Wierd people

Even now, almost 18 months later, I’m never quite sure whether I will laugh or be outraged at his attitude when I remember the 90 mins spent in his company.

I wanted a Woodland burial. I can’t remember why – it was just something I’d decided on after reading some article when sitting in the dentist’s waiting room years earlier. I knew I couldn’t bear the thought of Al being set on fire. Every time someone said, “Are you having him cremated?” as if it were the default option, I imagined his flesh on fire and felt sick. I also hated the thought of him lying in some dark cemetery where the gravestones served mainly as a magnet to vandals with a grave that would slowly become abandoned and unkempt after I became unable to tend it.

A Woodland burial just felt right. I did a little Googling - as you do when your son has just died and you’re in shock and looking for something/anything to focus on which doesn’t involve picturing him at the very moment the car smashed into him.

Anyway, I found three Woodland burial grounds in the county. I dismissed one as too far away, and filed another under ‘exactly where is that?’ Eventually, that was the one I settled on. It’s a lovely place, which is just as I imagined a woodland burial ground should be. It’s set on the hillside overlooking a beautiful valley close to where I picnicked as a child, and just 10 minutes away from where I work. Although I don’t often visit, mainly because I feel so impotent when I do, it feels peaceful and tranquil and the right place for Al to be.

However, before deciding on this one, I decided to visit one around 10 miles away from home. My sister accompanied me – for once, I really needed her with me. She’d informed me that she was coming home with me the night that Al died and couldn’t be persuaded that I really needed to be alone so I’d held in the tears and hysteria because she was there and I didn’t know how to let myself just be if someone else was there. I’d lost count of the number of times she’d said, “It’s OK to cry” which was always followed by me saying, “Yes I know.” But not saying, “Well if you’d just go away, I’d be able to.” Yes, it was true to say that I’d been desperate for her to go but today - just for today - I was grateful for her company.

We arrived at the burial ground, having been on another errand en route and having forgotten the directions and address. I forgot lots of things that week. Fortunately, I had my trusty SatNav so we got there without any trouble. However, I’d also forgotten that I’d written down that I must park in a particular place and instead pulled into the driveway. A man in a dark suit exited the house and informed me I was parked in the wrong place. I apologised and said I was here to see a burial ground but must have come to the wrong place as I’d left the directions at home. He corrected me. “No you’ve come to the right place but I specifically told you to park over the road and not here.” I apologised, feeling like a naughty schoolgirl, and offered to move the car. The response, a deep sigh, was followed by the grudgingly delivered comment, “Never mind, I suppose it’ll do there - but if you can remember for next time...”

We were instructed to follow him across a field. As we walked, he explained that this was the next burial ground, which would be used once the first was full. We then entered the next field. I’d been expected a Wood. I’d imagined it to be akin to Enid Blyton’s, ‘Enchanted Wood’. OK I wasn’t expecting to find a ‘Magic Faraway Tree’ at the centre of it but I was expecting a few trees that somehow resembled a wood. What we were presented with was a field containing around half a dozen saplings, which were dotted at regular intervals. Each tree was placed at the centre of several graves, which radiated out from the tree like the spokes on a bicycle wheel from the centre cog. There were no flowers and the grass surrounding each tree was neatly cut. This wasn’t what I’d pictured at all. Had I completely misunderstood what a Woodland Burial Ground was?

The conversation that followed was almost Pythonesque in flavour. Afterwards, as we laughed hysterically, I wondered if Peter Kaye might want a transcript.

"Now love - See that grave? This is a funny one – you’ll laugh when I tell you. He bought it for him and his wife, but he left her and set up with another woman. And then he died. Anyway, she’s had the last laugh – she bought the one next to him."

We were speechless.

"Now ... see this one? Hung himself! Only young he was. And I’ve one over there – a lad – another young un like yours - who come off a bike. Eeh they just won’t learn about speed will they?”

I couldn’t see how my Al could be buried here. I felt sure he would say to someone, “See that one there – a lad who got run over by a taxi.” And I couldn’t bear my precious boy to be gossiped about in such a cavalier and heartless manner.

"Can you see this grave? It belongs to a lady –her husband comes three times a week. He just stands at the side of the grave looking at it and rocking back and forwards on his heels. He’s there for a couple of hours each time at least – just rocking back and forwards, back and forwards. Can you see the dent in the grass where he rocks? (Rolls eyes) I’ll have to get the roller on it."

It was a beautiful sunny day. There were just a few cotton wool balls of cloud in a sky of cornflower blue. It was so quiet and peaceful. I was thinking, “If it weren’t for this idiot, I guess I could be OK with Al here.” The birds were chirping and tweeting, the sun shone and I felt strangely calm. My sister asked, “Do you get much wildlife round here?”

His response nearly floored us. We expected him to wax lyrical about rare breeds of birds or tell us that they were almost tame and would eat out of your hand. Instead we heard, “We had loads of rabbits – but we soon got shot of them when we got a cat.”

He then said, “I’ve known sorrow.” Thumbing his head towards the young woman dressed in black who had silently accompanied us as he said “She’d cancer when she was a baby – that’s why she’s so short.”

We weren’t at all sure how to respond to this but both smiled politely and made noises about the wonders of modern medicine.

I said I wanted a cardboard or wicker coffin but was surprised to hear him give a sharp intake of breath and tell me he wouldn’t recommend that. I asked why not and said I wanted something that was eco friendly. He said that it wasn’t “the right time of year for that. Now we do some nice ones right here on site which are very reasonable.” I asked how it could be the wrong time of year for an eco friendly coffin. He said “Bodily fluids! Leakages! It’s warm right now and the smell – Well I wouldn’t like be next to a grave if the body were in that kind of coffin. It’s hard to keep them cool enough at the moment.” I said that I thought they would be refrigerated but he said it would still be difficult as the weather was so warm, “and do you really want to put your mourners through smelling a corpse?”

I asked about the possibility of a Humanist funeral. He wasn’t keen and said that Humanist funerals tended to be rather droll – as if this were a bad thing. My sister clearly had no idea what the word meant because she said, “Oh no - you don’t want that.” She was surprised when I countered with, “Yes I do – he was a young lad and I don’t want all doom and gloom. I want people to smile when they think of him.” He said, “Well it takes all sorts.”

He was keen for us to make use of the Methodist church right next to the burial ground. I said I really wanted a Humanist funeral. He said that if we made use of the church building, we’d have to include a religious element. I said that wasn’t a possibility. He tutted.

We’d heard enough and I said I wanted to think through my options. We walked back towards my car and into the house to get written info. I’d already decided that Al was not being buried there but politely waited to be given the info. He then gave me a price for a funeral and said, “Now that’s bare minimum but I can cut it by a bit more if you keep things simple and don’t ask for anything complicated or awkward.”

After he gave us a blow by-blow account of his older daughter’s mental breakdown, we left. Oddly enough, we didn’t go back.