A Ghost Story?
A Ghost Story?
My Dad had been in declining health for several months but the end was quite quick and peaceful. We’d had communion, the three of us, on Advent Sunday but he was unable to speak. On the Monday Mum and I sat beside his bed, chatting but including him in our conversation – hearing is the last sense to go, it is said. After a while Mum and I looked at each other and recognised that he had indeed left us – I am so thankful that our last words together were both commonplace and loving.
Mum stayed in the residential home whilst I made all arrangements. We were supported by many family and friends, some from far away or long way back. Mum and I spent Christmas at the home with other residents and their families.
In the New Year, the dust settled as it does. I was ready then to accept Mum home with her own disabilities but with excellent support, and we adjusted together to a new way of life. It worked – in some ways we were like chalk and cheese, and in others like peas from the same pod; but we had a shared bond – not just blood but shared experience, good and bad, over the years. I’d always had my own life since I left school – but the folks were always there, not interfering with each other’s lives but sharing the important things.
Then one Sunday the following September, she admitted to some discomfort that I had suspected. We had been playing Scrabble (taking no prisoners!) after watching Songs of Praise together. She had genuinely never complained of her disabilities: though an increasing lack of mobility and independence sometimes irked and frustrated her, she would even shun a tablet for a headache, so I knew something was wrong. Over the week she deteriorated until on the following Sunday the District Nurse, who had been keeping an eye on her, summoned emergency help. She was rushed to hospital and by the time I followed by car (having informed a close family member by phone of what was happening) she was already the centre of medical attention, including hot air blowers to keep up her body temperature. That evening she squeezed my hand as a last gesture of recognition – she never spoke again.
Tough as an ox and stubborn as a mule, she remained in that state`for nearly a fortnight. I continued to talk to her throughout, kept the radio or TV on in her room. Though there was a room in the hospital, family and nurses implored me to go home regularly for rest, food and a shave; things had to be kept going somehow. One day, fearing the end must come soon, I “scrubbed up” and put on Dad’s aftershave – she instantly stirred with a smile, I’m certain, from her seeming lethargy! Then in the small hours of the morning a couple of days later – I sensed her “call”. I woke up and a few minutes later the phone rang – the nurse called to tell me that she too had left me, peacefully. I composed my thoughts for 20 minutes or so then rang back the hospital – I asked the nurse to brush her hair and make sure she was presentable: the last kind office I could ask for her, a lady and my Mum.
Again, the usual practicalities to attend to. It had been pancreatitis, of which none of us, including doctors, had had any reason to expect. The dust settled again. But this time there was a difference. The folks had always been there whether I was returning from work, events, shopping or hobby – now the silence was deafening, truly. Unbearable. Fortunately I’d had a respite break away planned, previously arranged before life itself took over. I’d always fancied going to a place in North Devon that I’d heard of years previously – Social Services had strongly exhorted me to do this but I’d booked it reluctantly at the time; now I welcomed the distraction with open arms. There was the scenery and the company to appreciate at various times as I felt able. And there, overlooking the countryside and the sea, with the Welsh hills and coastline visible across the Bristol Channel on a clear day, I was able to settle my mind and my heart – I dumped the lot on God, and He sustained me, just like the Psalmist said He would. Looking at a photo of my parents together, I knew this wasn’t what they’d have wanted for me.
I returned home, not exactly in good heart but resolved to various matters. Though loving animals, Mum had always been afraid of their jumping up on her owing to the injuries she had received years before. So at the first opportunity I visited the Adoption Centre – among all the beautiful cats hoping for a new home, Patsy Jane, my little tabby cat, came lolloping down the ramp of her pen with her cheeky grin, and she adopted me – no question of that! She remains my closest companion, her every thought as transparent as though she could speak, always welcoming whether I’ve been away one hour or most of the day. The only female to whom I can really entrust my personal confidences! No, that’s not entirely true – but she is probably the only person to unlock them now.
By this time Advent was coming round and cards started to arrive. I was OK with this, but circular newsletters from friends telling me about their family’s year but who hadn’t registered mine alternately distressed, annoyed or even angered me however long I had known them. We had a Christmas wreath of dried flowers and a small Christmas tree – I hadn’t the heart to look for them but I did put up the cards. Then one day, whilst listening to my music, I looked up at that photo of my folks on their 60th Wedding Anniversary – they were happy and smiling at me. OK, I thought – I will put up that tree and wreath, a bit of tinsel and some holly would brighten the place a bit. But where are they? I looked at the photo again and sensed my Dad saying “Up in the loft, the light switch is on an eave to the left, and the bits are just to the left of that”. And, having braved the stepladder (neither of us ever liked heights), that’s exactly where I found them! Of course, I could have worked it out for myself. But having got them down (and dusted!), and dressed them up a bit, I sat down again with my music. Patsy jumped into my lap and I looked up again at that photo. There they were, together – smiling at me in their anniversary happiness: but, then, I know I sensed the sound of laughing too – “you silly twerp!”. And so I survived that Christmas.
True story? Depends what you mean – it is what I experienced, as fresh in my mind now as it was then, make of it what you will. But one thing of which I’m sure – memories of times shared together (“for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health”) are a precious legacy from those who have gone before. And I don’t care now who knows it, that’s my memory – six years on.
