None of us get out of this alive.
Posted by Jeni in | 23 July 2008
My fathers funeral was a farce.
He lived until he was 83.
From behind he looked as lithe as a boxer, from the side he looked as limber as a weight lifter, but from the front he looked his age. Although what does an 83 year old look like? His hair, dyed all his life, was now white, his teeth, like the stars, came out at night, but it was his legs that gave him away.
He had had surgery for his vericose veins, and because of his diabetes, his pins were wobbly and unsteady.
The man that had bullied, blustered and beligerently bluffed his way through life, finally gave up the fight.
I think it was three, it could have been four years ago, but his death was complex and his funeral inappropriate.
He had been born in 1921 in the East End of London. Both his parents were Jewish. He had 6 siblings, an enquiring mind and the khutspah of the middle born. It was his role, probably self defined, to go out and find food for the table.
He did it by means both fair and fowl.
Throughout his life he charmed and decieved. My mother and he were divorced in 1987 just after BB was born.
He spent the rest of his life in Luton with a woman who had secretly shared his life for years, so when it came to his death it fell on her to organise the funeral.
She was not Jewish, a fact that will become relevent later in this sorry tale.
January 22nd, Chinese new Year, I was just about to go on air with GFL when I had a text from my brother. Mr. Barnett senior was gasping for his last breath in Luton hospital. After much dithering I was given a mincab and sent off to Bedfordshire to sit at my fathers bedside.
I later was handed a bill for £77 for the fare - television execs. are compassionate beings...
I looked like an exotic actress, all made up for the show, with shiny hair and red stained lips. When I arrived at the hospital my glamorous image did not go unoticed I was, after all, dolled up for a Greek Wedding as opposed to a Jewish funeral.
I ran up to the first floor and was given a plastic apron and rubber gloves, although I was let off the marigold moment as one nurse remarked that it was too late anyway.
Apart from Cancer, I think he also had MRSA, but I'll never know. He was lying alone in an isolation ward off the main reception area. One bed, one table with a banana, a box of tissues, a blue plastic comb and tepid drinking water, the oxygen bubbles bounced about in the plastic jug.
He lay alone, his mouth open, his teeth out, his eyes closed. I stood at the end of the bed and stared at him. I walked to his left side, then his right. It took minutes before I could recognise him as my father. He was unconscious, but I had been told that the last sense to leave us was our hearing, so I started talking.
I talked for a long time. Through two nurses, who turned him over. An auxiliary who shouted at him, combed his hair and kissed him goodbye. I carried on talking through a cleaner who came to wipe the sink, tuned in Radio 3 and kissed him, they all loved him. I carried on my monologue through his Luton lover who argued with me and left in despair. I unloaded fifty years of frustration through daylight, twilight and darkness.
I sat next to him, stroking his hand. His arm was as thin and flat as a wooden ruler. As I stroked him I forgave him. Forgave him his misdeamenours, forgave him on behalf of myself, my brother, my mother, whether it was my job or not I did it, I spoke on behalf of all the absent people in his life.
I sat with him for a full 12 hours. Arriving at 11.00 and leaving at 11.00 when the Phillippino nurses came on shift. I walked right out of his room, realised I was going the wrong way so turned back and knew it would be the last time I ever saw him so I went back into his room. I bent to kiss him, the smell of death was on his breath.
A nurse had told me to watch the colour of his complexion, 'When it turns the colour of sour milk you know he is ready.' she had said.
When I went back into his room he was definitely on the turn. So I stretched over and kissed his forehead, on the blue scar where he had hung from a nail as a boy. There was his smell. The familiar, fancy smell of my father; cologne, hair oil and clean washhing. I did not cry as I left him.
I ran through the green corridors. The cold air outside was a blessed relief. Three hours later he died.
I vowed I would not go to his funeral but in the end I was persuaded to make a showing. Jim, BB and myself left for Luton crematorium on February 4th. The year still eludes me.
I sat behind my brother, his wife, my two nephews and in between two cousins. We were squashed up on the left hand side of the crematorium. On the right sat his, still living, brothers and sisters. The men wore their skull caps and the women expressions of grief. The service was a bad choice.
It was chosen by a Christian for a Christian. Jim understood it, but the rest of us floundered in our ignorance. The vicar said his piece, asked us to open our Ancient and Modern Hymn books to number 27. 'Amazing Grace', and join him in song. Jim and I were the only two who gave it any voice since no member of my Semitic tribe new the tune.
At the end of the service my cousin leant forward and asked me whether I was going to say something about my father. I didn't want to. I was asked again, I finally agreed. I blindly walked to the podium and made a speech of which I remember not one word. I had to ask Jim what I had said.
I remained standing as the congregation left. I looked at the vicar, he at me, I understood that I had to bid farwell to the assembled throng. So I extended my arm and shook hands with all the mourners as they left the room. At the end of the line were two women wearing green overalls. I asked if they had been his carers.
'No, Love.' they said. 'We're from Ladbrokes.'
Apparently my father placed a bet every day.
'He was a lovely old man.' they said. 'We loved him.'
My father's ashes remained on the shelf in the funeral parlour for months until I threatened to come and get them myself. His lover, who he had secretly married a few days before he died, owned the rights to his life. She came and collected the plastic urn lest I got there before her. That was the last I heard of him and her.
On February 5th we attended another funeral, the father of BB's best friend. It could not have been more different. Crowds of people, bouquets of flowers, noise, laughter it was a celebration of a life.. The self-same service was conducted including Hymn no.27. When Jim whispered that he preferred the Sussex version to the Bedfordshire rendition I started to giggle. Like a virus he caught it. We shook with laughter when BB turned to us we had to pretend that we were shaking with grief.
And in a way we were. It was some kind of cathartic release. To be able to laugh in the face of my father's death.
That night we went to see Ewan McGregor in 'Big Fish'. I fell asleep only to be awoken to Hymn Number 27, it was only then that I cred.
I cried at the loss of my father, the loss of a parent, the loss of my youth.
Today I interviewed Chantal Rickards, who has set up a bereavement website called www.lasting post.com. She lost many family members and two neighbours over a very short period of time. Her website is there for anybody who needs any kind of information, whether emotional or practical.
I have no idea where my father is now, but I have learnt that when I go 'I want to go like Elsie' or my mentor Betty Marsden. With a drink in my hand, mid dirty joke, with a congregation full of people laughing, crying and singing along to 'There's no Business like Showbusness.'
There wont be a dry eye in the house.
Jeni Barnett tells of her scrumptious time at Good Food Live in her first audiobook! Download NOW from iTunes
Comments
But we are not letting you go for a while!
Love
Chrissie
It's a Humanist funeral for me, I've been to too many Christian funerals where the vicar/priest didn't know the person at all and it was a farce half the time. At least at a Humanist "do" you get loved ones talking about the deceased, and you get to pick your own music (even if you can't hear it yourself, well maybe you can?!
Good to have you back Missus, xx Fee xx
The most touching and profound blog I think you've ever written. Hats of Mrs B for sharing such a touching experience and in a such lucid, engaging and wonderful way.
I can't remember much of my dad'd funeral except family feuds and was distraught thru my mums 2 yrs earlier yet it is only now 2 yrs on that i miss them more than i did at the time they died why is that ???? Is it because no matter how old we are we still feel like orphans once our parents have gone ???? - anyway Jen chin up i'm off to watch my dvd of GFL highlights :):) Cathy xx
P.S.
Dear Mrs. Jones,
Nobody said there was anything wrong with Bridlington! If you read the blog with less cynicism you would realise that people are positive and supportive of both Jeni (she might need a cheery word from time to time) and other readers who might have problems you know nothing about.
Life is a mirror Mrs. Jones. Smile at it and you might find it smiles back.
Chrissie x x
Jeni,
very moving and thought provoking for so many people. My father hit 80 earlier this year and I know I'll feel the same as you when it's his turn to part company with this world. Will I be upset? No! will I feel guilty about not feeling upset? No! How will I feel God knows how many years later? Just read the your blog, that's probably how I'll feel, laughter through the tears....
Hymie xx
Your beautiful words describe such a pain. I thank God both my parents are still alive. Dad is 84 and Ma is 78. Both are frail but full of fight!
Fee, you're right. I also have been to many a funeral where the vicar/minister didn't know the person. The problem is the person didn't want to be known by the church in life, so why on earth do families insist on having a religious funeral? A minister I know always feels totally out of place conducting a funeral for unbelievers. Like he says, it's hypocrasy.
