World Enough and Time

I'm going to be spending the next few days at the Rideau Mac Resort. Rest and relaxation! Books!

So I probably won't have net access till next Monday or Tuesday. I hope you will miss me. (Do you think I'll survive without going online? I'll try to consider it a kind of net-silent retreat.) Don't get into trouble without me.

I went to a funeral this evening of a man I've known since 1978, the father of a friend. I learned today he was the same age as my mother, who died in 1982, right about this time of year. They were both born in 1914.

It was a nice service, with any reference to religion carefully excised, held in the chapel of the funeral parlour - which has a vaguely churchlike atmosphere, but no explicitly religious symbols were present. There were two musical selections played, both beautiful: a piece from the Santana recording Abraxas, and Lili Marleen.

I learned that he was a fan of Perry Mason, which I'd never known. That was the first show for which I ever had a fannish love. I was six at the time. My mother and I used to sit together on the couch and watch it on Friday nights, trying to guess each itme who the murderer was. I hardly ever watched TV in those days, so it was a great treat.

By the doorway, they had a large replica of one of the Chinese stone soldiers from the antique tomb. I was reading the information about it with interest, and saw that it was donated to the funeral home by Tsin Van, who used to be one of the photographers for the Ottawa Little Theatre. Small world. Lovely statue.