time you see them you have to remind them, and they say “Oh yeah, I remember, sorry. I will remember it next time.” But they don’t, they just make a wild stab. “Is it Vincent?”
            “No, no it’s not. Good try, better luck next time Katie.”
            “I’m Pamela.”
            So you see really they’re ridiculous. At least with my name there aren’t too many around. My younger brother’s called Jack and there are hundreds of them. You just meet them everywhere you go. I’d try to call my brother in a crowded room and 20 people would turn round.
            But enough of names, I was going to tell you about my funeral.

A thought provoked by The Grapes of Wrath

Between the narrative of The Grapes of Wrath, wonderful and beautiful as it is, John Steinbeck includes many interesting and insightful comments, many of which still apply today, some seventy-four years after it was first published. Here is one I came across:

"If this tractor were ours it would be good - not mine, but ours. If our tractor turned the long furrows of our land, it would be good. Not my land, but ours. We could love that tractor then as we have loved this land when it was ours. But this tractor does two things - it turns the land and turns us off the land. There is little difference between this tractor and a tank. The people are driven, intimidated, hurt by both. We must think about this."

Now few people today (at least in Britain) could say they are being, or have been driven off their land by tractors, that do the same job at a cheaper cost. That I suppose happened many years ago, as it did in the USA. Now though we complain about the cost of food; food that is largely imported, making it more expensive and less fresh.
     This attitude fits closely with the western way of living, i.e 'someone else can do the planting, growing, harvesting, packing, etc., we'll just do the eating, preferably without having to pay too much. Meanwhile we do small jobs, that don't necessarily improve life, but often help us to do as little as possible.
     There was a time when each family grew their own food, made their own clothes, built their own homes, did things that were actually essential to life. Now we want other people to do this for us, preferably overseas where we don't have to see how hard it is. Oh and if you could make me the latest iPlod macro extra, with all the trimmings, that would be excellent.

Is the world going to change, no, or at least not over night. What I would like to suggest, however, is that we should take back our land from the tractor, which is itself a dying breed in England, where more and more fields are being built upon by our generous government. If farms cannot provide us with food, we should provide it for ourselves, as many already do.
     A small vegetable plot can produce a mass of food, enough to supply more than one family for a year. If every garden in Britain grew just one type of crop, we could stop importing so much food, which in turn would save a lot of money. Yes, we wouldn't have all food at all times of the year, but the food we would have would be fresh and probably much better for us.
     I hope that some day this is how we will live, because if we can improve our way of life in this way, perhaps we can improve it in other ways.

People don't change

The Grapes of Wrath is an American classic and was first published in 1939. Here is a paragraph though, that I did not expect to read:

"The doors of the empty house swung open, and drifted back and forth in the wind. Bands of little boys came out from the towns to break the windows and pick over the debris, looking for treasures. And here's a knife with the blade half gone. That's a good thing. And - smells like a rat died here. And look what Whitey wrote on the wall. He wrote that in the toilet at school, too, an' teacher made 'im wash it off."

Such a paragraph would not be out of place in a novel set in the twenty-first century, because people don't change. Houses are still left empty and boys will always be boys.

Down by the Weir

Outside of the town and on the far side of the hill the river ran in twists and curls. Trees shaded each bank and in places large rocks protruded from the water. In the summer we would go down to the river and lie in the sun or bathe in the cool water. It wasn't deep and the current wasn't strong and it would have been perfect except for the noise of traffic on the nearby road.
     One day while exploring further down stream, away from the town and the cars we discovered an old weir, still in perfect condition. The water flowed over the smooth rocks and tumbled noisily down the far side. Below the weir the river became very shallow for a while and we paddled about and watched for fish. Then someone had the idea of sitting in the cascade of white water, which we did, letting the flow cool our backs, hot from the sun.
     We stayed all day swimming and wading, enjoying the peace. The next day we came back, and almost every day that summer when the sun shone. It was our secret place. Our garden, our play park and we shared it only with the birds.

Ashes - Day 1 from Trent Bridge

An interesting day of test match cricket. It was always going to be nervy and exciting but I didn’t really expect 14 wickets, or even half that number.

Anyway, got the ground well in time for the toss, England won, although it might have been better to lose. Cloudy conditions made it a good time to bowl.

Then there were the national anthems, the Coldstream Guard, fireworks and perfectly timed, the Red Arrows.

Finally got the first ball, a wide, good start and after that everything settled down for a while.

Plenty of Aussies in the crowd kept the noise and the tension up but with England 98-2 at lunch everything seemed as per normal.

After lunch though it got a bit mad. England played some bad shots and seemed to get intimidated by Siddle. So they threw away their decent start and early in the evening session collapsed completely. 215 all out was bad, very bad, and the England fans were very quiet. Sadly this made the Aussie fans sing even louder.

However half an hour later, however, everything changed. Finn took two in two and Anderson bowled Clarke and there was a rousing rendition of ‘You’re not singing anymore’ to the much subdued bunch from Down Under. It was still cloudy and chilly but then a cameraman turned up next to me and the guys I was with. We tried to act normal… but failed...

 

 

Anderson got another wicket, possibly a bit luckily and that was about the end of it. Hoping for something a bit more steady tomorrow, not sure I can take another day like that! Still, COME ON ENGLAND!

Travelling British Columbia

Outside the teepee our fire is crackling. The mountainside campsite grants us a spectacular view of a snowcapped range with the sun setting in the distance. From the border with Alberta I can reflect on four days in eastern Canada.
     Vancouver is a city. Like most cities it has skyscrapers, restaraunts and buses that don't run to time (although they were better than many English services). We also visited the pleasant area of Gastown and had dinner there.
    In north Vancouver is a hidden valley and across it the Capilano suspension bridge. Above the river and between the trees we swayed and I began to feel like I'd found some of what I came to British Columbia to see.
    Monday morning we collected our hire car and departed Vancouver on the Sea-to-sky highway. It was precipitating rather badly but we ignored that and set off in search of mountains. It wasn't long until we found some and lost ourselves amongst their soaring peaks.
     In Whistler we stopped in the Olympic village before heading on around hairpin bends, deeper into the Canadian wilderness. We drove over 500 km and finished at a small youth hostel with old railway carriages for dorm rooms.
     Today we continued further into the Rockies, in dryer weather thankfully, until we arrived at Goldenwood Lodge and our teepee.

Our aim to reach Calgary by Thursday night should still be possible, despite the floods. For the meantime though it is farewell BC, hello Alberta.