The Likely Resolutions of Oliver Clock

by Jane Riley

Regrets were accumulating like bills yet to be paid.

Words were coming out of my mouth without my brain being able to stop them.

one of the problems with being a funeral director is that you see the dead at their best and the living at their most wretched.

I didn’t like resorting to pleading; it only reinforced my inferior position of ignorance.

Do not berate yourself for the clouds, do not worry if they hang around, do not fret if they bring storms; let them.

‘What you’ve got to remember,’ he said, ‘is that you’re number one. If you don’t care enough about yourself, who will? You need to believe in yourself.

Sometimes change requires getting out of your comfort zone.’

Can you ‘get a life’ or does life find you?

When I started working in the funeral industry, I thought it would be fun to make up answers to such questions, as if my work revolved around making B-grade horror movies, until I realised I didn’t have to fabricate. Humanity did it all for me.

I wondered at a man who bothered to use bubble wrap on something he didn’t want.

A dying person gains regrets and loses dreams.

Demonstrative hugs and affection didn’t come as naturally to her as did protecting me from the world and telling me what not to do, rather than what to do.

sometimes life has a strange way of showing us it cares. And the act of accepting this can be the hardest thing to do.’

‘Smell is more powerful than people realise,’ she said gently. ‘Its memory never fades. When you smell something once, it stays with you for the rest of your life.

Categorising these aspects of my life helped compartmentalise them emotionally and keep me focused on my resolutions.

At least the dead are more predictable than the living.’

It was draining trying to love things that didn’t love me back.

I had to remember what I didn’t want as much as what I did want.

Thou shalt not let others decide things for you.

Thou shalt not sacrifice your own happiness for someone else’s.

I realised that being single and lonely was better than being taken and unhappy.

Her fears had become my fears, which was understandable, I suppose, as the mother of a child who had passed away in such tragic circumstances, but wasn’t it time for her to let go, too?

I shouldn’t be pushing memories of my sister away but welcoming them with fondness and joy. I didn’t want to pretend she never existed.

‘Sometimes I find giving someone something for no reason is the best gift of all.’