Guilty says the conscience

Mid-afternoon it dawns upon us it is nearly time for the Bat's funeral. We feel a bit guilty about not going. But it's not as though we knew him that well. We knew of him through mutual friends, met him a few times but not really sufficiently to regard him as our friend. We would have gone to support PD but Lin, his wife, had managed to rearrange the looking after the grandchildren so she could go to the funeral as well. 

We don't like to think of the Bat's passing being unnoticed. There's something particularly grim about funerals where only a couple of people turn up, but in this case we knew a fair number were intending to go. After the service refreshments were going to be put on at the Pub & they had been asked to cater for 40-50. So we didn't go, just thought about the living Bat.

We're equally feeling a bit guilty about not going to my cousin's funeral, which is happening today. After all, she was family even if I can't remember ever even meeting her. When I spoke to my cousin Ann at the weekend & said as much, she pointed out this particular cousin was at my cousin Bridget's wedding. I had to point out I wasn't at Bridget's wedding. I saw Bridget when she was about 1, the summer of 1972, just before I went off to university. The next time I saw Bridget was at Ann's father's funeral in 2000 when Bridget was already married & the mother of one child.

We've also dismissed this funeral as we feel it's more important for the Fox to keep up his strength for such a long drive as the one to Stoke. We're half-expecting to feel the need to go down to see Ann if she does need support & encouragement if she does indeed have cancer. Or for that matter if her husband needs help through this spell. So we're staying put.

On a more cheerful note, I can't help noticing we don't seem to have had many fireworks going off this year. Is this a sign of the continuing recession & the lack of money to burn? Or is it simply the fact that, for once, Bonfire Night is coming at the weekend so everyone is intending to celebrate it on the day? So often of late it has come midweek, when children are at school, with the result so people have celebrated the week before, others the week after. The fact fireworks keep going off encourages children to want to have them all week long. I suspect it may be the former as our local Morrisons hasn't had such a big display of fireworks for sale this year, & I've certainly not seen queues of prospective buyers lining up to purchase. I wonder which it is. I'm just grateful for the peace & quiet, though I did enjoy one display earlier in the week - some very pretty colours.