Funeral Service
Catherine's Funeral was held on Tuesday 16th May 2006 at Bushbury Crematorium in Wolverhampton.
For the benefit of those who were unable to attend the following is an account of the service.
The Order of Service:
Front Cover Back Cover
Centre Piece
Reading (Read by Jill Bateman Catherine's Mum)
1 Corinthians 1 - 13
And now I will show you the best way of all.
I may speak in tongues of men and of angels, but if I am without love, I am a sounding gong or a clanging cymbal. I may have the gift of prophecy, and know every hidden truth; I may have faith strong enough to move mountains; but if I have no love, I am nothing. I may dole out all I possess, or even give my body to be burnt, but if I have no love, I am none the better.
Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one. Love is never boastful, nor conceited nor rude; never selfish, not quick to take offence. Love keeps no score of wrongs; does not gloat over other men's sins, but delights in the truth. There is nothing love cannot face: there is no limit to its faith, its hope and it endurance.
Love will never come to an end. Are there prophets? their work will be over. Are there tongues of ecstacy? they will cease. Is there knowledge? it will vanish away; for our knowledge and our prophecy alike are partial, and the partial vanishes when wholeness comes. When I was a child, my speech, my outlook, and my thoughts were all childish. When I grew up, I had finished with childish things. Now we see only puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we shall see face to face. My knowledge now is partial; then it will be whole, like God's knowledge of me. In a word, there are three things that last for ever: faith, hope and love; but the greatest of them is love.
Tribute 1 (Written and read by Mark Brennand)
"Good afternoon and thank you for coming.
I realise that this is not going to be easy, either for me or you, but given what Catherine has endured these last four years I felt that it was the least I could do to say a few words as a tribute to the wonderful life that we’ve had together. It therefore goes without saying that this is a sad, sad day, not only because Catherine was so young when she died but also because her death has robbed us of such a talented and lively individual.
That said, I recognise that we are not unique in our grief because there are some of you here today who have experienced similar tragedies in your lives. We know that we have your support and take strength from both that and the great swathe of goodwill that we have received.
So what do we know of Catherine. Most of you will have an association with her through her art. She was a talent. Her paintings reflected her character: lively, bright, vibrant, with lots of vivid colour. She was driven, so much so that she spent every spare hour in her studio painting, and that effort paid off when she was elected as a full member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolour. This gave her a huge boost and provided the platform for a highly successful career, which culminated in February of this year with her first One Woman Show in Malta. That it was such a resounding success, selling out on the very first day, was a source of tremendous satisfaction. And the world is a brighter place for all the hundreds of paintings which are out there and which are a constant reminder of her existence.
So we know she could paint. She was also a talented pianist reaching a high standard as a young girl and once at college she joined a band called Virgil Bone and wrote upwards of fifty songs with titles such as Phoenix, Wolf Hunt, Mono Crox and Crying Song. In later years she would take great pleasure in playing complex duets with her mum Gill, a similarly gifted pianist.
She was an avid reader, a bookworm in every sense of the word. From Jane Austin and Charles Dickens, to Tolstoy, Dostoyefsky, and J K Rowling, all were read. Our house is full of books, yet Catherine would often comment that she wished she had been better read. If I manage to read only half the books she has devoured, I will be happy.
She was great writer of letters, taking time from her busy life to maintain regular correspondence with her close circle of friends. She loved cooking, Radio 4, fell walking in the Lakes, classical and contemporary music, London, architecture, Italy, France, going to the cinema, yoga, buying clothes, fine cuisine or simply a good cup of tea. She was a true enthusiast with a zest for life.
To her mum and dad, she was a wonderful daughter. The past couple of weeks have given us time to reflect and her father John has said that if they had wanted to knit a daughter to fit their needs Catherine would be it.
To our two boys she was also a wonderful mum. Like many mums she experienced periods of self doubt brought on by the conflicting demands of her desire to succeed as an artist and her responsibilities as a mum. And yet without exception, she was utterly selfless in placing their needs ahead of her own. They are super lads and in them her talent lives on, Jack through the piano and Tom through his love of drawing.
And to me she was my best mate. From the moment we met at a Halloween Party in 1986, she dressed as Morticia Adams, me as a Ghostbuster, we just clicked. We started yakking and we were still yakking twenty years later. I have been incredibly lucky. Some people spend their whole lives searching in vain for their perfect soul mate but, in Catherine, I know I found mine. I cannot believe that she no longer here and I miss her terribly.
For someone who believed in the sanctity of fairness and fair play it was the cruellest of blows when, four years ago, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Throughout these four years she has met every hurdle head on. She had an indomitable spirit, built on an incredibly positive attitude. Time and again she would return from New Cross Hospital and it would be as much as I could do to ask her how things were. I knew in my heart that the news would not be good. It never is with this most wretched disease.
We’d talk for 10 minutes or so about the implications and then as if from nowhere she would say; “But it could be a lot worse. I’m still fit, I can do everything I want to do. Treatment is improving all the time and I’ll just have to get on with it”, and from that point, it was as if she discarded all negative thought into a little recycle bin. Off she would go, we’d hear very little more about it and life would return to normal.
To this day I do not know how she kept it up, often in the face of the most gut wrenching news. And whilst she may have lost her physical battle with cancer, she won the mental one hands down.
We have been overwhelmed with all your letters of sympathy and we’d like to thank you all for your thoughts. All offer a glowing tribute to Catherine but the words contained in one, from a long time friend and patron crystallise her character.
He writes:
“More important than her paintings, I shall forever recall what an angel she was. The dearest person imaginable; kind, thoughtful, utterly decent and unspoilt. Just a really lovely person in every possible sense. It was my pleasure to know her and an honour to own paintings created by her own fair hand.”
Thank you."
Tribute Two (Written and read by John Bateman)
"Hello …………..I’m Catherine’s dad.
You won’t be surprised to know, that like everyone close to Catherine, I’m in something of a turmoil--- a mix of thoughts and emotions; pain, sadness, pride, gratitude, disbelief, from time to time re-visiting the question WHY?
Happily, perhaps strangely, anger has played no part in it. Perhaps that will come later, I don’t know but what I do know is that since Catherine’s death we have sometimes functioned normally, sometimes not – sometimes in control, sometimes not.
Adding to all this, is an anxiety that I might not be able to handle this. It IS a risk. It’s a risk you must share with me because Jill and I very much want to add our personal tribute to Mark’s very brave and eloquent words.
It’s also a risk I can take in the knowledge that, because of Catherine, we are among friends, even though there are many of you we have yet to meet. And so ………………
Catherine ………………………. A lovely name for a lovely young woman.
Wife, mother, daughter, sister, neice, cousin, neighbour, friend…. Very very special friend and it was this quality that linked all those roles and many more in a unique way.
As you know, she was Mark’s wife and, as you have heard, she was also his best friend. Catherine was our daughter; she was also someone we would have honoured to have as a friend had we not the good fortune to have her in the family.
If you then think of Catherine’s wonderful painting, her music and many other gifts, you have a truly astonishing range of talents and attributes that, somehow, many of you have been able to honour so sensitively and caringly in your cards and letters.
Mark, Jill and I have read every word and we thank you. Believe me they have helped and you are all so right when you marvel at Catherine’s courage – a word which rang out in message after message.
Yes, we all know that Catherine was very special and, throughout her tragically brief 44 years Jill and I watched, marvelled, worried and gloried in our good fortune.
Catherine became something of a star quite early --- at nine months to be precise. It was a family break and we trotted down the village summer fete where we were persuaded to enter Catherine in the Baby show.
You-ve guessed it – she won it and stunned the local population. Visitors just don’t win rural Baby Shows and I can still picture the forced smiles of the massed local motherhood. For the first, and possibly last time, Catherine made few friends that afternoon, but we remember it with a smile.
As a child Catherine was shy, always creative, imaginative, industrious, took untidiness to new heights, was very strong on the leg side at garden cricket and was spirited – oh yes she was spirited.
I read somewhere that the skill of parenting is learning the art of gradual retreat. Undoubtedly at times I didn’t retreat fast enough, possibly not at all and a verbal sandblasting from Catherine encouraged and speeded up the process.
Never in doubt, however was her rich potential and keenness to learn and try new ventures. Her intelligence, humour, originality and artistic and musical talents were widely recognised and came to light in various forms.
School magazine word and picture presentations shed new light on the Civil War or whatever fired Catherine’s imagination and a breezy piano solo would always liven up a dreary Grammar School Speech Day.
College days for Catherine were, I think, something of a voyage of self discovery, with highs and lows for her and times not without their anxieties for us. But she succeeded, broadened and developed her music and art and, perhaps most importantly, made lifelong, caring friends, some of whom are here today.
It was however, only after Catherine came to Wolverhampton, met Mark and they built their lives together that she truly blossomed, maturing and gaining confidence, fulfilling that early potential so gloriously, not only as an artist but as a wonderfully complete and fulfilled person.
Catherine was taken to the heart of Mark’s parents, John and Barbara --- she was their daughter too and brother Dave, close family friends and their ever expanding wider network of friends, art and business contacts and painting collectors loved her too.
Catherine’s life was a broad canvas but, if you ask what was her greatest gift, I think it would lay in her love of life. She had a zest for it, an intelligent and fierce appetite for it and she exuded a vitality that touched almost everything she did.
If I were to disagree in any way with the loving tribute quoted by Mark, it would be to say that Catherine was no angel – but she had all the human qualities you could hope for. She was warm, caring, full of fun and brightened the life of almost everyone she met.
We all have it in us to be generous at times – Catherine, though had generosity stamped all the way through and that generosity was wide reaching, far more than simply materialistic, although she delighted in giving quite frequently extravagantly.
Her generosity included the sharing of her beloved boys with Jill and I, Barbara and friends, and despite at times massively daunting work pressures, she always ensured that they came first.
An urgently needed painting would always be put to one side to ensure that a pirate’s costume or football kit was ready in time for the boys.
Catherine loved making people happy – one of the reasons she was such wonderful company. It showed in many ways.
On her travels, either for her art or on holiday however busy or brief the trip, she would make time to send her wonderfully witty, informative and carefully chosen or sketched postcards that brightened up the morning post.
They invariably told us what a great time she and the family were having – even when she was feeling far from well. That inimitable hand writing would tell us of great buildings, brilliant restaurants or whatever and we would invariably pass the card round with a smile, simply feeling better.
We all knew, too, that the cards were not sent out of some sense of duty, unthinkingly because of some address book list or just because that’s what people do when they’re away, but because she loved spreading her joy of life, of sharing what she felt was her good fortune.
The handwriting is much in evidence throughout the house. Notes here, helpful guidance lists for Mark there – original, practical. Catherine still makes us laugh too. In the kitchen there’s a biscuit tin which we opened at boys’ tea time recently.
Covering the contents is a note; “Jack, I know you’ve been taking these biscuits – please don’t”. Shades of Joyce Grenfell.
Most of us, I suppose have a modicum of talent --- not bad at this, quite good at that. Catherine though was truly gifted and hundreds of homes, offices, galleries or great council chambers bear glorious and lasting testimony to her creative achievements.
There is some evidence, gathered over the years, that some people gifted with great and rare creative ability, somehow live their lives with an intensity and brightness of light that is beyond the rest of us --- a burning energy that fuels a ferocious output as if there is a knowledge born long before the cruel reality of illness, that time may be short.
True or not I don’t know, but Catherine’s output was astonishing and for that we must all be grateful. Whether or not she had been an achiever, Catherine will always live on with us, but it is good to know that her paintings ensure that her memory will be universal.
Back here in town, it is Tarmac you can thank for bringing Catherine to Wolverhampton --- a signing I like to think, equivalent to Wolves snapping up Thierry Henry on a free transfer.
But it is Mark, Jack and Tom we can thank for making her years here truly happy, truly fulfilled. Quite simply she loved life here, and despite the massive health set-backs she repeatedly suffered during these past four years, she always retained her hope and her resolve to make the most of every day.
Those days of Catherine’s I suspect, contained at least 25 hours and Jill and I are indeed fortunate to have such a daughter, such wonderful company and someone who never ceased to be happy to see us, in the knowledge that we were always so very happy to see her.
With Catherine around life was fun and it is, at present, impossible to envisage a future without her --- never to hear again the gales of laughter from our little music room as she and her mother thundered out a Polish dance piano duet, or to enjoy the giggling and clink of wine glasses in the kitchen as splendid meals were prepared ….. meals which would stretch long into the evening.
Whenever we parted, there would be a great pile of books for us to devour. Not only could Catherine never have enough books, she kept our reading up to scratch, too, and in so many ways she was a remarkable young woman.
Now the way ahead is darker and will be far from easy – most particularly for Mark, Jack and Tom. It is, however, of immense comfort to know that they – and we – have you…. a great reservoir of love, understanding and, when needed, practical support upon which to draw.
Catherine’s love of life and her inspirational courage helped her to cope with devastating blows and, from somewhere, she mustered the strength, determination and cheerfulness to battle on – always with hope.
Now we must do the same.
Thank you."
Pictoral Tribute inserted into the Order of Service
Front cover Back cover
Centre spread
Scattering half of Catherine's Ashes
On Tuesday 30th May, Mark, Jack , Tom, and Catherine's Mum Jill, scaled Cairnsmore of Fleet in Galloway to scatter half of her remains. It was a cold day with a strong northerly breeze but we made it to the top. From the summit we could see the fells of the English Lake District to the South, the Cree Estuary, Mull of Galloway and the Isle of Man to the South West, Ailsa Craig to the North West and Merrick, (the highest peak in the Southern Uplands) to the North. Cainsmore is a fell which Catherine and I had walked on a number of occasions, always in glorious weather, so it held happy memories for her.
Photographs below:
Setting Off On the Way up
At the Summit - Cree Estuary in background The Summit
Catherine's final resting place - looking South West across the Cree Estuary
The view of Cairnsmore of Fleet from North Balfern, Kirkinner
Scattering the remainder of Catherine's Ashes
On Monday 31st July, whilst on holiday in the English Lake District, Mark, Jack and Tom walked up Holme Fell, (Tilberthwaite) to scatter the final remains of Catherine's Ashes. The climb was one of Catherine's favourites and from its summit it offers wonderful views of Lake Coniston, The Coniston Fells, The Langdale Pikes and Fairfield Round above Ambleside.
Jack & Tom about to set off -
the summit is the peak immediately above them
Half way up
At the summit - Langdale Pikes behind left
Tom with Fairfield Round behind
View of Wetherlam
View of Holme Fell (in the middle of the photograph) from Black Crag
