Fading from Memory

The end game

Mike — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:35:00 +1000

The last few months have been spent, in part, slowly working through the process of tidying up.

All the known major investments, insurance policies and accounts have been, or are very close to being, liquidated and consolidated in the one bank account. Only mum and dad's UK premium bonds, which amount to a mere 36 pounds, are still outstanding, and I am in the process of searching for old bank accounts in the UK, those we may never have heard of, through www.mylostaccount.org.uk.

The house has just been sold for a good price, within four days of being on the market, and despite the deep economic trough we keep hearing about. I am sure that the improvements Greg organised for the house were very instrumental in facilitating the sale. We had tenants in residence for just a few months, but it seems that one or more of them wanted to leave and the remaining one couldn't afford the place on his own. He asked to terminate his lease early and, given the difficulty we had had getting regular rent payments from him and his co-tenants, we agreed quite readily. We were rather unimpressed, to be honest, not least with their casual attitude to mail intended for mum and dad. Some of it appears to have been just thrown away, and at least one letter was used as notepaper.

When we hired a solicitor to do the conveyancing we also asked him to look after the application for a grant of probate. How this works in Australia is, I imagine, fairly similar to how it works in other countries. If the estate is significant enough, or if the wills are sufficiently complex (or non-existent), then the administration of the will must be granted by a clerk of the supreme court. Greg and I, as executors, have had to apply for this power to be granted to us before we can dispose of the house. The completion of the sale is therefore now hanging on us having probate completed. There was been one hiccup in the process, however. When we had a codicil added to mum's will, the family lawyer took the original for safe keeping, and provided me with a copy. Since then, he retired and passed his practice in toto to another law firm. When our solicitor contacted them to ask for the codicil they reported that they were unable to find it! Now, providing everyone plays sensibly, we should be able to get this sorted out, since no beneficiaries were changed, only the names of the executors, and for very transparent and understandable reasons (Derek being in the UK, Greg and I being here). However, it does complicate the process, requiring additional explanations to be written, evaluated, acceded to, and then acted upon, best case.

Despite this, from what I hear of others who have been in a similar situation, we are having a dream run with this process.

In the middle of these considerations, mum's 87th birthday came and went, in April. I remembered on the day, unlike last year, and wondered what was appropriate. Nothing, really. There's no grave to attend, no spouse to call, or anything like that.

Forward

Mike — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 22:51:00 +1100

Mum's death certificate arrived today and, you would not believe it, there are errors in it! Someone has very helpfully expanded the initials of the nursing home - incorrectly, twice. I think this is minor, but it leaves me shaking my head. Doesn't anybody every check their work?

The other silly thing is that the letter was delivered to my P O Box, just as I had requested. But at about Christmas the undertaker called me to say that the Registry had told her that they needed another address, as they would not deliver to a P O Box. I gave her the street address the Registry already had for me - as informant. I often think of Monty Python at these times.

The summer holiday doldrums are coming to an end in Australia. People are getting back to work and many of the usual summer entertainments are now over. It seemed a particularly long and enpty time for me this year. I never like it, but this year I felt particularly listless. I doubt that this has much to do with my parents, though I am ready to accept that it might. It is just that I do not miss them at all. Dad has been dead four months now and, as for mum, there was not much to miss, to be bluntly candid about it.

Anyway, being in possession of the second death certificate means I am now able to make forward progress on sorting out the estates. I took all paperwork files relating to my parents in to my office today, as it is much easier to do this kind of work there. One of the things I did in 2008 was throw out my computer printer at home. I'd had it for about 14 years and found that I no longer used it - the ones in the office do a much better job.

If things continue like this there will be little to add to this blog. I haven't stopped thinking about my parents but there is not much to add. They are gone. We are left to tidy up their affairs. We shall do so.

New phase

Mike — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:17:00 +1100

This weblog now enters a new phase, as the final act involving my mother took place today.

We had the funeral in the same chapel and in much the same clear weather conditions as for dad's funeral. There were some differences. It is a much hotter time of year now, and standing in the sun in a suit was not comfortable, not for long, anyway. The music was the same as for dad. The flowers were different, slightly, including irises this time. There were flowers from Bob, mum's brother, and from a close friend of mine, also containing irises. The coffin was white, not wood. And three of the family spoke.

Derek's wife Janet read a hymn which had been sung at our grandmother Annie's funeral in 1963, and then talked about her early experiences as a daughter-in-law, and the help and welcome she received from our mother. Then Rachel spoke, and described mum very well, covering her early life, meeting our father, leaving England, raising, in effect, two families and travelling all over the world. And last, I read the messages, not just those that have been received for mum, but also those for dad, most of which came in too late, and which we were just not in the right frame of mine to read back then.

I found it harder to read the messages that I expected. I had read them several times over to myself in preparation, but at the time, after having listened to Rachel's very affecting talk, I heard my voice faltering at times. However, it was good to have made the thoughts of family and friends public. I do think dad deserved it too, even though it was not his occasion today. I think we are all much more in possession of ourselves and able to determine what needs to be done, and how, this time.

There were fewer people at the funeral than last time; fewer from the church, and no family friends. When, mid-reading, I looked up at the congregation I was surprised at how small a gathering it was. We had expected staff from the retirement village to attend but in the event they were unable to.

Rachel has produced an order of service, using a photograph of mum taken on 17th April 2003 - both her 81st birthday and mum and dad's 60th wedding anniversary. For that event, we had received telegrams from Queen Elizabeth and several dignitries, the Governor-General, the Governor, the Prime Minister, the Premier and the local Member of Parliament. I'd presented mum with a bound first edition of the family history. We drank three champagnes, three different whites, three reds, and five dessert wines. But, really, all mum cared about was that everyone was there, all of the family who were there again today.

Afterwards we all went back to Greg and Regan's place, and had lunch sitting out on the deck overlooking the bay. None of us appear to be functioning in any way different from how we normally would. Life really does go on. I was interested to hear Derek reminisce about our mother's mother's funeral, the one I mentioned earlier. Several of our Irish relatives came across from Belfast, and some from where they were living in Southport. They surprised Derek by having no reserve, they were as familiar with him as they were with each other. One grabbed a clothes-brush and brushed at Derek's jacket.

I left after lunch. A bad night's sleep last night and too much wine the day before had given me a strong need to get horizontal. I came home and slept from 3 pm to 6:30. It is now time to start thinking about dinner and feeding the cats, both of whom outlived both my parents - something I didn't expect to happen.

Tomorrow we are all going to a restaurant high on a hill-top overlooking the Pacific. We went there after dad's funeral. Then, on Saturday, we are having Christmas dinner together - the first time since 1992, when Cassie's birth was still six years in the future.

Together

Mike — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 13:35:00 +1100

It's odd how things turn out.

Rachel and I met with the undertaker, in the same room, round the same table, as we had fourteen weeks ago. We knew the drill. The undertaker was a different woman, much more matter of fact and business-like. The goal seemed to be to get things done nicely, rather than to mourn, and this seemed suitable to the occasion. We even joked several times.

The funeral is scheduled for 9:45 am on Thursday, and will be held in the same chapel we had for dad, and the service will be conducted by the same minister, who remembers mum from her church-going days. Derek and his family are flying out here again, and will be here for four or five days. Mum's brother Bob sent flowers. I feel very sorry for him; I am sure he would want to be here but he is not young either and has an ailing wife to tend to.

My mood over the last few days has been, bizarrely, quite cheerful. I've had a lot to do, both as a result of mum's death and simply because the rest of life doesn't stop on these occasions, but I've been up each morning, unweighed by misery or sorrow, and able to function quite normally. Yesterday was marked by torrential rain. I had to make several car trips and got soaked several times. It could have been an opportunity to read all sorts of pathetic fallacy into the story, but it was not. I have a real sense now of being able to move on, and I think that, when looked at objectively, this is exactly what this time is: a time to move on.

I am very heartened by the messages that have come in as comments and private emails since my last post. These are from people I have never met, but whose parallel lives have helped set mine in context at times, and whose comments over the years have added new insights into the process that none of us is ever really prepared for. Towards the end I found my preoccupation with our own family's experience precluded keeping a daily check on those of others, but it had always been good to know that someone somewhere understood something of what we were going through.

Our cousins have also been sending us their thoughts. They nearly all mention the timing. It is odd to think of mum and dad being together for so many decades and then leaving so soon one after the other. I am sure that the double blow of this year is not what anyone would have expected, and certainly not hoped for. At this time I am glad it has happened this way. There have been times when I have looked at mum, wimpering and fidgeting in mute anxious frustration and thought that this is just not worth prolonging. We had to do all we could, as her life was as sacred as any, but now that it is over, and we are still dealing with dad's death, it is satisfying that we can think of them as dying together, as they were for most of their lives.

Greg contacted the people at the crematorium, who have still not done anything with dad's ashes, and asked them to hold them until they have mum's too, and then we shall decide what to do about both. Despite my earlier avowed indifference to the matter, I think there is something good about this, too. I am not sure what, yet, but I am sure it is the right thing to do.

And now mum goes

Mike — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:11:00 +1100

My phone was ringing this morning. One message was from Regan, to say that mum had collapsed this morning and the staff at the home had asked us to there right away. They suspected a heart attack.

I left right after breakfast and had barely been in the car five minutes when Regan called again to tell me that mum had died. It was a strange feeling, dissociated, calm, already thinking about the numerous things that now need to be done. I spent much of the remainder of the trip on the phone to a friend who I had told, earlier in the morning, about the first call from Regan.

At the home I went to mum's room and found Regan and Rachel there with mum. Greg was still at work, busily trying to rearrange his week so that he can take the rest of it off work. Mum was lying in the bed, her face yellow, still badly bruised. She reminded me immediately of dad, lying dead only a few metres away, exactly fourteen weeks ago.

Apparently the staff had woken mum and got her showered and dressed. She had been put to bed when she collapsed, but it was only ten or fifteen minutes later when she died. None of us got there in time.

My reaction this time was almost completely the opposite of how I felt when dad died. Back then, I just wanted to withdraw and think. This time, I wanted to get cracking, do what had to be done and not spend any time commiserating with myself. I left maybe half an hour later, sent some emails to Derek and our cousins, made an appointment with the undertakers (10am on Friday), and began collecting the information that will be required for the death certifcate. This time I am making sure there is no room for error, I've printed out all the details in exactly the format of the NSW death certificate, and I shall give the undertaker a copy of that.

I am quite prepared for the meeting. This time it is Greg who wants to keep out of the preparations. He said that as far as he is concerned, we can do an exact repeat of dad's funeral, and I am inclined to agree. I said to Rachel that if she wants to do more, that is fine, we just need to know what the differences are to be by Friday's meeting. It might behove us to decide early rather than at the last minute what the death notice should say.

My over-riding feelings are one part relief, two parts release. Numbness too, perhaps. I think it is a release for all of us. Mum may have been content most of the time, and cheerful for quite a lot of it, but we had the prospect of steadily worsening conditions, and constantly lowered expectations. We've been released from that now, and this overlays the realisation that we can now really start to sort things our, rather than constantly steeling ourselves for worse to come. The numbness is due to the fact that it still hasn't quite sunk in that dad is dead.

Dad's affairs are by no means resolved, and now a number of the processes that I had initiated are invalid, as they had involved the transfer of assets to mum. We now need to go back and do things differently, and now things are not quite so clear-cut, as there are four beneficiaries (my three siblings and I) instead of one.

It has been one hell of a year: putting first mum and then dad in the home, clearing the house, dealing with dad's death, its bureaucratic aftermath, and now with mum's. I went back to my blog entries for early January, just to see how things had changed since then. Back in January dad was plaguing me with telephone calls and I was constantly impatient with him. Back then, he was still compos mentis enough to suggest in his garbled way that we go out for lunch together. And we never did.

Mum's deterioration

Mike — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 14:36:00 +1100

I dropped in to visit mum yesterday afternoon.

I was in for several surprises. Mum was sitting in a wheel chair, wearing a night-dress, and sitting next to her was Rachel.

The wheel chair caused me some concerns. The background to this is that since her series of falls mum appears to have lost the confidence to stand or walk unaided. The staff cannot be there to take an arm each side every time mum needs to walk, and in any event, mum tends to try to slump down anyway, and make herself a dead weight. the wheel chair is the only viable option now for moving mum. Mum also seemed to lose interest in food. The staff are confident that they can get her appetite back, but they are pessimistic about her walking again. The physiotherapist has been a regular visitor, but walking also depends on the will and the memory of how to do it - and mum seems to have neither now. This augurs badly. Once mobility is lost, muscles atrophy that much faster, fluid collects where it should not, and the circulation suffers. All these factors add up to a kind of attrition against the body - a process that we saw eating into dad increibly quickly. And the end is inevitable. Neither Rachel nor Greg think mum will last another year, and I have to agree with them.

Rachel had been successful in encouraging mum to drink orange juice. She can still lift a cup to her mouth and knows how to regulate her own drinking. The only weakness is that she sometimes seems to become distracted and forget that she is holding the cup, and it will start to tip.

On the positive side of the balance, I noted that the bruising on mum's face has reduced markedly. She still looks bad, with her missing teeth, blearly eyes, wild hair and deep wrinkles, but a lot better than she had done a few days ago.

Oddly, none of us seemed that upset about mum's condition. I don't know if it is because this is coming so soon after dad's death, and we area all a bit numb still, or whether we have just seen so much and recognise the inexorable quality of these slow descents.

We did talk a bit about dad at dinner later, the three of us. I mentioned that I keep having the thought, 'my dad's dead', but that it seems to have no content, to be no more meaningful than saying 'a equals b'. Rachel says she has been experiencing the same thing. Earlier this week I told one other friend about dad's death, and we discussed this point. He's also suffered a bereavement and says that he has thought the same thought every day since, with the same emotional detachment.

Maybe mum's passing will be over before we know it, at this rate. It's an odd thought. I always thought we would all be more affected by losing her than losing dad. It may still prove to be so.

Could be worse

Mike — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 21:44:00 +1100

Seeing mum today was quite a shock. The bruising on her face was far more extensive than I had imagined. She looks like one of those Hollywood horror monsters whose flesh is all the colours of rotting meat. She has also injured a leg - her right hamstring is very tender, the physiotherapist discovered - and she is not able to walk without assistance. I spent some time helping to walk mum around the common room with the physiotherapist; mum moved a slide and glide walker ahead of her while we each held on to a loop of the lifting strap which was secured around her chest.

Mum appeared to be suffering a headache, or it might have just been the pain of the injury; she has a big bump on her forehead. It is again remarkable how her bones stand up to falls. We cannot recall mum ever having broken anything, and this must be considered a major blessing now. Anyway, after the short walk we sat her down and although I talked to her, she soon fell asleep.

Other things I noted...

I have never seen such a lack of recognition on mum's face. My face, my voice, my name - none of it really seemed to register at all. Yet mum has come off Risperidone and is currently only being given Panadol to dull the pain of the injuries. Apparently her aggression has already begun to show. One of the assistants showed me several red marks on her forearms, all of which had apparently been caused by mum. She seemed very happy-go-lucky about this occupational hazard, and I thanked her and apologised for it, but I think that this foretells a return to the Risperidone, but perhaps at a reduced dose, as a compromise between unsteadiness and aggression. The staff at the home are incredibly good, I think. They take time to stop and explain what has been going on, they talk to mum as if she is a friend, and do not patronise her, and they seem genuinely pleased to see her improvement since her return, which has been significant, I am told.

Greg told me today what mum was like at the hospital. She was biting his hand, kept grabbing at his sunglasses, and constantly fiddled with the sheet and her sleeve, appearing to want to do something with them but never managing to do it. He said it was like dealing with a six-month-old. He saw no recognition either, but did at least get a smile from her when he tickled her feet.

More hospital news

Mike — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:43:00 +1100

Apparently mum has only just been taken back to the retirement village now (6:30 pm), but she is being walked around, seems none the worse for her experience, and has been doing physiotherapy.

After Greg was told that mum was to be discharged today, Rachel was at the hospital and was told that there was no question of that happening. Brilliant! And the reason given for not discharging mum was that there was a purported duty of care - and yet no-one there took care to see that mum ate her meals. It was the same with dad. If he didn't open the containers and eat what was put down in front of him it was interpreted as him 'not wanting' his meal.

Keep your parents out of hospital any way you can, I say.

One step forward, two steps back

Mike — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:54:00 +1100

That mum's recent falls have come at just this time has had a bad effect on me. I've been short and impatient with people. I am sure it is not just for the reason I am about to cite, but largely it is, I believe.

After dad died we started trying to sort out all his affairs. This took a long time even to get started on, but about a week ago I had finally written to all parties concerned and had started some way down the path of resolving various affairs, one by one. I then began going through my own affairs. Not only do I think that I need to simplify things now, rather than later, as a result of dealing with mum and dad's, but I more immediately need to make sure that all my correspondence is redirected, as I had been using mum and dad's address for all my mail, and I cannot expect the tenants (who will be moving in on 1 December) to dutifully redirect everything for me.

Meanwhile, several of the organisations dad dealt with had told me how to proceed, and once I had complied, then told me what I had done wrong. In one case I needed to show that I had power of attorney for mum. A copy of the power of attorney form was insufficient, as was a copy certified by a Justice of the Peace. In addition to this I was also required to send a copy of both sides of my driver's licence and this, too, had to be certified by a JP! The letter I then sent them began as follows:

"In compliance with your latest unbelievably arbitrary request..."

So, despite all this paperwork very little has been so far achieved. The JP who certified multiple copies of my documents told me that it took six years to sort out all her father's affairs, so I am probably complaining too early.

Greg and I had agreed that what we ought to do to prevent a total replay of this situation when mum dies is to cash out all her various investments (insurance policies, shares, deposits in a mutual society, and so on) and pay the money into a bank account to which we are also signatories. Then we can both access the funds before probate is completed, and have far less to do during probate.

So, today I had a number of things to do in addition to going to see mum.

I visited the house and was just in time to see a couple of lads from the rubbish removal company loading their truck and sweeping up. I told them how much we appreciated their doing the awful job of clearing out the rubbish under the house. This involved crouching low and dragging stuff through the dust. I did a bit of it several weeks ago and was in no mood for doing any more. I put the wheely bins out for rubbish collection on Thursday morning, and I collected the mail (many items of which are still not coming to the new address, Greg's post office box. I put a copy of the garage key into the lock-safe with the house key, and had a quick look around for the snake. One of the builders has been surprised by this reptile when he was moving sheets of asbestos behind the garage. He describes it as fairly thin and having a diamond pattern on its back, which makes it sound like a baby python. I've seen enough evidence to know that a strange thing happens to the human mind when it encounters a snake. People's descriptions are often quite at odds with the reality. I wonder whether the sight of a snake triggers something atavistic in our minds, which makes us later recall the archetypal snake rather than the common or garden variety we've seen.
I sat in the car and went through the mail, scrawling replies on the letters themselves, and enclosing the requested documents (of which I have several certified copies now). On anything unimportant I just wrote 'no longer at this address' on the envelope. I shoved the excess enveloopes and advertising in the Paper and Cardboard Only wheelie bin and put the rest in the post box on the corner.
I went to the bank and requested forms to allow Greg and I to become signatories to the account, so that we no longer depend on the power of attorney to write cheques. While I was there I also set up internet access, so that we can pay ourselves and watch the rent coming in. I fully expect mum to grow steadily richer now. Financially, everything has worked out extremely well so far.
And then I was meant to visit mum, but it never happened. After talking to Greg on the phone and going over everything that has been done today and what we are going to do tomorrow, it was nearly 4 pm and I hadn't eaten at all today. Food was suddenly a priority. I thought that I could drive home immediately and beat the rush hour. I all but did that, but it was not until I was in the car and on my way that I realised that I had meant to visit mum today. Well, that must now happen tomorrow, as Greg and I will be meeting up at his offices to take our ID and the signatory form to a branch of mum and dad's bank, and I can make the long detour to the retirement village on the way home.

Mum was to be discharged today, but I do not know at what time. Seeing her yesterday had had a depressing effect on Greg. He openly wondered, on the phone to me, whether she would be better off dead. I can understand the feeling. We seem unable to do anything for her now, and she oscillates between cheerfulness and weeping without any apparent cause. I never found it easy to go and visit, and today's performance just tells me that unconsciously I don't want to do it, but lately, the trip over (for all of five minutes in which she is occupied with me before she wanders off again) just doesn't seem worth it.

So, nothing seems to be working lately. And just as I reach the end of one task, others spring up. It is no fun.

Falling over

Mike — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 19:47:00 +1100

Every day for several weeks now I have been posting letters to organisations, first informing them of dad's death and asking what they would like me to do about closing off his affairs with them, then responding to their requests, then responding to their further requests. My earlier impressions, which were that utilities companies, insurers, and government departments' interests extend to delaying payouts and covering their own arses, has remained unchallenged by any signs of helpful behaviour on their part. The one quick result we got, without the need for any documentation, was the increase in mum's UK state pension. Hardly suprising though, as the increase in her pension was about 20% of what they had been paying dad. To them, therefore, it was an instant saving to be realised, and the resultant efficiency is remarkable only for its impersonal execution.

That's not what has prompted me to write though.

I just heard that mum had a fall on Tuesday, in the common room. Greg was notified at 6:30 pm, just after it happened, and again when the ambulance arrived to take mum to hospital. The hospital also called to say that mum had arrived. After examination mum was determined to be all right and was discharged, so that she was back at the home for the night.

Then, on Thursday, she apparently fell out of bed. This time there was no treatment as she, presumably, didn't appear to be hurt.

Then, yesterday (Saturday), she fell off her chair while sitting at the table. She was again taken to the hospital, and is there now, sedated and bruised about the face. A urinary tract infection is suspected.

The communications to the hospital have been as difficult as ever. And the confusion over what has been going on seems to have reared its ugly head once more. A doctor at the hospital has prescribed antibiotics for the UTI, under the impresssion that mum has been on these for two weeks. This is news to us. The staff at the home think that it may be worth taking mum off the Risperidone, as this may be making her drowsy and unsteady. This is defrinitely worth a try, I think, and I hope that mum does not resume her aggressive behaviour. If she does, it begins to look remarkably like the scenario we've just been through with dad: behaviour that is considered unmanageable without stronger drugs, a prescription that puts him out of action, reduced mobility, reduced appetite, poor sleep and the inevitable host of ancillary problems that come with that.

I need to speak to Greg and Rachel about finding an alternative hospital, too. Nothing about the one mum is in has ever made us feel good.

Amateur Hour

Mike — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:43:00 +1100

The NSW Registry of Births Deaths and Marriages has just convinced me that New South Wales is a bad place to die. I think it was on 10th October that I contacted them to say that dad's death certificate was full of errors, and I was told that some form was being sent out to me. Well, that never arrived. So, I called the Registry again today, waited the obligatory few minutes while inane 'messages' were spoken at me, and then explained the whole story once more.

This time I was told that a form could be sent out, no problem about that, but that there was rather a backlog and we would not get a corrected death certificate for about three months. I was instead advised to take the original document, in person, to the Registry office in Sydney, and wait in line. Apparently, if I get there early (they open at 8:30 am) I might be able to get the corrected form later the same day.

How cheering and helpful this all is. Meanwhile, I have collected a few more 'deceased estate' forms. The bureaucracy is frankly overwhelming. Several companies demand original documents. Nearly all want to see documents that have been notarised. I can see days of form-shuffling going up in smoke.

The lesson appears to be this - get your elderly parents to simplify their affairs as much as possible before they die, before they get too demented to do anything, and before they start losing papers - if you can. And good luck.

Reappearances

Mike — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 20:47:00 +1100

Last weekend a woman in England contacted me to say that her recently deceased father had been on the same ship as my father, when they were torpedoed during the Second World War. After a couple of email exchanges, she sent me a photograph of the survivors. My father is among them, standing at the back, but nearly a head taller than everyone else, looking young, confident, fresh-faced and excited by life. This is a photograph that none of us have ever seen before, yet it was so clearly dad, so easily identifiable, that when I forwarded it to Greg, Rachel and Derek there was no need to point dad out.

It was nearly 67 years ago. It staggers me to think that that photograph has been in existence, in the custody of strangers who had quite independent reasons for preserving it, but that it has finally come to us, only a few weeks after dad's death. And the contrast between how dad looked then and how he looked the morning he died just serves to emphasise what a long long way we travel in a lifetime.

Some weeks ago I had a rather unusual dream. Dad was standing to my left. I recall vividly that he was wearing a check shirt and seemed considerably shorter than I am, and than he was himself in his prime. In the dream I was having to explain to him that he was dead. Bizarrely, I was using all sorts of colloquilisms - or euphemisms, perhaps. 'You've kicked the bucket, dad. You're pushing up daisies.' 'Am I? he said. He wasn't taking it very well. His reaction was that of confused resignation, a feeling that things were just out of his control and could not be improved, that what he had hoped for was now unattainable. As the conversation wore on I was telling him he had to go, that there was no two ways about it, so he might as well just accept it. It was certainly not pleasant, but nor was it unpleasant. it just took place.

More threads

Mike — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 21:19:00 +1000

Going through the paper work is a big job. After reading everything related to, say, a life insurance policy, I make notes of the questions and most vital pieces of information I have. Then I call the insurance company, whose name has invariable changed since the policy was taken out. I explain the situation, and the person I talk to always says, 'I am sorry for your loss.' I always reply, 'It's OK.' And it is. They don't need to say anything, and in fact that would be preferable. The other thing that seems to be invariable is that every company, whether a phone company or an insurance company, has the equivalent of a 'deceased account process', which always begins with them sending me a 'pack' or, at minimum, a form. Not one of these packs has arrived yet, and I still haven't received the form the Registry of Births Deaths and Marriages promised me so, really, nothing has been achieved.

I went over to the house today and collected the mail. I also had a look around. The outside woodwork has been painted dark green to match the deck Greg and I built a few years ago, and looks very good. Doors and gates and gutters have been fixed. Inside, the floorboards have been sanded down and glazed, and they look good too. Everything above floor level has been painted white. It has made the house look bland, but has brought a lot more light into it, and it probably what tenants will want. We expect to have it let within a month.

The next stop was to see mum. She was having dinner when I arrived, and was fully occupied. She reminded me of a small animal, so intent on her food and so few other concerns. I stayed out of sight, not wanting to spoil her meal. Earlier in the day Rachel had attended a meeting at the home and had offered to donate dad's clothes to them. The offer had been accepted, so I got some assistance and brought them all in , stacked on a wheelchair. They've been in my car boot for several weeks. These garments are going to go into the communal mix now. It will be very odd to visit mum and see all the old blokes around her wearing dad's old clothes. It is a good job she won't recognise anything. She seemed pretty cheerful, was looking well, and has continued to put on weight. If anything, she may be getting a little fat now. She mumbled away to me about things. I kept nodding and agreeing, and eventually faded away after about 20 minutes, as her attention was drawn away by an imminent sing-along.

One of the things that really surprises me at the home is how well the staff remember me, and always know who I am there to visit. They always seem to remember who else has been there recently too, Rachel or Greg. I mentioned this to Greg today and he suspects that it is no great feat of memory, that the explanation is that very few of the residents get visitors, and we are an anomaly. I had never thought of this, but it could be true. The fact that the home was so keen to get dad's clothes seems to suggest that other families are not providing enough for their own elderly relations.

Oh, yes. I forgot to ask what had been decided about dad's ashes. We haven't finished with the morbid jokes. One suggestion for what to do with the ashes was to scatter them in the garden that he was never very interested in - 'You didn't make your bed. Now you can lie in it.' Another was that we sprinkle them on mum's porridge. There's plenty of carbon and calcium in ashes, presumably, and recycling is all the rage now.

Unnecessary complications

Mike — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 14:13:00 +1000

Dad's death certificate arrived, and is full of errors.

I don't know who is to blame for this, but I am pointing the finger at the undertaker. She could so easily have given us the form to fill out, but instead insisted on providing 'the service'. Some of the errors are potentially complicating. Dad's name is misspelt. So is the place of death (and residence), the number of years spent in Australia is inaccurate by about a quarter of a century, and the place of his marriage to mum is about 10,000 miles off target. On top of all that, Rachel's name has been spelt wrong.

Too many assumptions were made. We weren't asked how long dad lived in Australia; we were asked when he arrived here. That was 1951, but he lived overseas many years since then. Dad lived in Australia about 34 years, not 57. If the undertaker had asked the right question, we would have given her the information she really needed.

The undertaker has put the place of mum and dad's marriage down as West Derby, NSW. Well, since the wedding took place when dad was 21, it is obvious from the information already given that he was not yet in Australia, so that was a clever trick. Moreover, there is no West Derby in New South Wales, it is a registration district in Liverpool, England.

I was talking to a friend only this weekend, and asking her whether she had sorted out her brother's estate. He died about two years ago and, on the basis of his name being spelt differently on the death certificate and the insurance policy, the insurance company has steadfastly refused to pay out. This is salutary - we don't want to get caught in the same bind.

I therefore called the NSW Registry of Births Deaths and Marriages today and told them about the errors. The person I spoke to said that she would send me a form to fill in. So, back to square one on the death certificate.

Follow ups

Mike — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:12:00 +1000

The crematorium called Greg this week to ask him what he wanted to do with the ashes. They offered a couple of alternatives: placement behind a brass plaque for $1,000, or scattering in their surrounding gardens for $180. Neither of these options means much to either of us. I asked Greg, 'how much does it cost to give them no answer?'

Ever since I learnt that the residual material can include remnants of the coffin, is often mixed up with ashes from other bodies, and is actually the result of fire plus pulverisation by large steel balls, my interest in ashes has fallen from zero to something less. Sentimentally, I think I would now have preferred a burial, but that is more a throwback to the past, where gravestones were the only record. I am thinking of the interest I've shown recently in the past generations of my own family. Future descendants of dad might have appreciated having a gravestone to search out, but dad is so well documented in many other forms, anyway, that a grave is completely redundant.

A couple of days after the funeral the undertakers called Greg to seek feedback on their services. He told them that we were satisfied, but there was plenty of scope for black humour in that telephone conversation:
- 'we were all waiting at the grave and no-one appeared'
- 'we weren't happy and we'd like our money back now, please'
- 'it wasn't much fun, no-one had a good time; don't your people know any jokes?'
- 'can't wait to do the same with mum'
- 'I would recommend your services to anyone who was dead'
- 'dad appeared very happy with it all'
- 'we are all still in mourning, and you call about this? Where's your sense of decorum?'

That last question reminds me of what we talked about at the time. The call came as we were all at the house. We pondered the question of how long the undertakers wait between funeral and follow-up call. If they think it's a particularly uncaring family, maybe it is only a couple of hours. If there has been prolonged and inconsolable wailing during the service, perhaps they leave it a couple of weeks? Leave it too long and the response might be 'funeral for who?'

We've also received a few cards from people who have found out about dad's death through the grapevine. It's hard to know what to do with them. I put them up for a couple of hours and then took them down again. Now I shall put them in one of the big white trunks - and defer the decision.

It isn't hard to see why primitive people believed in life after death. If one's discrimination between memory, imagination, and experience is less than precise, it is easy to believe that the dead, in the form of dreams, memories, personal or shared, references and representations, are still with us. I suppose we have a kind of half-life after death; we slowly fade away, but never completely.

Clearing up

Mike — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 21:20:00 +1000

As I sit here at the computer, I am surrounded by my parents' papers, lying all over the floor like pack-ice. I have been tip-toeing over the various stacks of paper for a day and a half now. I've made a path through the middle so I can get from the kitchen to the desk. Although I have been filing mum and dad's papers for about two years now, everything needs to be collated and re-examined. Many of their affairs involve money, which they owe to others, which others owe to them, and which they have in several places. Now that dad is dead, several things change - pensions, life insurance, and so on. Other services such as his broadband and gas, telephone and burglar alarm maintenance, are no longer needed.

The picture in my spare room is somewhat similar except that there there are icebergs - four great white plastic trunks which contain a) photographs, b) books and masonic material, c) personal items and mementos, and d) gramaphone records and the x-rays and scans mum and dad have had over the last ten years. I've spent quite a bit of time doing the preliminary sorting of this material but, again, much more is required.

In the boot of my car I now have all of dad's things from the retirement home. That amounted to three big bin-liners full of clothes, a small portable stereo, a clock, a couple of wooden bowls, two framed photographs, and some tapestries that mum made. I drove over to the home this afternoon and picked up all of it. This is the last of several bootloads of stuff I have brought back to my place recently. I shall probably do what I normally do - leave it in the boot for a few days until I am in the mood to sort it out. In this case most of it, the clothing, will simply go into one of those roadside collection points the charities operate. I'l keep the clock since, even though I don't like it particularly, mine has recently begun to lose time. I'll keep the little stereo too.

And, having learnt the lesson of clearing out mum and dad's house, I have started doing the same at my office. there were complete filing cabinet drawers full of reference material I've kept but haven't referred to in eight years. In all, in one day, I filled an entire wheely bin with discarded paper, and rediscovered a few things I had thought were lost. It was, in other words, just like the house clearing.

Unfortunately, though, I was unable to visit mum today. There is yet another outbreak of gastroenteritis at her section, and they are in quarantine. The last time I saw her was the day dad died, 3 September, and I must admit that today I really only wanted to go in out of a sense of duty, and was glad to have a cast iron excuse for not going in.

Excavations

Mike — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:41:00 +1000

It is astonishing to think that a week has gone by since the funeral. I have slowly felt things getting back to normal and, just as astonishingly, this has seemed to happen very quickly.

I've been back to work, and meeting friends, only two of whom know about dad's death. I feel no need to tell others about it. In fact, I would rather not endure their awkwardness or sympathies. Instead, I have begun to sort out the loose ends that surround the death.

Derek, who is now back in the UK, has been in touch with the relevant government departments and Rolls Royce to find out what we need to do about dad's pensions. I've provided him with the pension numbers and various other bits of bureaucratic gobbledygook that they need. We still need to organised notarised copies of the powers of attorney and the death certificate.

I also began to go through the boxes of mum and dad's belongings that I brought back to my place. First the files, to make progress on the pensions, then the more personal stuff. I scrubbed one of dad's toolboxes, the plastic one, and used it to replace my old metal cantilevered one, which was rusted the day I bought it, in October 1976, at the start of my Fine Art course.

Next, I began to clean all the old record sleeves. Most of these records are from the World Record Club (NZ). They cover the more popular classics, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Bizet and Ravel, and the crooners, Sinatra, Reeves, which were probably mum's choices, and movie themes, My Fair Lady, and comic opera, which could have been dad's. There are also some later ones, Music For Pleasure, bought in the UK I believe, and including Roy Castle and more movie themes, Where Eagles Dare. Still later, records from Turkey and China. There are a few dozen children's stories too, which I've mentioned here before. And one complete surprise - Maxine Nightingale.

I remember listening to nearly al the records I am seeing again today. There were several romantic song collections, featuring fireside sleeve designs, which my mother used to play during the day. I remember thinking, as a young child, that such romantic fireside liaisons would happen to me one day, but the day hasn't arrived yet.

Considering that dad's mother was a piano teacher and mum's father was a church organist, my parents themselves were rather unmusical. The last music I can remember them getting excited about was Jesus Christ Superstar (that was one of mum's obsessions for a while, as was either Godspell or Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) and ABBA (dad, of course).

I have been writing this during a break from the cleaning work. I shall get back to it now.

And today

Mike — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:32:00 +1000

I got up in plenty of time and dressed in black clothes for the funeral. I have so much black, it was not at all a strange thing to do. The day was very bright and sunny, almost blindingly bright, and several people commented on it. How much worse things would have been had it been raining.

Greg had managed to make contact with the minister of mum and dad's church. He remembered them both, and agreed to conduct the service. One of the elders of the church had asked to say a few words about dad (ironically, this is the man who once wiped out all the speed-dial numbers in dadd's phone and left him sithout his lifeline for a couple of days). A half-dozen of the congregation wanted to attend, too. So, there were about twenty of us there altogether.

The crematorium is a big place with four chapels, all operating in parallel. Some thirty funerals were scheduled for today. I was struck by the informality of the gatherings for other funerals; many of them looked like random collections of individuals, with no concession to mourning. This seemed unsatisfactory to me, and I was curiously gratified to see that, with the exception of the old people from the church, our group looked decorous and dignified.

It is always interesting to hear how others see your immediate family. Dad, it seems, was considered a bit of a racontuer, a bit of a maverick, a character, a nice bloke. We heard a little of dad's tales from his operations around Asia - sitting in a Beirut hotel listing to the gunfights taking place outside, being stabbed in the Philippines, having a gun waved at him in some other forlorn corner of the world. We've heard these tales dozens of times and they seem commonplace to us. They are not, however.

A few of Greg's friends were there too - people who I have known for decades, and who knew dad. It is true what they say, that your presence at a funeral is deeply appreciated by those who are closer to the deceased.

For a wake we ferried ourselves back to Greg's place again and spent the next few hours together there. It began sombrely, but slowly warmed up, despite the fact that those who had travelled half-way around the world were slowly winding down with jet-lag. I left in mid afternoon and battled the rush-hour traffic and low sunlight on the way home. I had stayed up late last night. it was time to catch up on sleep. Arriving at 5 pm, I went to bed and slept for three hours.

Last night

Mike — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:16:00 +1000

Last night Greg and I went to the airport to meet Derek and Janet, Rebecca and Connor, who had all flown in from points European on the same flight. Before they emerged from the immigration gates Greg and I had a long talk about dad.

Greg seems to be having a much harder time than I am. He is preoccupied with how we might have done things differently, perhaps even tortured over the question. I eschewed the usual soothing noises, this situation not being one that I feel sits comfortably with me, and probably not with him either. Instead, I simply stated that if I had been blessed with foresight there were two things I would have changed - the medication dad received and the trips to the hospital.

The medication, however, was part and parcel of the deal I thought we made with the home. We knew, I maintain, that any difficulty they had handling dad would be medicated away with sedatives and so on. Although at that stage we were not aware that we should legally have had the opportunity to bless or veto any prescription of any medication, had we done so it is quite possible that the home would respond that without medication they could not cope, nor do their job properly, and that dad must return home. Well, that was a bridge we had already burnt; dad could not return home, so he would have had to come and stay with one of us. None of us wanted that. Perhaps we should have been prepared for it, but if so, why consider the home in the first place?

Dad's hospital treatment was such a rude shock to all of us that we simply had no way to foresee it, and so there is nothing to feel guilty about there either. I think we all thought that hospitals were comfortable caring places, and we have learnt that they are nothing like that. They are more like a mechanic's shop: apply the toolbox, fix the problem and get the job back on the road as soon as you can.

Greg now regrets that he saved so few things of dad's. He mentioned particular items that we saw walking out the door in the hands of strangers, at the garage sale. And yet, Greg had been so uninterested in setting aside these things when I was doing so. I told him that I have quite a few things of dad's, and mum's, here in my spare room, and he is welcome to whatever he wants of them.

When our visitors arrived we drove them home across Sydney, and sat down with Regan and Cassie for a late dinner. The conversation was good - not preoccupied with dad, but not ignoring the subject either, not maudlin, not false, not forced.

I came back to my place later, and arrived at midnight. I feel strangely composed. This week, I have stayed at home, avoided all situations where I might have had to talk to anyone, and Greg and Rachel have respected my wish to be kept out of further funeral arrangements. It has allowed me to think my own thoughts. Frankly, nothing else seems very important. And since I neither want to talk about things that are unimportant, nor talk about my father's death, I have remained silent. Tomorrow is the funeral, so tonight is the last night for dad's body. It seems all quite neatly arranged. I am aware that these feelings can be transient, illusory almost, but it feels pretty certain.

Funeral set

Mike — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 18:09:00 +1000

Id been warned that the necessities of dealing with the funeral come at exactly the time one least wishes to think about such things, and it is so true.

We at least seem not to disagree too much about how the affair should be conducted. When I arrived at Greg's house he told me that he and Rachel would prefer not to have the church service and instead just have the service at the crematorium. I agreed immediately. I look askance at our parent's church. After over two decades of attendance and contribution to it, they have been all but ignored by it. I would be very cynical about anyone from the church who now turned up at the funeral to show how much they cared.

We met with the undertaker, and what ensued was one of the most excruciating meetings I have ever attended. She addressed us in approved deferential tones, and we embarked on the agenda. Details of dad's birth and marriage, ancestors and descendants were divulged, and then the discussion switched to funeral options. This is where it began to get difficult. Greg and I both feel that since dad is gone whatever respects we had to show to him should have, and in fact were, shown in the final few days of his life. The remaining acts now boil down to disposal of the body. I personally feel all questions of music, flowers, decorations, cars, personnel, ashes, public notices, and so on are meaningless except for one redeeming fact: there are people from overseas who are coming all the way here, and for that reason alone we need to have some event to mark the occasion. By that criterion we tried to answer the questions honestly and appropriately, but it still left plenty of room for awkwardness.

For example, simply deciding that there ought to be flowers on the coffin led to the subsidiary questions of how many flowers, what types, what to do with them afterwards, who might want them (we all had to say yes or no to this) and whether if other people would like them how we would go about getting them there.

Music: dad's favourite songs are all incredibly inappropriate - ABBA, Boney M, for example. He regularly used to sing 'John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave' and would enjoy listening to Strauss's Death and Transfiguration on Sunday afternoons. Rachel seemed unable to decide, so I went through the astonishingly badly spelt list of musical pieces the undertaker proferred and chose Ave Maria, Nessun Dorma, and Vivaldi's Four Seasons. We are not going to be having hymns.

The most awkward part of the process was deciding the wording of the public notice (since Rachel thought we should have one). The undertaker wanted an adjective to complete the following phrase 'Don Pritchard, ... husband of Irene'. She suggested 'dear' and 'beloved'. Rachel seemed not to like either of these. I suggested 'forgotten' since we had apparently departed from the path of being conformist at this stage, and thought that maybe verity was called for, but we eventually decided on 'dear'. Then we had to think up different adjectives for '... father of' and '... granddad of'. It seemed ludicrous and, having been on the verge of excusing myself and going down the road to have a cup of coffee while the rest of the decisions were made, I had great trouble staying.

It wasn't upsetting. My reaction was one of exasperation and black amusement, I think.

We've settled on Thursday, at 11:45 am. The cremation will take place in North Ryde, at a crematorium I once used to pass every day on the way to work. I have asked that Rachel and Greg handle all the dealings with the minister or the celebrant, whichever is chosen to host the service. I can't offer anything constructive and I feel that the time spent considering the niceties of the event is eating away my time to think about dad. If we really had proper rituals we wouldn't have to go through all this, we would just follow the ritual. Our recent attempts to make funerals 'personal' has created a monster.

Dad will be attended by his four children, his three grandchildren, possibly a friend of Greg's who has known us for about three decades, and whoever is picked up by the public notice. We did not even raise the question of whether mum should come. I ought to contact all the masonic lodges that dad belonged to, but finding the addresses of them all entails going through the huge box of masonic material that I have collected and I am just not sure I want to do that this week.