I arrived back yesterday later that I had planned to for 2 reasons. One was the good old M25 being true to itself and catching you out be seizing to a halt between 2 junctions in the early afternoon when you least expect it to. The second was due to my mum trying to poison me! Maybe that’s an exaggeration but I think I had food poisoning which had me being sick most of the night and all morning leading up to the funeral. Afterwards I was seen stopping to find a carrier bag every now and again. But you do not need the gory details!

Families are great aren’t they. I have not seen my extended family for a while and I forgot how well us cousins got on. It was also great to meet up again with Sandra who was always my favorite aunty, who took great delight throughout the day of calling me childish names. Not I do not write them here!

It was weird, I left Weymouth over 20 years ago, but yesterday it was as if we had all always been there. I best describe it as being a bit like a video tape which has been put on pause – just for 20 years.

The funeral itself was ok as far as funerals go. I am the only Christian in the family and found myself praying as the vicar spoke of new life and Easter that something would sink in, but I did not really think that it would. A funeral has never seemed to be the best place to me to talk about a forgiving and loving God.

It struck me how people show their grief differently. Because of my need to be not far from the toilet I sat at the back of the crem and was able to observe others. Some were in tears, most were dignified, but one of my aunts was traumatised – to the extent that she wailed and flung herself on the coffin twice, the second time when the curtains were closing and I did have this horrible vision of her going through the doors on top of the coffin!!

That is not meant to be disrespectful – but the whole incident was both worrying and funny at the same time. People really did not know what to do – and I am sure we all feared the same fate for my distressed aunt.

I guess everyone grieves in their own way, and I wondered whether sometimes we are all too British and reserved. Sometimes, I guess, it is helpful to let stuff out in a major way.

As I looked to the ceiling while all this was happening I noticed that there was a copy of Murillo’s painting called Two Trinities. n interesting picture to have in the crematorium. I thought it could be a great reminder to people that what people in the coffin were going to experience could still be had here on earth – a full on relationship with my living God. That excited me and I did not expect to leave the funeral so excited!