Better Than the One Before

Rob and Liz came up from Sutton today with the little casket for Gracie. 

We saved the final chapter of The Last Battle to read with Paul, who came with them. I could hardly read for crying; Kendall says we should respect tears, and I agree - but when I'm reading, I want to read, not break into sobs.

Here's the part that got me going:

    Then Tirian saw King Peter and King Edmund and Queen Lucy rush forward to kneel down and greet the Mouse and they all cried out, "Reepicheep!" And Tirian breathed fast with the sheer wonder of it, for now he knew that he was looking at one of the great heroes of Narnia... But before he had had much time to think of this he felt two strong arms thrown about him and felt a bearded kiss on his cheeks and heard a well-remembered voice saying:
    "What, lad? Art thicker and taller since I last touched thee!"
    It was his own father, the good King Erlian: but not as Tiran had last seen him when they brought him home pale and wounded... This was his father, young and merry, as he could just remember him from very early days when he himself had been a little boy...

The last two chapters of this book have probably done more than anything else to inform my hopes for the next life, "which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before."

Gratefuls:
- the hope of a new heaven and a new earth, where all tears will be dried and we'll meet again those we have loved
- sunshine that has streamed into the flat every day I've been here, at least once
- garlicky, buttery brown button mushrooms on Tom's homemade sourdough toast, with a glass of Alentejano red