A woman walks into the street clutching a collection of shopping bags in both hands. She wears a red beret and a purple coat, which she believes makes her look sophisticated. Tonight she’s making baked salmon for her family who consist of two teenagers (one self-oppressed, the other pining from a recent heartbreak,) a husband who drives a taxi and chain-smokes Marlboro reds in the back garden, and a dog Miffy, a West Highland Terrier. The dog is the woman’s closest companion next to her daily recreational listen to BBC Radio 4 during which she finds immense solace in knitting Miffy brightly-coloured jumpers to wear for winter when its cold. There is a whole cupboard in her wardrobe dedicated to such apparel.
As she crosses the road, avoiding a puddle harbouring a half-broken Smirnoff ice, she only has two things on her mind; what time to start cooking dinner since Bill gets home usually round about half-past seven and expects his food steaming from the oven the moment his key twists in the lock, and that Miffy needs to be taken out for a walk. This woman, who shall not be named, briskly walks down her local street, heels clapping on the pavement with a steady, yet firm and purposeful rhythm, and finds her way to her front door. As she pushes open the peeling wooden framework she is met by a feeling of uncertainty. Miffy is not waiting at the door as she always does, Miffy is not barking as she always does (to much annoyance, I may add). Miffy is not lying in her bed in the kitchen, paws outstretched and placed together in a quizzical act of prayer.
The woman walks through the eerie silence out into the conservatory they had installed last spring. She drops her shopping bags, cracking a bottle of balsamic vinegar, which at present leaks out onto the hardwood floor, staining her shoes.
She puts her hand to her mouth in shock, and we turn to see Miffy lying outside in the grass, underneath the rapidly darkening sky, dead.
We see death everywhere. Squishing a bug under your shoe is comparable to murder. At least, to me it seems so.
Although that doesn’t mean I don’t kill bugs. I fucking hate them.
Why is everybody so afraid of dying? We pray to save our souls, mass congregations lapping in the ignorance of human fear, feverently questioning what lies beyond death, hoping to God someone will provide the answer. Women today feel the need to frantically reverse the natural order of things, flatten out those creases, buff out the dents of their faces as though they were cars simply needing a bit of ‘pimp my ride’ to get them back into shape.
We’re all going to die. It’s inevitable. For all you know it could happen tomorrow, at work, at home. You could die in a really fucking stupid way, like being electrocuted by the toaster. Trust me, its happened.
In my opinion death is quite beautiful, mesmerising, transfixing. But don’t be afraid, the dog in the picture didn’t die until a few months after the photo was taken. It was put down, by old age, I must stress.
