Chief mourner

Angela Dunn

There can be no more bitter or wretched way to end a life than by a funeral with no mourners. What does that say about the tragedies or simple, sheer bad luck which must have dogged the deceaseds life to bring them to their last day on earth, un-mourned and, by extension, unloved?

I had gone to this old ladys funeral as a representative of my exs family, shocked and saddened that he wouldnt do so himself. I felt that, more than representing him, I was representing our young daughter, whose Great Aunt this woman was, though these two females had never met. A history of spinsterhood and, latterly, alcohol abuse, had brought the elder woman to a strange city, my home town, to be near her last living relative - my exs widowed mother. The kind and compassionate woman who brought her lonely sister-in-law to live in the same city as her would have been my own mother-in-law, had she lived. And had her son turned out to be more like the lovely person she was.

Anyway, this son blamed the strain of looking after his aunt for his mothers own early death. Consequently, he refused to attend the aunts funeral, in spite of my reminder that his mother would have been appalled at his dereliction of duty. So, I went instead. For his mother. For my daughter. From respect for all the women who have always shared the jobs of caring and of mourning, regardless of blood ties. I went expecting there to be perhaps one or two folk who had been flushed out by the death announcement in the local paper. I thought, at the very least, there would be staff members present from the Care Home where the aunt spent her last few months in this strange city. ... (continues)