Why I’ve built my own coffin

I have inadvertently built my own coffin. I’m rather chuffed with it. It wasn’t meant to be a coffin. It’s actually a boat. My son found a YouTube video on how to make one, and although these videos are normally created by practical men for other practical men (I am the world’s most impractical man), I watched it and thought: ‘Even I could do that.’ It’s essentially an open-top plywood box, eight feet by two feet by one foot, with a 45-degree angle at the front to make it look slightly less like a box.

Needless to say, my son got bored after the third nail, but I soldiered on and, seven bathrooms’ worth of sealant later, I was the proud owner of a punt. As I pushed off from the riverbank on the vessel’s maiden voyage, my partner seemed shocked that, yes, it was in fact floating.

As I meandered past, this time lying down, she said: ‘It looks like you’re in a coffin.’ That’s when it struck me: why not? Why shouldn’t this object double up, whenever the day comes, as my final home? It’s the only thing I’ve managed to build, and I’m proud of it. So I’ve decided: in my will there will be money set aside for another piece of plywood to act as a lid, plus a few nails.

Whoever is organising my funeral is going to be left in no doubt that spending three grand on a mahogany coffin with brass handles is not an option. The modern undertaking industry is a massive con. The way they use guilt and embarrassment is shameless, nudging you towards ‘superior’ coffins and ‘premium’ hearses as if without that vast expense your grief isn’t sincere.