Honour Guard

The morning was early but I was late. That’s probably why I didn’t pay attention to the cars in the care home parking lot.  I would surely have noticed the distinctive black mortuary vehicle.  

Whooshing automatic doors proclaimed my entrance, startling the woman who stood just inside, dressed in business black, her hands resting on the handle of an empty stretcher. “Good morning” stuck in my throat, turning into a solemn nod of greeting. 

Moments later, at the piano in the still-dark lounge, my fingers found  ‘It Is Well With My Soul’. Tears ambushed me. The suddenness of death had surprised a family this morning. I heard elevator doors close with efficient finality upon the stretcher and its custodian, whisking both to their appointed destination.

Incongruous laughter bubbled above my softly played hymn as various staff arrived for their shifts, exclaiming over one another’s Hallowe'en attire. 

Above the laughter, a quiet loudspeaker announcement extended an invitation to join in an Honour Walk. My first. Joining with staff and residents, I stood in the crowded foyer, waiting. Grief filled my heart and eyes. Someone in the group gestured wildly to a late-arriving, oblivious worker. The dancing dinosaur turned tail and rapidly sequestered in a nearby office. In the midst of life, we are in death, or is it the other way around?

The Chaplain whooshed through the entrance doors.  Clad in a yellow reflective jacket, and clutching his bicycle helmet, his gaze swept the room  “Who did we lose?” Hardly slowing his pace, he disappeared into the lounge, dashed briefly outside to the courtyard garden and joined us minutes later.  Divested of cycling gear, he clutched a single red flower, which had bravely bloomed in the autumn garden - waiting for such a time as this. 

Disgorged by a more distant elevator, the no-longer-empty stretcher surprised us all with its silent arrival, accompanied now by a family member, nurse, and the mortuary attendant. Someone dear lay under the folds of a bright, cosy afghan, knit by members of this caring community and provided as a last gesture of love and comfort on the final journey.

The Chaplain stepped forward to place the flower on the blanketed form. The tears in his eyes made mine increase. He spoke a few very personal, kind words of comfort. I met the eyes of the bereft family member and cried for him. Or perhaps they were my own tears.

Flanked by a surreal Honour Guard of clowns, grandmothers, spacemen, clerical workers, nurses (real and pretend), the mini cortège solemnly exited the building.

The dinosaur emerged from solitary. Breakfast carts rumbled out of the kitchen. In the midst of death, we are in life.