Lessons learned from a birthday in a graveyard

On Friday I turned fifty.

And you know what I did on my big five oh-oh-oh, on my scary half century? I went to the graveyard.

It’s an odd thing: when I was celebrating my birthday in 1991 my fella was watching his father die.

Dessie Connolly passed away on my twentieth, a decade before I met his son. I didn’t know this for several years after we got together because the family quietly agreed to lie about the date; they let me believe it was the day before my birthday so as not to cloud my fun.

Then one day I found a mass card, and I knew.

So, because my fiftieth celebration was their thirty year commemoration, I asked to go with them to the cemetery.

I’d never been before: my Protestant sensibilities insisted I would be intruding, but they are Irish and Catholic, so there is no uptight protocol when it comes to death.

Everybody shows up. For the first time, I did.

I went with my guy and his mum, bought flowers from the seller at the gate – including a bright red South African “gerbera” – then laid them on the family grave.

Interred in the same plot are the paternal grandparents, and there’s space for Himself’s mum too. It’s a very Irish thing: in days of yore, people would propose marriage by saying, “Will you be buried with my people?”

Afterwards, we sat outside in the coffee shop overlooking the skyline of Celtic crosses that is the historic Glasnevin Cemetery.

“Thank you for letting me join you,” I said to Mrs C, as Himself fetched us refreshments.

She tutted. “Nonsense!” “How are you feeling?” I said.

She’s 88 now. She lost her husband when she was only a few years older than I am today. It seems unimaginable.

Afterwards, she got her drivers’ licence, went back to work, travelled the world and lived a whole other life, but still she wears her wedding ring.

“You know,” she said, “I always say there are two things I can do nothing about: yesterday and tomorrow. All we have is the present. It’s a gift.”

Our tea arrived, and Mrs C tucked into her scone enthusiastically.

“It’s nice here, isn’t it?” she said.

I smiled. It was. And being fifty really didn’t matter at all.