A complicated life, well-lived

Some days you feel more connected to the world than others, and Thursday was one of them. On my way home at 9.30pm, after a day that had started at 5.30am, I stopped to talk to a dog (normal), and then without thinking batted a balloon back into play for some teenagers playing balloon tennis (not at all normal).

I felt more connected to the world because I had participated in marking someone else’s life: singing at a memorial service for T’s 90-year old father. It was an extraordinary life, and in a small way an extraordinary day.

Arriving bleary-eyed at Waterloo, we emerged from the crowd in ones and twos until about twenty of us were there, clutching cardboard cups of tea and coffee. We don’t all know each other well, but we instinctively stuck together, bound by a common purpose and the exigencies of the Isle of Wight catamaran timetable. We chatted, did crosswords, marked up little bits of music: you could feel the group shift and resettle, slightly nervy.

It’s a long way from London to the Isle of Wight. Not so much in miles, as in difference – flowering hedges and stuccoed houses called Sea View. The church was warm and full of small signs of what was going to happen (“Don’t sit there – those chairs are for the standard-bearers!”). We rehearsed: everyone wanting this to go well for T, but at first woefully flat and unmusical. Finally, like clouds parting or a headache lifting, it started to go better and a palpable feeling of relief spread through the group: it was going to be OK.

A rushed lunch, and then back for the service. Is there any more fraudulent feeling than walking through a guard of honour (naval, in this case) to which one is not entitled? No matter how calmly you try to walk, you’re scuttling apologetically inside. The church full of young and old, and many medals and banners.

And the eulogies, split between his naval career and his family. What were you doing when you were 24? This man was commanding a squadron of the Fleet Air Arm in the Second World War and was referred to, quite naturally, by his men as “The Skipper”. Swinging between affection and admiration (less of the latter for his driving skills, apparently, which owed too much to his abilities as a fighter pilot – scattered laughter from the many there who had clearly experienced it). I am always drawn to people who are described as not suffering fools gladly – and he was thus described by at least three people in the space of an hour and half. Less keen on the interdiction on women with sunglasses on the tops of their heads (and very glad that for once I had remembered to take mine off), and frankly baffled by the hatred of “certain episodes of EastEnders”.

Unexpectedly, it wasn’t T’s speech that had us reaching for the Kleenex, but his older brother’s. Lucky, really, as we had to sing straight after. We sang O For the Wings of a Dove (first time ever, for me, and chosen because T’s father had sung it as a choirboy), Faure’s In Paradisum, Walford Davies’ beautiful God Be In My Head and T’s own setting of the Compline prayer:

Be present, o merciful God, and protect us through the silent hours of this night: so we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this fleeting world may rest upon thy eternal changelessness.

There was a silence when we finished – of surprise? Of peace? Satisfaction? I don’t know. “Should one applaud?” muttered one of the bemedalled crowd as we trooped back to our pew. They did. We should have been applauding them. Two minutes later, after the bidding prayer, the whole church was laughing at the final organ music – A Life on the Ocean Wave (followed by Crown Imperial), as we filed out slowly into the churchyard.

This was to be the big moment – a flypast by the remaining Seafire (naval Spitfire) plane. We were all listening out for the sound of the engine (“It could be, or there could be a lawnmower coming round the bend”, remarked H at one of the false alarms). Then there it was – small, noisy and incredibly moving. The plane flew low over the church, circled and wheeled around, rolled lazily over in the sky, and was gone again, back to its base in the West Country, as the sun suddenly came out from behind the clouds. Everyone was gasping, clapping, holding out their arms as if hoping to touch it. It was like the Second Coming.

We sang again at the reception afterwards, including Over the Rainbow. In my mind, this is linked to the last of the readings at the service, High Flight (http://www.deltaweb.co.uk/spitfire/hiflight.htm) - a world above and beyond the one most of us inhabit.

Back to the ferry – again, we narrowly missed one and had to wait at the terminal –rather a cattle-truck experience. A race on board to get the sundeck seats (success!), and the people sitting on the other side of the gangway were treated to Moon River and Let’s Do It, both of which they (and we) enjoyed. As they applauded, R explained cheerfully, “We’ve just been to a funeral – no, really, we HAVE….”, causing laughter on both sides. On to the train (consternation when we thought that we wouldn’t be able to get any drinks – R the hero of the hour for dashing off to buy a random assortment of mini wine bottles). The train cut through the Hampshire countryside, and it wouldn’t have been at all surprising to see the Seafire again, wheeling above. Instead, as we pulled out of Woking station, we saw a partial rainbow, startling in its intensity. As D said, “Looks like he must have approved”