Two Funerals and a wondering

To be honest it's been a few funerals,  but specifically I'm thrown off by axis by one of which was this week, the other from 1988.

This week the funeral of a friend, Des Tierney, a good bastard by any measure. If I end up half a good a bastard then I'll be spectacular. No one exemplified the meaning of community than Des. There won't be a million words or books written about Des, and that's a pity in some regards, but he'll be an oral legend, around these and other parts.

The other funeral, my Father. The one I didn't go to because I just moved to New Zealand, in 1987.

The thing that links them? Well in the sadness of things they both died before they were 60.

And why then would I be thrown into the funk that I have. Well I'm not getting any younger, and I'm now contemplating, as I did with some incredulity at 16, as being as old as my dad. Except now that the words "when he died" are added on the end.

So why should I panic about the age my father died? He was a heavy smoker with a sedentary lifestyle, it's not the way I am. And how does the passing of a friend conflate a story to make it a doom.

In a normal thinking they don't. But as your own mortality, and your own perception of that mortality changes you begin to fret. I spoke to a couple of of me friends about this, and they get it, what I'm feeling, they didn't laugh, they just compared theirs to mine, and we all agreed that it was a nothing. It is what it is, there is no binary thing going on, that event A does not meant that it will equal a similar event  A for me, or them.

So now here I am wondering why it is that I never owned a Lotus Elite Turbo, and E-Type Jaguar. A 1967 Mustang fastback , or a V8 anything, and it's not like that would define me in anyway. It might bring me immediate pleasure, and the added angst of maintaining and paying for it.

I'm now wondering why I never went home to England and abandoned almost everything to a new country, like no one ever did that, but I've not been home, not am I likely to go home, and I left in 1987. And yes it's still home. Go figure.

Do I think people will tell grand stories about me when I die? You're having a laugh, the most heroic I've been was when never.  Should I worry about that?

So a life just as ordinary. A fear and doubt. A surprise? There are many things in my head, and a weight on my shoulder that has descended for no reason other than self.

But if I had a motto to live by it would be "this too shall pass", and it will. Might get that as a tattoo.

Why George Best's death is the worst thing that's ever happened to me.

"When I heard the terrible news that George Best had passed away I cried and cried and cried. I cried and cried more than I have ever cried in my whole life.

I cried and cried and cried because more than anyone else I have never met George Best represented something important. Important to me.

As a schoolboy huddled on the grainy, black and white football terraces of the past, his dazzling football skills opened my says to a Technicolor world that was limitless and free and beautiful.  A world that was limitless. A world that was free. And, yes, a world that was beautiful.

George Best was all those things and more. He was limitless. He was free. And, yes, he was beautiful. Before George the Saturday afternoon football match was a dismal, grey experience. Drab grey men would pass a lumpy grey leather ball to each other on a cold, churned up, muddy, grey bomb site whilst the crowd of  black and white, grey men in dull, flat, lumpy, grey caps smoked Woodbines, yawned and looked at their feet.

When George appeared on the scene it was like being struck by  lightning, sticking your fingers in a socket and being struck by some more lightning all rolled into one. It felt like seeing Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles and Elvis Presley all rolled into one. Every time he touched the ball he literally defied the laws of gravity. I can still recall the trill of seeing him on the news yesterday doing things with a football that no-on else on earth would ever have attempted, let alone tried.

With every effortless kick, he taught us more about wisdom than ten Confuciusses. With every graceful swerve around a defender he taught us more about freedom than a hundred Mandellas. With every sublime header, he taught us more about artistry than a thousand Michelangelos. With every picturesque indirect free kick, he taught us more about beauty than a million Marilyn Monroes.

By any measure you care to choose George Best was the most perfect and flawless human being who ever lived.

And yet, he wasn't perfect. Far from it. Like all of us he had his flaws"

... and so it goes on.  I found this in a comic book that I have. Viz, and it's written under a byline of Tony Parsehole.

I found it humorous and I wonder if it's a template for any near future obituaries that we're about too see, and if it had been used as and previous ones.

I'm not big on forced faux grief. On forced empathy and sympathy, of forced and faux mourning, If you're affected be affected, don't try to get me to join in with that, it's not going to happen.

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Under the Auckland Harbour Bridge #1

I was as about as underneath the Auckland harbour bridge as you could be  today and I saw this. It was beyond a fence line.

[caption id="attachment_1031" align="aligncenter" width="300"] The Plaque to Shanlee Maree Haggerty[/caption]

Curiosity and all that I googled the name with no results. It's an unusual name, and I would have thought that there might have been something. But then it goes to show that you have to have been on the internet somewhere to be on the internet somewhere. I wonder why there is a monument at that place, something that is so permanent and a reminder. Their quiet place, their reflective place, I don't know. Well I do know that I found a reminder to them, and that's got to make you wonder, just a bit.

So Shanley Maree Haggerty, whoever you were clearly you mean something to someone given that the garland of flowers was present, and you'll have to trust me that you have to know where this is to know where it is, it's not a place that many Auckland people would even consider there being access too, let alone a park.

My curiosity about the undersides of the Harbour bridge let me to seek out access, I wasn't expecting to find this nor the memorial that I found either, it's not a welcoming place, it's shaded, noisy from traffic, and there are not a lot of redeeming features, no beach, no access to the shore line, just the undersides of a steel girder bridge. But it is wonderful.

[caption id="attachment_9012" align="aligncenter" width="200"] A monument to the 3 who died in construction on the bridge[/caption]

 

11th January Update :

I’ve had someone let me know that they think that Shanley Haggerty was someone who died during the construction of the clip-on lanes. Which could be right, but seems a little odd considering that the monument to the other construction workers isn’t close and is somewhat grander

There is some conflicting history about the number of deaths widely reported as 3 but sometimes as 4. The monument lists just the three names. None of the documents that I’ve skim read (to be fair) mention any names of the dead workers. And they are all mentioned as “men”, and although I don’t think Shanley Maree Haggarty is a man’s name it could be that Maree is a family name that has some significance.

24th January Update :

Google eventually coughs up a bit of information as:

Shanley Maree McGowan –
Birth: 7 Aug 1967 in Auckland.
Death: 29 May 1993 in Auckland Harbour Bridge.
Burial: Body Not Recovered
Sex: F.
Father:  is not listed
Mother:  is not listed
She was a Teacher who Married  on the 27th Oct 1990 in Our Lady Of The Mount, Titirangi to Malcolm James Haggerty.

And now I’m saddened even more, because I know why there is a reminder, but more because it's not a way to end a life.

On death, dying and the ever after.

Personally speaking aside from brief moments of fear there isn't much else but death. Death in it's finality. The end.

We're on the earth to make more of us. That's all. More of us by procreation. Ensuring the existence and continuation of the species. That is all.

No big plan, no grand design. And no ever-after.

We're remembered if we're lucky for a few years or so, by an large, unless you're someone famous, and then your name and deeds may live on in folklore.

However ashes to ashes and all that, and that's all there is. There is no other place we go to, no afterlife where we hang around handing out cryptic messages to dodgy people who claim to be able to talk to the dead, none of that.

We stop, it's over. We lived we died, we laughed, we cried. That's all there is.

And I think that's where we hang our hat on the after-life or reincarnation or whatever our personal belief system is. We think we're more significant, special, and that means that there must be more right? Nope.

I get the need to believe that there is more, I get that some people think they can talk in cryptic to the dead, I do. However you're all having a laugh, and you need to exercise you're imagination a little to ponder why it should be that after your four score and ten on the earth you get a couple billion years in some other place?

Oh of course I could be wrong, but then it'll be that's pleasantly surprised and if I'm right we'll never know.

Word War II wasn't about Jews and 9/11 wasn't about Firemen

In my opinion, the actions of School kids when confronted with Nazi Symbolism and images at a museum exhibition was totally predictable.

The reaction of the Jewish council - again predictable.

However the War wasn't about Jews. and Jews seem to have or want to hijack history and hammer relentlessly the holocaust, the holocaust. Sidestepping the gypsies, infirm, gays and anyone else caught up by circumstance in the aspect of the war that was concentration camps.

Don't worry about the carpet bombing of civilians, that's what? Unfortunate? Allowed? Don't worry about any other war crimes - hey they all pale into insignificance right, so we can ignore them?

But can't overlook the Jews. No Sir! Lest we forget it's all about them and only them.

Now I open myself up to all sorts of abuse and accusations with this opinion. And you have then not understood a word of it. The War happened. Lots of people died. Germans, English, Russians - a lot of Russians, Americans, French, Japanese and more than a lot more other nationalities also lost citizens, either conscripted soldiers or unfortunate bystanders.

For Jews to rail at ignorance of youth implies they only want the high ground. They don't do anything at or with schools to education or provide education - that of course would be indoctrination, but I bet dollars to cents that they don't have an active education lobby going on that would require teaching of the whole history of WWII. They only want the high ground.

Much like 9/11. Which has all become about Firemen. Brave as they were the willful destruction by terrorism wasn't about Firemen. But hey guess what every remembrance - I was tempted to say celebration - involves almost exclusively Firemen. Disproportionately represented yes - about them no.

Are these good things? Do we need "Leaders" in remembrance. Yes of course.

Do we need leaders in only one aspect - or leaders that re-write or concentrate only on one aspect of an event - no.

Are the kids insensitive - yes they are. But ignorance of youth is no excuse to high ground and make a stand. If it's offensive it's offensive - or do you allow a museum display as in context ? In context to who? and what?

Word War II wasn't about Jews and 9/11 wasn't about Firemen

In my opinion, the actions of School kids when confronted with Nazi Symbolism and images at a museum exhibition was totally predictable.

The reaction of the Jewish council - again predictable.

However the War wasn't about Jews. and Jews seem to have or want to hijack history and hammer relentlessly the holocaust, the holocaust. Sidestepping the gypsies, infirm, gays and anyone else caught up by circumstance in the aspect of the war that was concentration camps.

Don't worry about the carpet bombing of civilians, that's what? Unfortunate? Allowed? Don't worry about any other war crimes - hey they all pale into insignificance right, so we can ignore them?

But can't overlook the Jews. No Sir! Lest we forget it's all about them and only them.

Now I open myself up to all sorts of abuse and accusations with this opinion. And you have then not understood a word of it. The War happened. Lots of people died. Germans, English, Russians - a lot of Russians, Americans, French, Japanese and more than a lot more other nationalities also lost citizens, either conscripted soldiers or unfortunate bystanders.

For Jews to rail at ignorance of youth implies they only want the high ground. They don't do anything at or with schools to education or provide education - that of course would be indoctrination, but I bet dollars to cents that they don't have an active education lobby going on that would require teaching of the whole history of WWII. They only want the high ground.

Much like 9/11. Which has all become about Firemen. Brave as they were the willful destruction by terrorism wasn't about Firemen. But hey guess what every remembrance - I was tempted to say celebration - involves almost exclusively Firemen. Disproportionately represented yes - about them no.

Are these good things? Do we need "Leaders" in remembrance. Yes of course.

Do we need leaders in only one aspect - or leaders that re-write or concentrate only on one aspect of an event - no.

Are the kids insensitive - yes they are. But ignorance of youth is no excuse to high ground and make a stand. If it's offensive it's offensive - or do you allow a museum display as in context ? In context to who? and what?