Funeral

There are many times in one’s life, where you might find yourself, wondering about how your life is going and do you really matter or make any sort of a difference.  Today I found myself wondering such a thing – Not because I was finding that my depression had started kicking in again but as I sat between my husband and daughter in the second row of the Crematorium listening to a chosen few, say how much of an impact a certain beloved uncle, father and husband had had upon their lives.  I wondered if today had been my funeral, what would people say about me?

As I sat listening to friends and family relate stories of how Stuart had made them laugh, held their hand when they weren’t certain and been the rock that they could always lean on no matter the problem, I began to realise that maybe I didn’t know the man as well as I may have hoped.  That he wasn’t just the Jolly Uncle with the big white beard (that on the odd occasion resembled Father Christmas).  But to other people he had become so much more, and in doing these things Stuart had lead what could only have been a full and happy life.  No one’s life is a complete bed of roses, and just like every other person that you might wish to name, he had his health problems, times when things might not have been going as well as they could of.  But amidst all of this Stuart had always tried to be a good friend a loving husband and a wonderful and carrying father.  Furthermore I really don’t think that a person can ask for more.

So when my day does come and someone is standing up before my coffin and re-sighting tales about me, I hope I have proved to be at least as half as good, loving, wonderful and carrying person as Uncle Stuart had been in his life.

He was a very large man that everyone loved, cared for him and will now find that they have a large hole in their lives, that once this wonderful man had stood.

Dearest Stuart you will always be missed, but never forgotten

xxxx

Now List - 16 December 2011

Today is my birthday, as a child I loved the fact that my birthday was so close to Christmas, as people were in such high spirits and only too eager to help me celebrate, but as the years passed and my Adult years took over – my birthday being so close to Christmas became a pain.  We never seemed to have enough money in the house as I had concentrated too much on Christmas presents and helping Santa with his parcels. 

For the last 3 birthday’s I’ve taken the day off work, to spend time at home, only to find myself being nursemaid to my three children and husband who for some strange reason each year came down with horrible flu. So with the days counting down I really wasn’t holding out much hope for any kind of celebration.

However, 7am this morning, husband and children entered the bedroom in loud chorus of Happy Birthday and clutching an a ray of present in their arms.  What a wonderful surprise to wake to.  A new pair of earrings and a ring tree from my little girl – Jamie’s Great Britain recipe from  my middle child and the eldest had bought me the  Christmas Album by Michael Bublé.  My wonderful husband gave me two gifts – A heavy duty tripod that I’ve been looking at for ages and he gave me the gift of being able to knock off a item from my Now List.

I’ve given up counting how many times my family have been to Madam Tussauds and on each occasion over the years for one reason or another I have been unable to go as well – I’d heard many tales from the children about the wonderful statues  that  they had seen and have photographed.

Visiting Madam Tussauds had been high on my “Now List” hence you can imagine my delight as we drove to London and the car came to a halt outside said attraction. I couldn’t believe that it took us two hours to get around the exhibition, but I suppose the amount of times I exclaimed with delight someone else I’d seen and just must have a photo with helped with the amount of time we were there.  Only this week Madam Tussauds had added Colin Firth, Helen Mirren and Kate Winslet to their list of stars, each a must have a photo with.  The fact that we didn’t have the children with us, allowed us to visit the Scream section – a display and interaction of the macabre activities of the human race and some of them were quite fiendish.  The latest section that has been added to the exhibition was the cartoon strip “Marvel” and before departing the building we were witness to a 5 minutes 4D comic strip – So not only were we watching the wonders of Spiderman The Hulk etc but they were jumping out of the screen at us and movement of any time was enhanced with the movement of our chairs.  The amount of time the wind blew and we were drizzled with water, poked in the back and had to duck from flying debris just added to the audience delight.

I’ve had a wonderful day and thank my husband and three brilliant children for making it such.