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Entry tags:
YVR->MSP->LHR, BRS->AMS->YVR
Saturday, four days ago, I flew from Vancouver to Minneapolis, spent my layover chatting with my dear friend ADB who had come out to the airport to meet me, and then flew to London on a red-eye. (But not before ending my 31-month streak of never getting either groped or pornoscanned in an airport; there was only one checkpoint open at MSP that Saturday night, with only a scanner option. I had been planning to opt out if that happened, but at the last minute I decided I didn't want a random cis person touching me. In any case, I couldn't think of a better reason to end the streak.)
Sunday, I arrived in London feeling like a zombie, since I'd only slept for about four hours on the plane, if that. Plan A had been to go to a coffee shop for a few hours and noodle around pointlessly on the Internet, I mean catch up on work, I mean... In any case, my laptop was almost dead and the power adapter I'd bought at the airport wasn't grounded, which of course I didn't notice when buying it, in my zombified state. So I collected all my belongings and headed down the road to the Superdrug, where I bought another adapter. Nope, that one wasn't grounded either, and so I embarked on a long, long journey to the Apple store in Covent Garden to get the "world traveler kit". I ended up finding out just how long it can take me to find the Covent Garden market starting out from the Covent Garden tube stop (answer: a long time), and by the time I got back to the coffee shop where I'd planned to meet![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jasonelvis, he was waiting there.
After dinner with Jason, Tracey, and their adorable three-year-old, we all agreed that I'd want to collapse... except instead, Jason and I stayed up for a while talking about Debra. I was able to put my tiredness aside, because getting time to talk about her with someone who knew her the way I did was really important to me and meant a lot.
Monday, we accumulated more people and headed out to Bath in various cars. We went to a park and (unexpectedly) saw hot air balloons take off, then Indian take-out food was had and silly TV was watched.
And then, Tuesday, the big event. Prefaced by hat shopping with the three of us guys in our little entourage, since we'd been told that Debra wanted the funeral to reflect her Jewish heritage, though it wouldn't be entirely traditional. So part of that was that the men would cover their heads, and the women would too if they wanted to. That was fine, but none of us had hats. Then it turns out to be difficult to find a funeral-appropriate hat in May, but the clearance rack at Debenhams saved the day.
Fully equipped with hats, we drove the 45 minutes to Bristol and got to the chapel and cemetery, in South Bristol, a bit early but not too early. I met various people who I'd only known from their LiveJournal comments before, and before we knew it, we were being called in for the service. The opening music, "Good Morning Starshine", let us know that this wasn't going to be an entirely traditional funeral. Debra wasn't a traditional person, so that was appropriate.
There were several eulogies, including one delivered by Jason, which captured the playful, caring, bum-joke-loving Debra who I knew. But the moments I remember most clearly were actually the music: Kate Bush's "Feel It" in the middle, and Lemon Jelly's "Space Walk" at the end. Someone had posted a link to "Space Walk" on Debra's Facebook wall soon after she died, and I listened to it in my apartment. Hearing it again at the end of the service took me back to that confused, surreal state.
We milled out to the grave site, which was facing out on a hillside with a really nice view of the river and the green hills beyond. I thought to myself that maybe someday, years from now, I would have some reason to be back in England again, and I would rent a bike and ride from Bristol up to the cemetery; it would be a nice ride. And they laid her in her grave, in a wicker casket, which seemed very fitting.
A group of us went to a pub nearby for lunch afterward, and comics that Debra had been involved in making got passed around; I got to look at some I hadn't seen before. Then we headed to Debra's house to pay our respects to the family and such friends as were still there. Talking to Debra's mother and stepfather, I found myself struggling for words; I found it hard to explain what Debra and I were to each other, and resorted, as so many queer folks do, to the language of "friends". Maybe it's something to do with that whole queer thing of not being able to assume there's a framework your relationships will fit into; maybe it's something to do with how none of it really makes sense if you can't assume the other person understands the notion of deep, meaningful, partially computer-mediated relationships. Probably some of both.
Debra's last LiveJournal post was about hummus. There are worse things one's last LiveJournal post could be about. Or rather... the last one I can see; due to me moving from LiveJournal to Dreamwidth, I'm no longer able to see a lot of her posts that I was able to see before, which is a little sad; I would have liked to re-read her posts from around the first time we met in person, especially.
And then the next morning, Jason did what only a true friend would do and drove me to the airport bus stop at 5:45 in the morning, and eventually I made it back to Vancouver, a place I can't lay any permanent claim on.
"well, it could be love
Or it could be just lust but it will be fun
It will be wonderful"
Sunday, I arrived in London feeling like a zombie, since I'd only slept for about four hours on the plane, if that. Plan A had been to go to a coffee shop for a few hours and noodle around pointlessly on the Internet, I mean catch up on work, I mean... In any case, my laptop was almost dead and the power adapter I'd bought at the airport wasn't grounded, which of course I didn't notice when buying it, in my zombified state. So I collected all my belongings and headed down the road to the Superdrug, where I bought another adapter. Nope, that one wasn't grounded either, and so I embarked on a long, long journey to the Apple store in Covent Garden to get the "world traveler kit". I ended up finding out just how long it can take me to find the Covent Garden market starting out from the Covent Garden tube stop (answer: a long time), and by the time I got back to the coffee shop where I'd planned to meet
jasonelvis, he was waiting there.After dinner with Jason, Tracey, and their adorable three-year-old, we all agreed that I'd want to collapse... except instead, Jason and I stayed up for a while talking about Debra. I was able to put my tiredness aside, because getting time to talk about her with someone who knew her the way I did was really important to me and meant a lot.
Monday, we accumulated more people and headed out to Bath in various cars. We went to a park and (unexpectedly) saw hot air balloons take off, then Indian take-out food was had and silly TV was watched.
And then, Tuesday, the big event. Prefaced by hat shopping with the three of us guys in our little entourage, since we'd been told that Debra wanted the funeral to reflect her Jewish heritage, though it wouldn't be entirely traditional. So part of that was that the men would cover their heads, and the women would too if they wanted to. That was fine, but none of us had hats. Then it turns out to be difficult to find a funeral-appropriate hat in May, but the clearance rack at Debenhams saved the day.
Fully equipped with hats, we drove the 45 minutes to Bristol and got to the chapel and cemetery, in South Bristol, a bit early but not too early. I met various people who I'd only known from their LiveJournal comments before, and before we knew it, we were being called in for the service. The opening music, "Good Morning Starshine", let us know that this wasn't going to be an entirely traditional funeral. Debra wasn't a traditional person, so that was appropriate.
There were several eulogies, including one delivered by Jason, which captured the playful, caring, bum-joke-loving Debra who I knew. But the moments I remember most clearly were actually the music: Kate Bush's "Feel It" in the middle, and Lemon Jelly's "Space Walk" at the end. Someone had posted a link to "Space Walk" on Debra's Facebook wall soon after she died, and I listened to it in my apartment. Hearing it again at the end of the service took me back to that confused, surreal state.
We milled out to the grave site, which was facing out on a hillside with a really nice view of the river and the green hills beyond. I thought to myself that maybe someday, years from now, I would have some reason to be back in England again, and I would rent a bike and ride from Bristol up to the cemetery; it would be a nice ride. And they laid her in her grave, in a wicker casket, which seemed very fitting.
A group of us went to a pub nearby for lunch afterward, and comics that Debra had been involved in making got passed around; I got to look at some I hadn't seen before. Then we headed to Debra's house to pay our respects to the family and such friends as were still there. Talking to Debra's mother and stepfather, I found myself struggling for words; I found it hard to explain what Debra and I were to each other, and resorted, as so many queer folks do, to the language of "friends". Maybe it's something to do with that whole queer thing of not being able to assume there's a framework your relationships will fit into; maybe it's something to do with how none of it really makes sense if you can't assume the other person understands the notion of deep, meaningful, partially computer-mediated relationships. Probably some of both.
Debra's last LiveJournal post was about hummus. There are worse things one's last LiveJournal post could be about. Or rather... the last one I can see; due to me moving from LiveJournal to Dreamwidth, I'm no longer able to see a lot of her posts that I was able to see before, which is a little sad; I would have liked to re-read her posts from around the first time we met in person, especially.
And then the next morning, Jason did what only a true friend would do and drove me to the airport bus stop at 5:45 in the morning, and eventually I made it back to Vancouver, a place I can't lay any permanent claim on.
"well, it could be love
Or it could be just lust but it will be fun
It will be wonderful"