Dying of a Broken Heart

I had thoughts about my mother's craziness tonite and was remembering the details of her death, how uniquely "hers" they were.  A complicated woman and one who did what she didn't want to do for her entire adult life   I call that 'the gals' prison'.....yuk, what a generation.  No options, no power, sexist biases every where especially when a woman thinks of leaving her husband.  Well, how would you live?  O, thank GOD/DE for Betty Friedan and Germaine Greer.  Anyways, of course, after having lived the life she didn't want, at the end of her time, facing death, she exercised the one power she had left.  She wouldn't let my father come and visit her.  Her final word - NO.  She'd scream and holler when he came near the room.  He finally stopped going but it wasn't long before she died anyways.  She became senile/demented, very serious for a few weeks and died within four months in hospital.   Beside her bed was a book entitled "Dying of a Broken Heart" - i've seen it at the book stores but never read it, of course!  It was very sad compiling her eulogy because she was so much more than just a "housewife"..but she didn't see it, or felt she couldn't be it.  I saw it and i shared her sorrow over her losses in her life.  Also beside her bed was a slip of paper on which she had written in shaky hand:  "Be still and know thy God/de.".  You could tell there'd been some effort put into writing it down.  She'd never been religious that i remember.

My dad's death.  Well, it was weird and hard and somewhat a relief (because of all the caretaking i did, while holding down a full-time job and raising a young girl)..  The call at night and the rush to the hospital and i stayed and wiped his forehead with a cloth saying "You've been a good father".  Just repeating that and he would nod his head, oxygen mask taking his voice......and looked in my eyes and nodded his head over and over.  Then......he died   It's amazing seeing someone's last breath leave them.  So so painful.  Leaving him at the hospital was very hard, i remember; disorienting, to say the least.  I also feel bad because when my bro and sis-in-law and i were there together i told a joke.  The nurse's must see that all the time, though.  So many responses to grief.

Our mother was cremated, my father as well.  But with Dad, there a viewing and a service with his body present.  My mother donated her body to the University of Toronto (typical).  At Dad's funeral a majorly cool jaze/blues singer belted out that mournful cut from Sibelius, The Four Seasons (i think) - 'Going Home'.  Anyways, I'm telling you all this because personal histories are important.  Seeing, hearing, reading, writing our lives, straight out, as they happen, the patterns that emerge and the mistakes and the joy and the sorrow.  Aging is really over rated but with it comes wisdom and that always involves responsibility but does bring peace.  That's why the Native people of North  America revered their elders and held them in great esteem.  Many cultures do, still; ours does not.

I went to my "old" home and picked up my hot pink lawn chairs, my wheelbarrow and my favourite hoe, a lovely wicker basket i'd found somewhre  I drove by where my ex lives and and my jaw dropped at the luxury and beauty but it was in syncht with what he feels comfortable in, you know, regarding his "style" and "influence: and "status".  I'm not judging, i'm just saying...