“Well Francis my friend, that was a pleasant kind of morning, don’t you think?”
“Oh yes, certainly.  You can’t beat a good funeral, can you?”
“No, you can’t.  Indeed you can’t.  Providing, of course, that it’s done right.”
“Oh yes, has to be done right.”
“Proper mourning.  None of that happy-clappy nonsense.  Proper solemn hymns.  I like a good hymn.”
“Traditional, yes.  A good traditional hymn, where the words don’t fit the tune properly and the verses don’t rhyme unless you pronounce them wrong.”
“Yes, nothing worse than being asked to sing something that sounds like it might have been written by Gary bloody Barlow.  I am at a funeral, not a Take That concert.  I do not wish to clap along.  I do not wish to shake my hips.  I do not want my vicar to wear a kaftan.”
“And I don’t want to celebrate the life of the dearly departed either: he was a miserable bugger anyway.  Wouldn’t have appreciated a good joke at his own expense when he was alive, let alone now he’s in a box.”
“You knew him then?”
“Who?”
“The fella in the box.”
“No, no… not at all.  I was just generalising.  I didn’t recognise a soul.  I thought the widow was very dignified though.”
“Even when they had to lower her down into the grave to get her bracelet out.”
“Always a perilous business, chucking soil down into a hole.  Fraught with danger…”
“Nice to get out in the fresh air though.  Get a bit of sunshine.”
“Definitely, beats a cremation.  Who wants to sit indoors for twenty minutes just to see the curtain come around and knock the flowers over?  Who wants to listen to the corpse’s favourite song when you could be on your feet banging out ‘Jerusalem’?”
“…Did I see you putting money in the collection, by the way?”
“Changing really.  Couple of those coins in there that you can sell on Ebay, so I swapped them for a couple of bog-standard.  Nobody loses out and possibly I might make a bob or two.  Silver linings and all that.”
“Do you know how to put them on Ebay?”
“Not a clue, but still, better in my pocket than the vicar’s.”
“Have you ever considered your own funeral, my friend?”
“How so?”
“Well, what hymns you would have, what prayers… who would read your eulogy?”
“I don’t suppose it will be you: you’re three years older than me.”
“Fitter mind.”
“Do you reckon?”
“I traipse half way across the estate and up the stairs to your flat every day.  All you ever manage is a stroll to the pub.”
“I walk a lot faster than you.  You dawdle.  Dawdle, dawdle, dawdle, like you’ve not a care in the world… Mind you, there’s no doubt why you want me to get to the bar before you, is there?”
“Nor why you never decide to have a pie until the second pint.  ‘Oh look, it’s Benny’s round.  I think I quite fancy a chomp on a chicken & mushroom.’”
“…I’ve written it all down, you know.”
“What?”
“My funeral wishes.”
“What on Earth for?  What does it matter?  You won’t be there, will you?  Listening, I mean, or watching.  Well, you’ll be there of course… unless you’ve been lost at sea or something.  Unless you’ve just wandered off.  ‘Police are making enquiries about the whereabouts of Francis Collins – known to his friends as ‘Tight Bastard’ – who they believe was trying to walk his way out of buying peanuts…’ but you won’t know what’s going on, will you?  They could be singing a selection from Abba for all you’ll care.”
“No, no.  I want it to be right, you know.  I expect all of my friends will be dead by then – you’ll be long gone – and I want to make sure that I don’t repeat mistakes, you know.”
“Mistakes?”
“Well, look at that funeral we went to last week.”
“The one at the chapel?”
“Yes, the one with the paste-table for an altar.”
“It wasn’t a paste-table Frank.”
“It was made of hardboard!”
“It was not.  Granted, it was sagging a little bit in the middle, but a paste-table it was not.  Have you any idea how heavy all that silver is?”
“Well, no.  Now that you mention it, Frankie, I do not.  I have never lifted any.  Tell me old friend, have you and, if so, when?  Perhaps you could fill me in on the circumstances.”
“I have seen it being lifted on the Antiques Roadshow.  Comment is often passed viz-a-viz the weight.  ‘A fine example,’ they say.  ‘Full of… decoration… and… very heavy.’”
“Yes, well whatever, the service was much too long and I didn’t know a single word of any of the hymns.”
“Nor the tunes.”
“Nor the tunes indeed my friend.”
“Lovely wake though.  Corned beef sandwiches and pickled onions.  Trifle.  Lovely.”
“Yes, nice food, I’ll give you that.  Good spread.”
“No free bar though.”
“No, shame that.  Fortunate you had your hip flask.”
“Indeed.  My many years of Dib-Dib-Dobbing not entirely wasted Frankie my boy.  Always prepared.”
“So, don’t you have any last wishes then?”
“Well, nothing special.  I want to be buried, not burned: the surgeon told me that this new hip will last a hundred years – I wouldn’t want that to go up in flames, now would I?  …And I don’t want a photograph of me looking startled on the front of the Order of Service.  Why do people always pick ‘amusing’ photos?  I want a picture of me looking serious, sombre like, you know.”
“When did you last have your photograph taken, Benny?”
“Well, I don’t know.  I had a passport back in the day.  I must have had a photograph then.”
“Your passport ran out in the eighties.  Have you not had a photograph taken since then?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, what on earth are they going to put on your pamphlet then?  A drawing?  A photo-fit?”
“Well, I don’t know.  I always thought they might take one after I… After, you know.”
“Oh yes, that’ll be nice won’t it.  ‘Ah look at him on that photo.  He looks really… dead.’  Classy.  ‘You can see where the cat chewed the end of his nose off.’”
“Are you suggesting that I should have my photograph taken now, in case I die suddenly?”
“Well, it would save a lot of bother, wouldn’t it?  Tell you what, I could do it on my phone I think.”
“Could you?  Do you know how?”
“Well no, but how difficult can it be?  Look, there’s a little picture of a camera there.”
“Well, press that then.”
“Alright, alright, I will.  There…  Oh look, it’s me!”
“You need to turn it round.”
“Now I can’t see the screen.”
“I can.”
“Oh, shall I press the button then?”
“Yes.”
“Right… Which one?”
“I don’t know.  Let me see.  What about this one?  Oh… That’s your ear.  That won’t do.  We’ll need to practice a bit, don’t you think?  I don’t want to be buried with everybody thinking that I looked like your left ear.”
“Yes, you’re right.  It’s not urgent anyway.” 
“No, I’m not ready to say my ‘goodbyes’ just yet.  It can wait.”
“Shall we just take a little stroll down to the pub?”
“Yes, a fine idea my friend.  Lead on MacDuff, lead on…”

First published 22.04.22