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When you awake in the morning’s hush...
It’s 5.30 a.m. and I am awakened by the shrill ringing of the phone. I reach across and pick up the receiver, though I know what to expect.
Ken’s voice is soft and consolatory. ‘It’s Mum. They’ve just rung to say she’s gone.’
‘I knew I shouldn’t have left. What time…?’
‘About an hour ago, they think. I’m about to go over. Shall I see you there?’
‘Yes, of course. Ten minutes.’
Frank is awake. He watches me dress. ‘Your Mum,’ he says quietly.
‘Yes.’ I run a brush through my hair and pull on the clothes I wore yesterday from the back of a chair.
‘Shall I come with you?’
‘No. Best if it’s just us...’
‘I see.’ I know he can’t think of anything to say.
Outside, it’s drizzling as if the grey sky is weeping for our loss. Daylight struggles through a light mist and I pull my coat around my shoulders and make a dash towards the car. After a short drive, I’m standing in front of the nursing home ringing the bell. The flower beds in the centre of the drive are a profusion of colour. They match the flowers in hanging baskets suspended from the porch on long silver chains. Mum loved the gardens. I picture her, not that long ago, sitting in a recliner. She’s wearing a large floppy hat to keep the sun out of her eyes. I never did find out who it belonged to. Everyone ends up wearing someone else’s clothes in the home.
Matron opens the door wearing an expression of grief and whispers me inside. There is an early morning hush about the place I have never experienced before. She takes my hand and squeezes it tightly between her own soft, plump hands. I haven’t shed a tear but I can see she’s on the brink. I follow her down the familiar corridor with its bright pictures and smell of urine, and she gently opens the door of Mum’s room. The room is in semi-darkness and I greet my brother and sister in quiet tones as if not wanting to disturb our mother’s sleep.
Claire is sitting on a chair beside the bed silently weeping. Ken moves forward and gives me a hug. We both turn and look at Mum. She looks so peaceful. Ken comments on her tiny frame. I put my hand on Claire’s shoulder and she reaches up and takes hold of my fingers.
Mum would have loved to see us together like this. Nothing pleased her more than to have us close by her. A close knit family, that was us.
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
‘I’ve searched everywhere, pockets, cupboards, drawers. It isn’t here,’ Claire says.
‘That’s odd. I know she had it. She wore it for her eightieth. Don’t you remember?’ I tell her.
‘Yes, I do, but it’s not here now. Come and look for yourself, if you like.’
‘No, I’m sure you’re right. Not to worry. It’s just that...’
‘Look, I’ll check with Matron before I leave. Oh, and they say it’s OK to leave everything until after the funeral.’
‘Thanks, Claire. We’ll see you tomorrow.’ I put down the receiver, try to remember when I last saw it. Mum had a habit of hiding special things away. Doors were never locked, and one old lady would wander into people’s rooms and help herself to cushions or sweets. Many housemates shared frailty of body and mind in equal proportions. I imagine Mum’s thin white hands rummaging to the back of her dressing table drawer where she kept a few notes in a sock. Matron discouraged people from keeping too much money in their rooms.
That necklace was the most precious thing Mum possessed. She had very few pieces of jewellery. What little she had were mainly gifts from us as children. I don’t ever remember my father buying her jewellery. But, in fairness, she would never have worn it if he had. It was the reason we stopped buying it for her. Our brooches and necklaces went straight into a wooden jewellery box that sat in the centre of her dressing table. The only time any of it saw the light of day was when I crept into my parents’ bedroom and peered into the box to see if anything new had appeared.
The necklace had been a present from her sister; the sister who emigrated to Australia over thirty years ago; the sister who I knew Mum adored and missed so much; the sister who had died two months earlier. I was the one to tell her. When I arrived, I found her in the lounge, asleep as usual in her chair opposite the bay window. I told her the bad news and she just kept gazing straight ahead at the flower beds in the drive. All she said was, ‘She should never have gone to Australia,’ as if Australia was the reason Auntie Dora had died.
I was disappointed not to have found the necklace because I wanted her to have it with her always; it was a symbol of the love between two sisters who may have been miles apart but were always in each other’s hearts.
It’s the funeral and there is a large gathering. Friends, family and neighbours have all come to pay their respects. It makes me realise how popular she was. The service is uplifted when the vicar delivers a eulogy revealing some aspects of her character—her great sense of humour, caring nature, loving mother and grandmother.
I listen attentively to the anecdotes, the highs and lows of a life that spanned eighty two years. It is a pleasure to hear such a tribute, even when it covers only a fraction of a life. The stories have been carefully chosen. The idea of a eulogy is to raise the profile of an ordinary person into something akin to sainthood. There were other stories, - stories that would not be told.
Still, I did not cry.
Man hands on misery to man. It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Frank is worried about me. I’m moody, angry. What does he expect? My mother has just died. He says I’m not showing the right emotions. I say everyone deals with things in their own way. He says things, your mother has just died.
I haven’t spoken to Ken or Claire since the funeral. I wonder how they are. It’s Claire I feel sorry for. She’s much younger than Ken and me. She’ll feel the pain more. But so will Ken, first born have a special bond, don’t they. And a boy as well—doubly blessed!
Frank’s right. I’m not dealing with this well. I keep going back and part of me knows I shouldn’t. I ought to remember how close we were after I left home. Once I was married, it was as though we were on an equal footing. Now we had something in common; we were both wives. But I would never be the kind of wife she was. I would never put up with the things she did from my father.
The excuses I find to try and understand her just aren’t good enough. As a child there were times I felt she hated me. I always meant to ask her why she treated me more harshly than the others but as time passed, so did my bitterness, until that night I sat next to her bed, the night she died. I’d stayed until one in the morning. We’d taken it in turns, Ken, Claire and me. That night it was my watch.
Ruth had come in around midnight with a cup of tea. ‘You look tired. Why don’t you go home, - come back in the morning.’ I asked her how long she thought it would be but she couldn’t say.
‘I’ll stay a little longer,’ I told her. She was right. I was tired. When Ruth left the room I sat and talked to Mum, told her how I felt. I knew it was too late for any answers; I even doubted that she heard, but I felt better for having unburdened myself after all this time. When Ken rang that morning to tell me, I remembered all the things I’d said.
I can’t sleep at night. I wake up at the same time, four o’clock. That was the last time the nurse had checked up on her. She was still breathing then. An hour later she was dead. I can’t get that thought out of my mind and when I wake up, I’m terrified. I sense her with me, punishing me. I tell Frank. He says, ‘What kind of mother would punish her child that way?’ And I tell him what she was like with me when I was a child and how I don’t think I can forgive her, and he just says I don’t have to. Nobody says you have to forgive parents if they treated you badly. But I can’t deal with that either because I think of all the good things she did for me for me later. When I was pregnant she would come over and clean the house; she was always willing to babysit if we wanted a night out; her wry sense of humour, and her gratitude when I did anything for her. I’m so confused it hurts and I cry myself to sleep at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry. I am not there; I did not die.
Two weeks later I get a call from the home. They’re really sorry to ask but they need the room. If there’s anything they can do to help...
I decide to go alone. Ken and Claire say they understand. I think Frank has spoken to them. It’s a strange feeling going back. I look through the big bay window half expecting to see her sitting in her chair across the room. I picture her doing her funny little wave, the half smile, her much admired silver hair that she wished was iron grey.
Matron has some papers for me, letters for Mum, a final invoice from them. She tells me how wonderful our mother was, how highly all the staff regarded her. Uncomplaining; so much fun. I smile but find no words.
She closes the door on me and leaves me to my task. I look around the familiar room, the box of tissues on her locker, photos of us and all of her grandchildren, her few ornaments and the jewellery box. Sometimes we would pin a brooch in her blouse. You should wear these, we’d tell her.
I begin to open drawers and pack away their contents in boxes to be sorted out between us. An unopened box of chocolates will be left for the staff. I place a plastic bin liner on the bed and make a start on the wardrobe. Any good clothes will go to charity. Each piece of clothing reminds me of the last time she wore it and which one of us bought it for her. She had more new clothes in that home than she’d had in all her life. I can still remember her penchant for jumble sales. I take out her pale blue anorak. This holds the most memories. She always wore this coat when I took her shopping or when she came for tea on Sundays, when we took her out for drives in the car.
I check the pockets and touch something hard right at the bottom of the second one. I take it out and hold it carefully in the palm of my hand, its thin silver chain dangling between my fingers. I stare in disbelief at the sapphire stone set in the middle of a silver heart. I am holding Auntie Dora’s present to Mum and wondering how it still came to be here. I feel a sudden rush of emotion—love, forgiveness, joy. I sit down on the bed and weep for my dear mother.