http://alzheimerblog.wordpress.com/2011/03/30/wenn-gedanken-und-reflexe-ins-leere-laufen/
Sunday 30-1-11: time moves on
I went to lunch at the home of my old friends Mr & Mrs VM, in Thames Town. Their daughter C was there, and her younger son D who is aged two-and-a-half. I hadn’t met him before. Also there were Mr & Mrs AR, Dr & Dr LA, Mrs SG and her friend Mr NT. Mr & Mrs VM’s son J also briefly put in an appearance.
I hadn’t met any of these friends of mine since late 2008. They expressed their condolences; I assured them that the Old Man’s death was in some ways a release for him.
Dr LA(f)’s mother, aged 82, is now in sheltered accommodation. Disconcertingly, she recently introduced her daughter to a group of her friends – people that Dr LA(f) had met a few times already.
Dr LA(f) is unenthusiastic about the NHS reforms that the Coalition government is proposing.
Dr LA(m) is optimistic that a cure for Alzheimer’s will be developed in the not-too-distant future – if the hypothesis that Alzheimer’s is attributable to beta amyloid plaques turns out to be correct.
One of Dr & Dr LA’s sons, who is aged 24, has a new girlfriend. She is aged 30, and is already asking him whether he plans to have children.
Day-trip to Peakville
On Monday 24 January 2011 I drove to Peakville and back.
At the Old Man’s house, a damaged Christmas card had belatedly arrived. The Royal Mail had enclosed it in a plastic sleeve. The postmark was 24.12.10; the address was correct, but incomplete, with a district-name but no postcode. When I opened the card, there was no writing inside. So I don’t know who sent the card.
Mrs CJ has replaced her old car with a Mercedes.
I quickly packed a suitcaseful of clothes to take back to Suburbia Somnolenta, then I drove to Bert’s. The grey car with the dent was on the forecourt. I saw only the younger man and the taller woman behind the counter. (Probably the shop does not do much business on Monday lunchtimes.) The batter on the fish was not very crisp, so I doubt that today’s cooking was from the hand of the master.
Back at Suburbia Somnolenta, I received a phone-call from Mrs CJ. She had not noticed that I had been visiting – she was phoning simply to check how I was.
I told Mrs CJ about a piece of folk-art I had brought back from Peakville with me: a fruit-bowl made of pieces of wood salvaged from houses in Peakville that had been destroyed in the Blitz. Who the artist was, and exactly where in Peakville the houses were, is information that is now lost in the mists of time. The Deceased Lady’s mother would have known. (Were the houses near where the Deceased Lady’s father’s sister used to live?)
Another thing that I told Mrs CJ I had brought back with me was the rug that she and Dr A had folded up and that the Old Man had put back in its place.
Saturday 15-1-11: catching up on sleep
This week I have been feeling tired and lethargic. Yesterday I was in bed at 20:30 exactly, and quickly fell asleep.
Wednesday 12-1-11: condolence
I received a card of condolence from Dr & Dr LA.
Tuesday 11-1-11: offloading and uploading
I threw away a lot of rubbish from the Old Man’s house, and I loaded up the car with numerous items that I wanted to keep. Then I drove back to Suburbia Somnolenta.
Monday 10-1-11: funeral
The day of the Old Man’s funeral.
The service was taken by Oliver Andrews, a curate of my acquaintance.
Harry did not attend, but two people from the Sunlit Uplands golf club did attend. One of them told me that his daughter, the first person in her family to go to university, had been a student at Cambridge.
The Old Man’s former colleague Mr MD also attended. I hadn’t seen him for many years, and reminded him of the party he and his wife and the Old Man and the Deceased Lady and I had attended on (I think) Boxing Day of 1981. In fact, I probably hadn’t seen him since then.
I asked the funeral director to send the spray of flowers to Eastwood Priory, for Francesca or whichever staff nurse was on duty.
After the funeral, cousin Y and her husband O, and L the son of the Old Man’s nephew C, came back to the Old Man’s house and we talked for an hour or two.
L has put on a lot of weight in recent years. I always think of him as being young, but he is now 50. He remarked that when he and his sister were in primary school, each Friday evening their parents put them on an express bus to a nearby town, to visit their grandmother. L said he would not do that with his children. I suggested that if anyone did such a thing nowadays, “Social Services would be called in.” At this, L laughed.
Sunday 9-1-11: two more cousins
The Old Man’s late nephew C has a daughter called T. She phoned me to say that she would not be coming to the funeral. Health problems prevent her driving such a long distance, and there is no suitable train service.
She spent a while telling me about her health problems, such as high cholesterol, and a hiatus hernia.
T is worried that she may develop dementia quite early in life, as her father did. By his late 60s, C was incapable of basic DIY such as laying floor-tiles.
T’s younger brother L, who had a heart bypass in his late 30s, now has developed type 2 diabetes.
Saturday 8-1-11: flowers and neighbours
I did some shopping at MegaGroce. On the way back, I stopped at the florist’s that Mrs CJ had recommended, and ordered a spray of flowers for the funeral. (I am asking other people to donate to a cancer or dementia charity of their choice, rather than sending flowers.) While I was perusing the brochure, an elderly customer remarked, “Doesn’t it smell lovely in here.” She had an accent that I thought might be a Shoreville accent. In fact she was from Bayville which is not far from Shoreville. She told us that she had lived in Peakville for 52 years – it would be 53 years at her wedding anniversary in March. I told her that “My Dad is from Shoreville.” When the customer from Bayville had left the shop, I remarked to the woman behind the counter that I needed to start saying “was” rather than “is”.
While I was unpacking the shopping at the Old Man’s house, Harry passed by. He had not heard that the Old Man had died, and he seemed quite moved by the news.
Harry and I spent some time reminiscing about people who used to live thereabouts. There was the family in the house opposite where Mr & Mrs JG now live: the Thornboroughs. The husband’s name we have forgotten, but the wife was called Dot. I reminded Harry that the children were Ch and S. Harry told me that the Thornboroughs had moved from Peakville to Norfolk, a place they had grown to like after spending holidays there. Thanks to an acquaintance who also used to live close by, Harry had seen a recent photo of the family; Dot, who used to be slim, is now quite fat.
Next door to the Thornboroughs lived a little old lady who always had her curtains closed, and peeked round them at the world outside. She let her hedges grow tall and wild. In the 1960s the Old Man once helped her with some DIY – mending a leaking tap or suchlike. He commented to the Deceased Lady and myself that he was probably the only one of that old lady’s neighbours who had ever set foot in her house.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Mr & Mrs RW lived in the house now occupied by Mr & Mrs CJ and previously occupied by Mr & Mrs HJ. Mr RW was a cobbler, as Harry put it.
Harry moved in to his house in 1963 or 1964.
Friday 7-1-11: Friday before the Monday
I drove to Peakville.
