Wednesday, October 31, 2012

I remember Margaret’s uncle Hubert's funeral music. I had prepared a CD of excerpts from Elgar’s Nimrod variation and Pachalbel’s Canon. As they brought the coffin in I thought it was a bit too quiet and insipid, but just as they put the coffin on to the catafalque, the music swelled as it went into the variation proper. It’s all to do with the timing! I also remember doing her mother Thelma's funeral music – on cassette! Sheep May Safely Graze and another classic whose name will return to me, maybe.

I remember the letters I wrote in longhand to my friend Richard when he moved to Heptonstall. They were in the form of humorous dispatches ‘from our correspondent’ – one was about Worcester Park scientists discovering that you could get cancer from licking stamps, another about Bob Dylan’s planned visit to the Worcester Park festival.

I remember David Miles (who retired nine years ago!!!) would always hand you your pint of Palmers with 'there you are, proper beer'.

I remember the lights going up one by one as I walked along the platform at dusk a couple of weeks ago. It was like a Hollywood musical.