The deed is done

I thought we were going to scatter my Aunt Lily Tagg's ashes today, but the funeral director had put them in a box, so we buried them instead.

Her other relations approved of my choice of her final resting place at St Margaret of Antioch Church in Barming, Kent.

They were very impressed with its beauty and how well it is maintained. I chose it because the old church is near the river and surrounded by fields. She used to walk her beloved dog Prince there.

Her two husbands, who predeceased her, are in Vinter's Park Crematorium, but I wanted her to be in a place that was about both life and death.

Her good friend May's brother is buried there. He died in the Second World War at age 20.

I used to walk to the church sometimes when I visited her and once I was showing my Aunt Lily some photographs -- coincidentally, I had taken a picture of May's brother's tombstone, and that's how I found out about him.

After her step-daughter said a few commemorative words her step-grandson put the box in the ground. Then the funeral director came around with a box of dry dirt and each of us threw a handful onto the box in the hole.

We didn't linger, but left the church graveyard and went to the Bull Pub for lunch.

Afterwards, the four of them left by car to return to London, and I walked back to the grave site, which had already been neatly repaired and covered over with grass.

There was a small dog running around and I thought about how much my aunt would have fussed over it. If you click on the picture below, you will see the dog more clearly.

I picked some wildflowers in the surrounding field to make a small bouquet for the grave.

I then hastened back along the River to the East Farleigh Railway Station and got on a train to Tonbridge where I made a connection to get to London Waterloo East.

I've always wanted to use the East Farleigh station because I have never done so, but have used all the others nearby: Barming, Maidstone Barracks, Maidstone West and Maidstone East.

If they hadn't suggested lunch I would have gone to the Bull Pub in East Farleigh instead. I was there a while ago when I was out for a walk.

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