Sarah went to a funeral today. Not the greatest of events to write about, but this one deserves a special mention for all the wrong reasons. Sarah's aunt died about ten days ago and with Ellie at camp, Rhiannon at school and me being me, she decided to go with her parents - which is a recipe for something happening in theory alone.Sarah's parents are incredibly frustrating mostly because they're just getting old, but not so old they can be excused for being belligerent. The biggest thing on my list is her old mans driving. I swear, most times I think I would rather get in a car with a drinker. They arrived at the crematorium barely alive. Her folks are in one of those situations where they can't do anything alone. They do absolutely everything together. This is bad. He 'drives' the car, but she navigates. That's right, he moves the wheel, the stick and presses the pedals, but she watches where they're going... So they arrive at the big C and as he's trying to park up, Sarah asks her mum a question. Thus because she's now talking to Sarah, he can't 'see' where he's going and as he's maneuvering the car into a space pretty much blind when he backs into a car.
Not just any old car. The hearse with the body in it.
"Dad, you've just backed into the hearse!" Silence "Dad, did you not see the hearse behind you?" More silence as he now moves the car to a different parking space away from the accident. Sarah swears he knows there was nobody looking and decided to avoid the responsibility of owning up by hiding.
A short time later, during the service itself, Sarah's mother leans over to Sarah and says, probably rather louder than she would have liked: "Where do the flames come from? I can't see where the fire would come out." You can't make this stuff up, I swear.
I don't get this Christian way of living. He's also a manic depressive. Neither of these things can possibly excuse driving away from an accident - even if the occupants are already dead! There could have been a person there and I know for a fact, he would have done exactly the same thing because it's what always happens. The kids have been banned from the car for years in my presence but Sarah has also banned them now. Is it possible to have somebody's licence taken away from them? I know I have a tendency to brand all Christians with the same brush on the basis of how I see them behave, but I'm sure that thinking God will sort absolutely everything out is not bloody healthy whichever way you slice it.
There's a great post script to the story though. Yesterday, her aunt's sister went to the chapel of rest and, on finding nobody there, went in to do her thing with her sis. A short time later, she came out only to run into the funeral director who nearly had a cardiac right there and then. Sarah never knew her aunt even had a twin sister either.
Clip of the Day: Blood Red Sandman | Lordi
