Mask

When I sent out reminders about our usual in-town Christmas Eve get-together, one of the guys got back to me to say his mother was seriously ill in hospital and that he wouldn't be joining us. Then, late on Saturday night, he sent a text to say that his mother had died earlier that day. I checked the funeral arrangements yesterday and spoke to him last night. The church removal was this evening, with funeral service and burial scheduled for tomorrow morning. Carl decided to come along this evening, so I went over to pick him up at his place. This ceramic mask hangs on his wall, a gift for his 30th birthday. It caught my eye, and seemed especially appropriate in a funereal sort of way. It's more colourful than this in reality, but a bit of de-saturation and further post-processing seemed the right thing to do under the circumstances.

Strangely enough, the church Tom's mother was removed to in Bray is just down the road from where our friends live with whom we'd already arranged to spend New Year's Eve. One of them said he'd come along to the church as well, so I parked the car in their driveway and we walked down from there. The presiding priest turned out to be better than most, and the short service was quite affecting. We three popped across the road for liquid refreshment and a bit of chat afterwards, and then Carl and I went down to Bray main street and had quite a pleasant meal in Shelby's restaurant (though we weren't impressed with the mandatory 10% service charge).