When I was younger and my grandparents had just retired I asked them about what wonderful things they were going to do now they were officially old. Fart in public and not give a toss? Snoozing whilst watching Countdown? Drinking copious amounts of wine until you get so hammered you start to talk like Danny 'fucking' Dyer. It in all fairness was a mixture of all of the above but when I grew up and asked them what the worst thing about getting old was my Nanny Pumpkin replied this ...
"When your young you don't think fashion it too much; A pair of comfy jeans here, cosy jumper there, maybe even a stunning ballgown once or twice in a lifetime. But the older you get the more and more you seem to have no choice but to reach into the wardrobe and bring out that same black dress you wore last time you went to say goodbye to someone you knew who is no longer there,"
In all fairness at the tender age of about fourteen I didn't full understand what she meant by that but as I have got a little older, and maybe a little wiser too, I have learnt that it is truest thing and as sure as anything it is what I will be doing tomorrow for a character no one will forget.
Phone ringing again for the third time I wondered why, after all this time of being in a new job, Mr. Warehouse still insists to call me about three-in-the-afternoon once he has finished work. Ignoring it previously thinking it was simply about dinner or where I have hidden something of his, this time I dashed to the toilet in order to take the call.
"Whats up you know I cant answer at work?" I asked, concerned yet anxious I had a lot of work to get back to.
"Its my Mom's Cousin. He's been in a car accident, Its really bad. He's Dead!" I heard sheepishly down the phone. Thinking it was a joke I called my boyfriend sick and told him to stop messing around tempting fate and all. But he said it again and this time it was deeper and more choked than the last.
For legal reasons we cant state too much but what we do know is that it was a collision involving a lorry and several cars, one of which we are under the impression that the driver was over the drink drive limit (as if there should even fucking be one that is). I will never understand sometimes why people still to this day continue to put other peoples lives at risk, and I say other peoples for a reason and that is in most cases the drink driver is so floppy and intoxicated that their bodies do not tense and seize up as a normal person would when bracing for a car crash.
But unlike most families (Or maybe not as my family is quite small) Mr. Warehouse and his family on both his mothers and fathers sides like to breed and with this comes children who will be brothers, sisters, cousins, second cousins, aunts and uncles, all very close in both age and as a group. Cousins and second cousins are more like extensions of brothers and sisters or aunts and uncles for Mr. Warehouse and his family and what with them being so close they experience everything from celebrating the good times to mourning the bad ones too, everybody as one riding out the roller-coaster together.
Standing there in the bathroom at work, my thoughts immediately turned to his wife and children, grown up now but forever his babies. It had only been eighteen-months or so ago that the deceased and his wife had got married. It was one of the first family events I ever went too as Mr. Warehouse's girlfriend and it was the very first wedding I had been invited to. Nervous after reading the invite I shook it off and said it was silly we had only been dating a few months, I couldn't be invited to such a thing and be in all the photos, What if Mr. Warehouse and I were to break up? That would be awful then, you have some random in all your snaps. No thanks?! But nevertheless I came round to the idea and even was asked up to be in the photographs, albeit I was approached as Mr. Warehouse's Wife, something we all still laugh about today. I will never forget both the Bride and the recently departed Groom's hospitality, making me fell welcome and loved even though I was surrounded by many I never knew.
Mr. Warehouse's Second -Cousin was more like an Uncle to him, taking him fishing or to play pool and darts but every time I met him and his wife, they would be forever asking when mine and Mr. Warehouse's big day was and always complimenting me on how beautiful and lovely I was. I remember them saying how sad it is that they both had to go through failed marriages to meet each other and if only they had fallen in love sooner they could have had more time, but it was always ended by a notion that they have the rest of their lives with each other. And that is the truly saddest part, is that they didn't. A devastating irony.
Sitting back at my desk trying to take it all in I was really emotional and upset by it and they weren't even my family. I had met them a handful of times but their energy and enthusiasm for everything including each other was just electric. And now that was gone. I could not think of anything more that they were the same ans Mr. Warehouse and I. Ready for Christmas (at the time less than a five-days away) with presents wrapped, stockings packed and plans all made. Plans that would never be fulfilled and with stockings and presents that were never to be emptied and unwrapped. All gone. And so tomorrow I will attend Gorfield Village Church to pay my respects for a man who could never believe I was a Luton girl through and through. Goodnight and sleep tight!
'Til next time, Love A.Lou xx
No comments:
Post a Comment