uncle jack’s funeral

This week I went to my Uncle Jack’s funeral in Chichester. He is the husband of my mother’s sister, also called Hazel who I was named after. It is their wedding picture above. Their only son Tim gave the eulogy. It really made me cry. I wasn’t crying for Jack, although I am sorry for Hazel, because he was 93 and passed on lying peacefully on his bed one morning with Hazel beside him. I was crying because Tim spoke so movingly about what it meant to have a father and as I reflect on my life as I grow old, I am increasingly beginning to realise how significant not having a father (he died when I was a baby) was to me. Tim didn’t make his dad out to be a saint, but he did belong to that generation who believed in good manners, didn’t buy things on credit and accepted that work could be boring, but if you had a secure job you were lucky. He talked about how his dad taught him the practical skills he knows and about the on-going sharing they had all their life. You can see the impact of his parent’s long term stability on Tim who went on to adopt two boys with his second wife. He just has a peace within himself and an ability to reflect honestly and without any rancour on the struggles and challenges he faces.

I also spoke to my mother’s brother Derek’s youngest daughter. Derek was in banking and as a child I thought he and his wife lived a very glamorous life. His daughter Mandy told me she remembers being envious of me because my mum used to rustle up new items of clothing for me overnight and that somehow I had that mysterious edge because I was the eldest. I don’t remember it like that. I felt our comparative poverty very deeply, hated the hand-made clothes because they never looked like shop bought ones and at that time was desperate to fit in and be like everyone else, not different. My mum loved Mandy who shared her love of sewing, and was close to her until her death.

I wrote Hazel a little card. I was anxious about it. I didn’t give a donation to Barnardos. I bought her a bag of nice toiletries. I worried afterwards that that might seem disrespectful to Jack. We had spoken on the phone and she said she was worried that she was still talking to him as if he was there. I told her to carry on talking to him to the end of her days if she wanted to. I talk to dead people all the time. I also told her I was envious that she had been loved all her life by a man who could dance.

She left me a lovely message. Just sometimes in my quirkiness I do the right thing.

P.S. I also want to plug the pub they used – The Anglesey Arms, HALNAKER, Chichester, PO18 ONQ.  Great food and service.  Lovely ambience with log fires.