WEDNESDAY 10th Feb - How Much ???
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‘Mrs D’ lost her long battle with Cancer passing away quietly in my arms early hours of 3rd Jan.
After a deal of thought I have decided to carry on posting these extracts from my ‘diary’ tracking the ups and downs of our time together till our ways parted.
22nd Jul 2009
I nearly had a heart attack yesterday.
Mrs D passed me a piece of paper – ‘What do you think of that?’ she asked
‘Very nice’, I replied. ‘What’s it for?’
‘My funeral’, she said.
I looked again at the piece of paper. I looked at the price – £9.85 a head. I looked at the cost of the room hire – £100
‘What do you mean – you’re funeral?’ I asked.
13th Jul 2009
The day started off well (for a Monday!!!) – an email from some friends inviting us to spend a day at Wolverhampton Race Course.
Anita used to work with horses in her youth and had always retained an interest in them. The date of the proposed meet was also a few days before her birthday so It would be a nice birthday treat for her.
Then we went to the hospital and all future plans were off !!!
Having reviewed her latest X-rays and scans, consultant’s opinion is she has just days – possibly weeks but not months – left now to live and strongly advised making any arrangements, see any friends/relatives etc in next few days before it is too late.
We stopped for a drink on the way home.
8th Jul 2009
Mrs D has a new mode of transport.
The silly bint fell down the stairs at work on Friday, landed on her arse, and has been unable to stand – never mind walk – since then.
She picked a good time to do it really – one guaranteed to ensure no shortage of hands, available and willing, to help her to her feet.
We finish work at 4pm on a Friday. It was a few minutes before then that MrsD descended the stairs more rapidly than she intended and ended up a crumpled heap at the bottom, thereby preventing anyone else from descending the stairs and leaving the building to start their weekend. With their egress from the building blocked, Quality and Eng Dept made a temporary alliance. Quality immediately grasped the nature of the problem – lying where she was, MrsD was preventing access to the machine where people were expected to swipe their clock cards before leaving the building. Engineering came up with a solution – move her out of the way. Quality then devised a process whereby this might be accomplished.
26th Jun 2009
Mrs D had arranged that Carla would come round on a Friday to clean the house while we were at work.
Her 1st day duly arrived.
As Mrs D sat at the table after breakfast – doing her makeup – she turned to me and said
‘Can you just run the hoover round the place before Carla gets here?
And wipe those surfaces
And hang your stuff up instead of leaving everything over the back of chairs
Empty the tumble dryer
Put a new wash on
Put all those dirty crocks in the dishwasher
Oh, and while you’re in the bathroom give that mirror a wipe. It’s a disgrace
‘Remind me again’, I said ‘just what Carla’s coming round for?’
‘Don’t be sarky’, said Mrs D
‘You don’t want her thinking we live in a pig sty, do you?
That may have been what Mrs D was thinking. What I was thinking as I rushed round cleaning the house and getting ready for work at the same time was something else entirely (#%$#@ !!!)
20th June 2009
As she has got progressively weaker, Mrs D has had to rely more and more on me to do things she would have done herself in the past – lifting her out of the bath, helping her get dressed, cooking, housework, shopping. All this, on top of going to work and walking and feeding the dogs, had Mrs D feeling sorry for me. She decided to lessen my workload. She would engage the services of a cleaner.
Several images filled my mind at this statement – (Click on pics to enlarge)
This was one of Mrs D’s better ideas !!!
‘I’ll get right on it’, I said. ‘Tricky business hiring a cleaner, though. I may have to interview a few before hitting on the one that’s just right for us’
‘You needn’t bother’, said Mrs D, giving me a funny look (can she read my mind, I wondered)
‘I’m going to ask Carla (her niece) if she’ll come round do a couple of hours a week. She’s out of work at the moment so she could do with some extra cash and it’ll be one less job for you to do on a Saturday
‘Oh right’, I said. ‘Er, will she need some kind of a uniform? I could have a look round if you like. Save her getting her clothes all mucky
Mrs D spoke no words – just rolled her eyes and made a ‘Tch’ sound with her mouth
‘Bugger! ’, I thought – she CAN read my mind !!!
24th May 2009
I saw a corpse yesterday.
It was late afternoon. I was cutting the grass in the back garden. I glanced up – and where before there had been nothing – now a skeletal figure with shrunken skull sat on the patio watching me.
I waved
The left hand struggled to lift from the arm of the chair – a twitch of the fingers was all she could manage, the chin barely lifting off her chest.
A feeling of ‘peace’ came over me. The world seemed to be happening outside of me. I was in a bubble that included just me and Mrs D – everything else just a vague background noise that was strangely muffled.
It was the moment I had dreaded. I have felt this ‘disassociation from reality’ twice before – when my mother died and later when my father passed away. Throughout the months since we were told Mrs D had lung cancer I have convinced her to ignore the dire statements from doctors about the time she has left – to listen, instead, to me. I will ‘know’ when her time is running out. She has often asked me if I have had my ‘feeling’ yet and has drawn strength and hope when I have said ‘No’.
I dread the next time she asks me that question for I cannot lie to her. I had my ‘feeling’ today. This is the last summer Mrs D will see in this garden.
Our time together is drawing to a close. I can ’see’ Mrs D at Xmas but not beyond that.
It will not be long now before I must say goodbye to my love
25th Apr 2009
The day after we were given the news that Mrs D had lung cancer – and that it was at an advanced stage- we were supposed to be going out with some friends to a ‘Whisky-tasting Social’.
Mrs D was very poorly and unable to get out of bed so I nipped out (the venue was just up the road) to let our friends know we wouldn’t be able to make it – and the reason why !!!
When we went to the same event 2 years later, it was with a sense of triumph that she had beaten the odds and she was given an emotional welcome from many of the people attending.
It was a good evening, and she enjoyed herself. During the break for the buffet, however, she signalled me with her eyes that she had had enough. The pain was too much and she wanted to go home – where she felt ’safe’
Ominously she did not want to stay to dance the Eightsome Reel !!!
Click on Pics to enlarge . . .
20th Apr 2009
I got paid today. Or to be more accurate, I should have got paid today. The deal is that on the 20th of each month a certain sum of money (not as large as I would like but as much as my miserable employer is willing to exchange in return for my services on the company’s behalf) is transferred out of my employers account and into my bank account.
That is the theory. The reality is somewhat different!
Oh, when questioned, the financial people assure me that the money is no longer in their account but for some unaccountable reason – particularly in this age of instantaneous electronic transfer of funds – it can take as much as a day or more for the money to appear in my account.
[I have my suspicions as to what happens to that money during the interval between leaving one account and appearing in another – but that’s another story.]
Anyway, I approach the 20th of each month more in hope than in expectation but by late evening today the money was in my account. For an all too brief moment I luxuriated in the feeling of being temporarily wealthy. Then Mrs D spoke.
18th Apr 2009
Some pics of our weekend cottage – Click on pics to enlarge
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- Ahem . . .
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- Our Weekend Cottage
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- Living Room looking to Front
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- Kitchen
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- Living Room
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- Rear View
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- Sunday Pub Lunch
17th Apr 2009
Mrs D and I decided on a weekend break to celebrate our 20th Wedding Anniversary. We found a dog-friendly farm with some cottages for let so packed Wee Rab and Ceilidh in the back of the car with a suitcase and a few bottles of wine to keep us going till we found the local source of supply at our destination
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It was OK till we got to Cheltenham. Then it let us down – badly !!!
At first I was inclined to blame Mrs D.
Well she does have ‘form’ with regard to leading me astray, but she protested her innocence – said she was only obeying orders.
‘It says ‘bear right’, she said
‘Well I’ve beared fucken right’, I said. ‘and it isn’t fucken right, is it? It can’t be. I’ve gone the whole length of this fucken High St and there’s no sign of it !!!
What exactly does it say?’
She consulted the bit of paper in her hand.
‘It says – follow the A4019 onto High St then 0.8 ml bear right, then right into Swindon Rd.
‘We were on the A4019′ I said. ‘It merged into the High St.
Shortly after that the road forked, I took the right fork (bear right). Did you see any fucken Swindon Rd on the right?
‘Perhaps we missed it’, She said.
‘You see any fucken Swindon Rd’, I asked – after turning the car and coming down the High St a 2nd time
‘You were driving too fast’, she said,
‘Too fast!’, I replied.
‘How could I drive too fucken fast down this fucken High St. I barely got out of 2nd fucken gear !!!
‘O.K.’, I said – being the reasonable man that I am.
‘I’ll try again – at 5 fucken mph !!!
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‘What the fuck’s that stupid bastard behind me tooting his fucken horn for’, I asked Mrs D – as I drove down the fucken High St a 3rd time.
‘You’re driving too slow’, she suggested.
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At the bottom of the fucken High St, I turned the fucken car – again !!!
‘You see a fucken Swindon Rd on the right? No? Me neither. You Know what? I don’t think there is any fucken Swindon Rd on the right. I think those fucken directions are a load of fucken bollocks!!!
After 20+ years together Mrs D has learnt to pick up subtle clues from the tone of my voice. She sensed I was not happy – that a slight air of irritation had crept in to my normal placid demeanor. She hesitatingly suggested that perhaps Swindon Rd might be on the left rather than the right of the High St.
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Dear Reader, if you have been following the story so far, it will come as no surprise to you to learn that after travelling up and down the High St a 4th time I turned to Mrs D and said –
‘after considerable research and having weighed up all the evidence, it is my considered opinion that there is NO fucken Swindon Rd coming off this fucken High St in any fucken direction, right or fucken left and those directions are a load of fucken crap!!!
What now? She said.
‘Now’, I said. ‘we go back to where the fucken road forked and instead of bearing right like those fucken directions said, we bear left’
About 100 yards after bearing left instead of right, the elusive Swindon Rd appeared on our right.
‘Fucken directions’ said Mrs D.
‘Oi’, I replied ‘Language!!!’
