I come in from the back garden weary and filthy to stroll over to the front window and watch the sun set. Outside I see a huge, shiny black car vie for a parking slot in front of my neighbour’s house. Good lord! A hearse can only mean one thing!
I dash to the door to rush over and see what can be done. I hover. I’m only a neighbour. I can’t just waltz in without so much as a by your leave at such a private moment. I can’t stay here and not offer whatever it is I might dredge up to offer. I can’t go over dressed like this, but no-one will care about what a neighbour is wearing at such a time. What will I say, what can I do? What would my mother say, or do for that matter? I stop talking to myself and plunge out the door. Little voices pursue me down the path. It can’t be "him," that daily visitor with the booming voice and the hearing aide, who stomps all over my floors with his mucky boots and outrageous braces? [translation = suspenders] Not the man who adopted 6 children on top of his own four. The guy who visits his parents and has a good word for everyone? How will they cope without him? A man for all seasons and an open hand for everyone. The one who is always there with a tease and a game, a substitute grandfather to weird foreigners.
I stumble towards their front door through the garden that has taken too many years to construct, because the owner is always too busy doing helpful things for other people, rather than taking care of his own. The self sustaining contractor, [translation = builder] with no functioning sprinkler system.
The door is ajar. I knock and peek inside. No-one hears my knock. The wake must be in full flow. I step inside to see revelers. I had no idea that they had Irish connections? From across the room, I see my neighbour, his lurid braces, hob nailed boots and baseball cap. He slaps the back of his comrade and guffaws loudly enough to deafen 50 yards of neighbours. He spots me and strides on over, “hey there Maddy! Whatcha doin?”
“I just came over…..I ……er , I saw the hearse.”
“Hearse?”
“Yes, the hearse, outside, parked outside, I just wanted to er…..”
“Whatcha mean hearse? There ain’t no hearse out there!”
“Yes, you know….......the big black car.”
“What big black car?” He peers out of his own front window. “That ain’t no hearse, it’s a limo!”
“A limo?”
“Yeah! You know! A stretch limo.” He looks at me, twinkling. He slings an arm, a tree bough around my shoulder and crushes me to his chest, “it’s prom night, fur ma grand-daughter. See her over there, in that big dress? That’s her. Her prom night.” Clearly, it is not only my children who need a "translator."
6 hours ago
