As I Face The Final Curtain...

Exit stage left, Pat Lawrie.  Photographer, Director, Neighbourhood Witch. 

Pat was one of our neighbours.  She died on November 5 in a nearby care home.  She'd left her house a few months ago when it became obvious that she could no longer take care of herself alone.  She was 93.  

When we first moved here she told me her great grandfather had invented Drambuie, probably a claim made by as many people as went to school with the Kray twins.  

She had been evacuated to Chatsworth House for the duration of WWII and claimed to have slept under Henry VIII.  She was a portrait photographer in Winter's in Derby.  She was a director of Shakespeare for the Derby Shakespeare Society and her after show party was held in its building on Kedleston Road.   She wanted to be toasted with Champagne and Scottish smoked salmon, which we enjoyed immensely.   The theatre was full of photos of her through her life, photos and reviews of productions.  A real treat.  

Alan Bates was a patron of the society and had lived a few hundred yards from Pat's, and our, house.   

There was a good turnout at the crem.  Family, her friends from the golf club, luvvies from the WS society and neighbours, past and present.  Her coffin came in to the Big Top circus music which raised a laugh.  She knew how to open and close a show.