Closing A Chapter

All the best films starting with a scene set in a cemetery seem to go for rainy weather. A small group dressed in black, under umbrellas, gathered around an open hole in the ground as a pastor says a few words from the little black book, and the casket is lowered into the grave. Sobs and sympathy all round, flowers and earth on the wooden box, and off we all go. There follows the usual words as people walk off, or the detective in charge comments to the Sergeant, or the lover races up to the waiting limousine hoping that now the time has come.

I am at the age where this scene plays out rather more, where people I have known for my entire life, normally, would be the ones disappearing in that wooden casket, and all the others, tears in their eyes, would be looking about them, wondering who they can get under the earth next. Or, as the Americans seem to say: wondering who will be unalive next, a term which I really abhor, and which serves no purpose whatsoever. I recently saw a video where the promoter, influencer, whatever, where the person talking said someone had been unalived, and that is the end of my love for this abuse of language.

To be honest, though, while I am at this age where one might expect friends and relations of a similar age to be departing into the great unknown, there is no one here, and has been no one for many years, who I can say has been a part of even a small segment of my life. I rebuild every few years, find new friends and acquaintances, and those of the past remain merely as memories, I have no knowledge of where they are now, whether they are alive or not. Or, just to shock my American readers: whether they are dead. There. I said it. The word.

There was a time, probably about three thousand years ago, where death was taken as much for granted as life was. Where humanity accepted that there is something of a cycle, and that each part of that cycle is definite, unavoidable. A person – a life form – is born, lives for a period of time, and then dies. Gilgamesh and all the others can search to the ends of the Earth for as long as they please, for as long as their mortal legs will support them, there is nothing else to look forward to. There is only the here and now, and it is this time, in the eternal cycle of things, which is our time, and which we should make the most of.

We might, in our own way, leave some sort of memorial to our existence, to our passing this way, or we might not. There could be a massive castle built, high on a hill, which carries our name, or is haunted by the remains of our story. Or perhaps not. In fact, I’d tend toward the not; very few of us are going to live on in the memory of others, in the history of the world, as an Alexander the Great, a Homer or Sinbad. Someone else will take our place, those who were around us will move on and continue with their lives, the image of our face will fade from memory. It is the normal cycle of things. And, even so, we will have left something of ourselves behind after the body is turned to dust. A memory, a good deed, children who carry our bloodline further.

Today is the day someone I knew will be placed under that clod of soil. Their life is complete, their presence is now merely a memory – and all the collected material things left behind – and the world will move on. For a while, in the chapel, we will remember their work, their friendship, perhaps even a few of the not quite so pleasant moments between us. And then, as the first rose petals and handfuls of earth fall onto the urn, we will turn, say a few words of condolence to the immediate family, and return to our own lives. And, yes, the forecast is for rain.

Image © Urban Camera.