It was her 208th funeral.
In the London cemetery, the four fields are dead silent, and an eccentric woman has been standing in front of the grave for hours.
Dressed in a black dress and wearing a black veil, she gently offered a white rose and turned away.
Her name is Jeane Trend-Hill and she is known as -
The loneliest mourner in the world.
Jenny is 55 years old and has attended more than 250 funerals of strangers.
Most of these funerals have no relatives and friends, no ceremonies, and the deceased is alone on the road.
The cemetery staff would call Jenny and ask her to give her the last ride.
However, for 10 years, Jenny received nothing.
He will even pay out of his own pocket and lay flowers to repair the monument.
In the eyes of others, this is an obscure and absurd thing.
But she said:
"They all have stories, they've all been loved."
Jenny was also loved.
She was born in London into an ordinary family, so ordinary that she closed her eyes and only remembered the wildflowers of spring.
Dad asked her to pick a small flower and present it in front of her grandfather's grave, and whispered:
"This is Daddy's Daddy."
A child who lives in love is not afraid, Jenny recalled:
Other children are afraid of cemeteries, but Dad told me that it was a box for missing thoughts.
However, little Jenny did not know that soon, she would also hold her father's urn.
When he was 14 years old, his father died of lung disease.
Mom was weak and she conducted the funeral alone.
Complete one's misery.
Six years later, my mother had cancer and passed away from her.
On the day of the funeral, the guests dispersed, and the twilight was rising, and Jenny stood in front of the tomb blankly, without a trace of fear, only feeling empty in her heart.
"I don't have a mother anymore."
She muttered, tears raining down.
From now on, Jenny can only go home alone.
She worked hard to live, graduated from college, was admitted to the civil service, and was safe and secure.
It's just that every weekend, she will come to her parents' graves, weeding and wiping monuments, talking about work trivialities and life anecdotes...
But when he looked up, only the wind answered.
She also talks about love.
That year, Jenny met a boy, and the two fell in love and walked into the church.
On the eve of marriage, she took her husband to see her parents, and there were tears in her laughter:
"Mom and Dad, he said he would love me for the rest of his life."
But love is easy, what is a lifetime?
In 2012, Jenny was sent to the hospital for an emergency, and the doctor's face sank: rare colitis + autoimmune diseases, complicated by sepsis.
"I won't die, but I won't get better, I have to take medicine for life."
Such as life imprisonment.
Jenny had diarrhea, severe pain, bleeding, and could not walk, and the 168cm person only had 65 pounds left.
It is said that tribulation sees the truth, but it has been heard for a long time.
The husband who said that he loved him all his life not only felt that Jenny was a burden, but even punched and kicked, and tried to increase violence.
Later, the husband filed for divorce.
The sworn Jenny sat in a wheelchair, signed her name, and let out a long sigh.
"Mom and Dad, Jenny is left alone again."
However, scumbags are like catastrophes, once they get out, time comes and goes.
Jenny's condition gradually healed, and she was able to walk on the ground.
Without doing anything, she quit her iron rice bowl and became obsessed with photography.
Angels, churches, weeping Virgins... Jenny smiled and said: "After dying once, I always felt close to heaven. ”
One day, she went to church as usual, but she accidentally ran into a funeral.
According to the rules, if you enter the funeral by mistake, you must wait for the ceremony before leaving.
Jenny stood frozen in the corner, listening to the scriptures being chanted, watching the lights go out, and a ray of holy light passed through her eyes.
A thought flashed through my mind:
If I die alone, who will remember me?
At this time, a staff member stopped her softly:
"If you have time tomorrow, please come to the funeral of a veteran. He had no children and was alone. ”
It was the first stranger's funeral Jenny attended.
The cold tombstone is full of the blood of the veteran's life, but no one knows it.
"At that moment, I decided to become the mourner of a lonely soul."
"I want to be their last listener."
Since then, there has been a strange woman in the London cemetery.
At the funeral where no one attended, she stood quietly and talked about giving a spring branch.
On the occasion of guests, she disappeared into the shadow of the trees and expressed her mourning from afar.
Knowing that the deceased was a tea-loving grandfather before his death, she would bring a bag of tea bags, and there was tea incense on Huangquan Road.
Hearing that the deceased had always loved John Lennon's "Imagine", she practiced in advance and sang softly in front of the flowers on the other side.
Wandering the grave hills and patrolling the forest, Jenny used her camera to record the last stop of countless people's lives.
She calls the cemetery an "outdoor art gallery."
The kiss of death is like a gorgeous and solemn gift.
The angels are down, a peaceful and clean wonderland.
The young girl sat at her grave.
Spring flowers sway, towards the dew like tears.
The divine soul stands at the foot of the cross.
An apostle with green leaves in his hand and a bird like a sky in his hand.
Jenny loves the angel on this sleeping cloud bed, and every time she passes by, she will stare for a long, long time.
This reminds her of an ancient Egyptian poem:
"Death is in front of me today, like the scent of myrrh, like sitting under the sails on a breeze day."
Everything is peaceful and complete.
Soon, Jenny's works and stories were widely circulated, and she was invited to attend crematoriums and cemeteries when they met unaccompanied and unexplained deceased.
Some people also treat her as a god wife and let her exorcise demons in her own family...
Jenny couldn't cry or laugh, and could only answer in Stendhal's words:
"I have come from hell, I am going to heaven, and I am passing through the earth."
She just wants to remember the scenery and moon she passed.
She studied funerals, earned a doctorate in mortuary science, and became a cemetery historian.
She wrote about her life and death, published photography books, and just wanted to tell the world that illness and death are not terrible.
"Because the cemetery is more sincere than the church, I have heard more sincere confessions."
Jenny is a big fan of diva Amy Winehouse, and every year on her death day, she goes to give flowers to her idols.
Jenny tattooed the bird on Amy's tombstone at her feet:
"Even if death carries me, I sing in the night."
She had seen a gray-haired old man, who, like herself, loved to nag at his wife's grave.
As he spoke, he lay on his stomach and wept, choking:
"Honey, I really want to hug you."
She once encountered a tearful tombstone, the owner drowned to save his dog, and finally the puppy was buried with him.
Every March, passers-by tie a garland to the dog, and someone even brings a small stick.
"It's as if they haven't left, they're just spending time with each other in a different way."
"When spring comes, the owner and the dog will run in the forest, and death will not disturb it."
She also met a special epitaph, longitudinal yin and yang, but loud -
I don't expect women to have power over men, I just want them to be in control of their lives!
This must be a super cool sister!
In the past 10 years, Jenny has met countless graves, and others are curious: Aren't you afraid?
She said calmly: "They were all loved." Death is nothing but a long journey. ”
Moreover, Jenny found that whenever she was alone, there would be a pair of blackbirds, guarding her.
"I guess that's my mom and dad."
This always reminds me of the saying:
Every ghost you fear is someone who others think about but can't meet.
Every interview, reporters ask a presumptuous question: Jenny, have you ever thought about your funeral?
She replied with a smile, as if the answer had been repeated countless times in her mind:
"I have no relatives, no offspring, no love.
If this body is available, please offer me to medicine, and when he comes to the end, please cremate me to ashes.
I will be buried in my homeland, with my parents and parents.
Trouble you, on the tombstone is carved an angel with a black bird resting on her fingertips, pointing the direction of home.
Jenny doesn't have to go home alone anymore. ”
At this moment, Curie remembered the sentence in "The Tale of Kamakura":
The train leads to Huangquan Station, and the platform station is full of deceased people who came to greet people.
Where is this tragedy, this is reunion.
Picture丨Network
Responsible editor丨Honey
Editor丨Happy Little Immortal