Death at a Funeral


Frank Oz directed a British movie called Death at a Funeral which Rob and I actually watched on purpose last Saturday night. The basic plot revolves around the death of an older man and the funeral service his wife and sons hold for him at their home out in the country. The movie is a comedy, and it is the first death movie that we have viewed, on purpose, since we watched Catch and Release back in the fall. Watching funny movies about the passing of a spouse and father is definitely on the order of gallows humor and oddly I find this type of story even a bit funnier now that I have a first hand perspective of some of the situations at which fun was being poked. For instance there is a scene where a close friend of one of the sons is sitting with the newly widowed mother in the garden – clearly uncomfortable – and trying to cover it with small talk that, as many widowed people can attest to. leads to questions about whether or not the widow/er has thought about remarrying again. As the friend puts it, “You’re young – relatively. Do you think you might marry again?” Withering look of disbelief. “Oh, right. Too soon to talk about that.” I know for myself I was being asked about dating/remarriage prior to my late husband’s death even and at four months my younger sister was inquiring as to the state of status, “So, dating anyone?” Rob’s late mother-in-law let him know at his late wife’s funeral service that she was okay with the fact that he would find someone new someday. Tactless takes on a new meaning from this point of view. It also further illustrates to me just how poorly equipped we are when it comes to dealing with death and the grieving on both sides.

Throughout the course of the family, tense family dynamics are revealed including a secret about the late husband. While it is over the top in that understated English way, it rings true. Family members have roles and almost set in stone ways of reacting and interacting and when something out of the ordinary occurs (although what can be more ordinary than death?) everyone is shaken loose from their moorings and things are done and said that can be more honest than the family business as usual even as they change things for everyone involved.

It was a good film, though, providing laughs and insight.

An Allergy Alert – Woman in Plastic Bubble Ahead


I have been sidelined today by a nasty hayfever attack that started at the gym yesterday morning. I discovered last fall that I am really allergic to something in the cleaning products they use. So I visited the doctor who put me on a heavy duty dose of a much better anti-histamine and I gave up showering at the gym because my symptoms usually started there.

All was well, relatively, until yesterday when I began sneezing in the locker room right after my work-out and continued to sneeze and drip the rest of the day. Fortunately my eyes didn’t swell nearly shut as they did the last time though they hurt. Today I skipped the gym workout to give myself additional time to shut down the histamine reaction which is much improved but I can tell I am not quite 100% yet. Since I have yoga this afternoon, I will still get a bit of a workout (make that a lot – yoga is a bitch and I discover new and lazier muscles all the time). Tomorrow I will get back to the gym and running – I am covering four miles now of which I run half or more.

I hate having allergies. It really bites and doesn’t seem the least bit fair. What makes it so exasperating is the attitude most people take towards my difficulties. I am not the only one to have complained about the cleaning solution the gym uses. Other people have reported allergic reactions as well but the gym’s attitude, well sympathetic, has been one of “you’ll have to learn to cope”. Not very helpful but typical of society in general as I often am told that my asthma difficulties in smoky environments, or even just dodging the smokers who gather outside doors of public places, could be dealt with by me simply never leaving my house. 

Rob wondered what we were going to do about my allergies and I replied that he will just have to disinfect himself well when he comes for conjugal visits in my plastic bubble. Not very funny I guess, but what can a person do but keep their sense of humor?

Obama’s an Elitist? Who Knew?


So Obama  stirred up a bit of a problem for himself  in the recent past with his painting of the working class as “bitter” though in truth he is about half right. People do not cling to religion or guns or bigotry out of frustration over their ejection from the American Dream race. They were already evangelical or NRA card carriers or Archie Bunkers. The loss of good jobs or the decimation of their small towns magnified traits that were already not so healthy into obsessions. Is small town America bitter? Disillusioned? Jaded? Yes. Have they all become right-wing talk radio aficionados? No. Anyone who is over the edge now was pretty close before, in my opinion as someone who grew up in a union town that lost its jobs to company union busting policies for the most part. 

What’s interesting is that Obama should show his elitist nature now with the Democratic Convention still so far in the future. Not that Clinton has a chance to derail the “juggernaut for change” that is Obama but because it gives all the people who don’t want to vote for him more reason to believe that he is as phony as any other politico who cries in the wilderness, “Vote for me. I’m different!” You can’t be different and be a politician. At least not an electable one.

Obama is just like the rest of us who escaped our middle or lower class roots. We look down back and see the people and places we have left behind and think – “Man are those people stupid.” And why not? They are. They are the ones who thought high school was the best years of life and that college was a waste of time when good jobs were to be had right out the front door of the high school at whatever the local factory was. And that was when? 1950’s? ’60’s? ’70’s? Maybe the ’80’s still, here and there. But not for long and certainly not now. Sad thing is that there are still people foolishly believing that an education is something to waste and that a person can still make a living out of the high school door. I see evidence of that here in Alberta where there are young people job hopping in hopes of finding work that isn’t work or isn’t the mind numbing/soul withering suckholes that those of us who busted our guts getting degrees already knew. When the economy is job heavy, employers tiptoe softly and throw as much money into wages as they can but booms do not last and here in Alberta the first signs of a softening are already beginning. It won’t be long til the owners have control again and the little guys who haven’t any choice but to work the minimum wage part time jobs will be under thumbs again. And that is what Obama is talking about. People who live and die at the pleasure of the economy, and they know he is right when he calls them “bitter” and points out that the guns, church and bigotry are the things they use to distract themselves from their own responsibility. People never like it when you see through them. It will cost Obama in November.