I did my ninth funeral yesterday, number ten tomorrow.  I like to arrive at least an hour early, to be on the safe side, so I took a camera with me to Mansfield Crematorium to keep me occupied while I waited.  That's me reflected in the entrance doors to one of the "chapels".  It's an odd coincidence that I'm doing many of my services not far from where dad was brought up in Pleasley.  In fact a couple of weeks ago I did a service for a retired miner who may have been working at Pleasley Colliery in 1940/41, when my dad worked there briefly.  As a result of taking miner's funerals I've learnt more about them and the industry and its record of industrial accidents and diseases. Wandering around the Crematorium grounds, as I often do, I've frequently seen rabbits nibbling at the discarded wreaths and bouquets and yesterday I got a photo of one.  I guess there are worse ways to use so-called "floral tributes" than as food for bunnies. I...

I got a call from the estate agent yesterday saying that my buyers, following their surveyor's report, had a number of "concerns".  Then this morning I got a second call to say they'd withdrawn.  The issues raised were actually not very major and I think the truth is they were in a panic.  This is the second sale their withdrawn from.  I'm trying to be philosophical, but it's frustrating.  Psychologically I need to move on from this little bungalow, surrounded by dad's stuff. It seems amazing that it's only four months since I was in Borneo with Sue.  Right now I could do with some of that heat to warm my bones.

I bit the bullet and put dad's house up for sale last Friday.  An older couple came round on Tuesday and found the place "charming" and within two hours had offered the full asking price.  Sometimes you just don't know how you feel about something 'till it happens and in this case my first feeling was delight. Faced with the prospect of getting out of dad's bungalow I dreamed of going back to Italy and leaving behind my celebrancy work for now.  Later I put things in perspective and began to see my celebrancy work in this area as a kind of apprenticeship to be continued for now, but not indefinitely. Today I felt very sad and disorientated as I looked around the bungalow and thought that in the forseeable future I would be leaving it and with it many memories of my father.  He lived here for over twenty years and for much of that time was actually pretty happy.  The couple who are buying, assuming the sale goes through are at a similar stage of life as ...