DEAD END JOB

I am a coffin maker and I love my job. Apart from my old man giving me the orders, I am more or less left alone to get on with it. I live above the shop with hours to suit myself as long as I hit the deadlines. (Excuse the pun). We’ve been undertakers in this village for generations. Dad was determined to keep the family business going, and me and my sister Sylvie were trained in everything to do with funerals; even got our embalming certificates. Now she concentrates on the customer relations side and I do the coffins. I’ve been reading a lot lately about new types of funerals; lots of people these days go for these bio-degradable coffins. You can get them made out of wicker or rushes or whatever; cardboard ones are quite popular; completely environmentally friendly and you can decorate them however you like – the Yanks have been doing it for years. That sort of customer often uses one of these new burial parks, where you inter the remains under a tree or wherever you choose: no headstone, just a nice resting place. I was discussing it with my girlfriend Amy; she agrees there’s money to be made here; mind you she’s up for anything that makes a profit, as she’s expecting our first soon and wants to get out of this flat and into a house before the nipper gets too big. There’s a two acre field going begging nearby; with a bit of work I reckon it would be a goer, and it wouldn’t take me long to learn to make the new coffins. Cheap too. When I showed Dad my business plan, the silly old sod wouldn’t even read it. Laughed he did, said it would never catch on, and we should carry on offering a traditional service (even if, as I pointed out, the business was going down the tubes.) Dinosaur in a top hat he is. Shame Mum died two years ago; I’m sure she would have backed me up. Lovely coffin I made her, mahogany with engraved gold handles. I was disappointed, but didn’t let it get me down. Always keep busy, me. Coffins is not all I am interested in. It’s amazing what you can find out about on the internet. Like medical stuff; herbs and so on. The coffin I’m working on now is nearly ready. Sudden it was; poor bugger got up last Thursday, right as rain, then dropped down dead after breakfast. The post-mortem showed his heart had just stopped. Couldn’t say why. I’m making him a nice light oak job, with a lovely bit of carving round the sides, and Sylvie’s sorting out a classy midnight blue silk lining. Only the best for our Dad.