My Dad
Coming out of lurker mode to post this one.

I saw my Nan just after she died and thought the cliche about wax-works held up. It was like a really good model of her. I didn't feel better or worse for having seen her.

My Dad died at home of cancer a year ago and I was leaning down to listen to his breathing as he went. I saw his face change as he died and it was such a strange, strange thing to witness that I leapt back from the bed. It wasn't scary exactly but odd and wrong and slightly shocking.

He had been wrecked by the illness and looked about 80 although he was only in his sixties. We sat with his body for a couple of hours wating for the undertakers to arrive and during that time his face smoothed out. When we all kissed him for the last time he was, paradoxically, looking more like his old self.

I went to see him in his coffin a few days later. I don't know what they had done but he didn't look like my Dad at all. He looked like a wax-work of Abraham Lincoln - it was weird. I would never recommend seeing someone when the undertakers have had them for a few days. You won't see the person you loved.
(Innogen, Thu 28 Feb 2008, 20:48, Reply)