Big Sweater Days

As we work tirelessly and relatively frantically towards my dad's funeral on Wednesday, it's weird to see how thoroughly he was, and is, the real Disappearing Man. I've spent days disconnecting him from the life support of connection to the outside world - magazine subscriptions, coin collections, membership organisations, pension providers and the like. Today, Ma and Geraint are down the garage, confronted by assorted metal oceans of what, though undoubtedly useful and meaningful to Dad, are to the rest of us, without his skills in the world, Utterly Bleedin' Useless. They've just rung a scrap merchant to take some of this assorted metallic detritus to, and given away a chest freezer. As you do...

Part of this general getting-of-space-to-breathe is also a sort of clothing giveaway - clothes that he bought before shrinking under the weight of illness, and never put on in the most part - Ger's got a jacket and shirt, and at the moment, I seem to be inheriting sweaters. Big comfy winter sweaters. While it's not entirely beyond me to whinge, along the lines of "Oh sure, give the fat fuck all the comfy sweaters!", this would probably rank as the Stupidest Whinge of the Century, biology and fat fuckery being what they undoubtedly are, so I'm absolutely not going to bother. Fact is, right now, while it's not exactly Big Sweater Weather (except in the mornings, when it certainly is), these big comfy sweaters are something of a not-exactly-God-send. A Deathsend? No, that sounds monstrous. What I mean is, I'm pretty grateful for them. Not, as I said, because I'm a shivering little snowdrop, all cold and unprotected against the Arctic blast, but more because my body is re-assuming a kind of Weebloid, or at least Wombloid (Non-Brits, look up the Wombles - even on this blog if you like - for this reference) shape, and it's good to have something fairly formal-looking that once belonged to a good tall man. Tall men and short fat fucks have a lot more in common than people might assume. If it has to cover a greater area vertically, there's at least a reasonable chance of it working to cover an expanded area horizontally too.

All of this serves to strip away the layers of surreality that have been surrounding us for weeks now. Wednesday is Just There, like the heartbeat of a big throbbing creature, threatening to swallow us up. The Order of Service for his funeral came across to us today. I've given the details out myself, time and time and time again, and yet somehow, they haven't seemed like A Real Thing...you know, that will be Happening To Us. But it is. I'm wearing his sweater - not as a loan till he comes home, but as a kind of woolen inheritance, because he never is coming home.

Going away now, to take some good deep breaths in and out.