Blue

You know that old nugget about death and taxes.

Just last week, I had attended a friend's father-in-law's wake. I don't actually know the deceased, mind you. I just came to know of the death because she had called for advice on probate matters, and how to handle the estate. She had come down to Dad's wake three years ago, sitting with me through the shock and disbelief, bringing some light relief to me from the whole proceedings.

Never having been adept at consoling the bereaved, I pulled the only trick I knew out from my bag and ask how the deceased had departed this life. I guess, for women, talking about the incident helps get it out of their system. I'm told men's brains work differently (martyr-mentality, perhaps?)...

As I pointed the car in the direction of the garage this evening, after a long day at work, I got a rude shock. Dad's Beemer, which had been sitting forlornly in the garage for almost three years now, gathering dust and with the tyres going flat, is gone. Finally. Suddenly. Unexpectedly.

I guess I should have realised things would be moving right along, once the Letters of Administration came out. Sure, I went down to the LTA personally to get the scrap value of the car. Sure, I was the one who had faxed the LA and the logcard to the "car scrap guy". Yet somehow, 2+2 didn't quite equal to 4 in my mind, and I just didn't expect the Beemer to be gone without a whole lot of fanfare.

I remember the trouble Dad went to, to get the Beemer that particular shade of blue. The colour of the sky, just before the sun sets over the horizon. Now every time I see a dusky blue Beemer on the street, it reminds me of the last car that Dad drove.

I'd had a vague thought in my mind earlier that I would have to take a picture of the Beemer before it's gone. Too late now.

Sigh. Slowly, a life will be dismantled.

R.I.P. - SBP9334U