Maths

Exactly three years since my mother died.
I was 56 then, a child. 


Cold and sunny in Deansgrange. I'd stopped off in Frescati Centre on the way, to pick up Sam, who'd had a meeting in Starbucks. I bought a pot of flowers for mum's grave (bright and colourful, like large pansies). The place was busy. Presumably a recent funeral. We had to pull to make way for a lightened hearse. 

Our son was surprised we hadn't had her name carved on the stone yet (delayed till we get the money). He was also a little in awe of the flat-out legions of the dead, that rolling-stone wave of extinction, figure-headed by the odd Sacred Heart or Virgin (one of which I noticed reflected in the black marble of a neighbouring grave).

On the way home, he said: 'Whenever I go to spiritual places my ears feel weird.'