from life to death
Entry posted by swilkinson
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I went to a funeral today. It was the funeral of a woman not much older than me. I had known her since I was seventeen. I remember being introduced to her as K's girlfriend. I was jealous. This was in a household of boys I always thought of as "mine". I laugh about that looking back but you know how intense teenagers can be. They moved away after they got married and I saw them only occasionally. Then he turned up in the same Dementia Lodge as Mum, pitifully aged with early onset dementia. So we got acquainted again, B and I and had some good conversations. K died before Mum, in his early 70s but looking like an old, old man. So sad. Then she was diagnosed with cancer and two years later died.
I am still pondering Asha's blog to answer the question: choice or destiny? I do not know. I don't want my destiny to be a bleak road to death, on the other hand I also don't want to make choices that would blight my life. It always seems to come back to the eternal question: "Why do bad things happen to good people?"
We are not bad people. Basically most of us have not done a lot to harm other folks. Of course I only know what you write about yourself, the same way you know me and of course there is a lot we don't put in our blogs. I hope I am a good judge of character and would know if you were a mass murderer or a serial killer. But I might not know. All I do really know is that we all have stroke in common. It is what brought us to this site. And we are all here looking for support. And if we are able to give support that is an added bonus.
People ask me why I go to so many funerals - it is the same answer, to give support. To support the family of the deceased, to express my gratitude for whatever that person did to add to my life. I have a lot to be grateful for. B always told me what Mum had been up to when she visited. She would say things like: "Your Mum had a good meal today, she ate all her vegetables and seemed to enjoy the dessert." When people said things like that to me it gave me peace of mind.Looking after Ray as well I was not able to go to visit Mum as often as I would like to so I relied on others to tell me what Mum had been up to. B also came to Mum's funeral bringing another mutual friend with her. She was in the middle of chemo and wore a bandanna but she made the effort. So she was a good friend to me.
So if you have not done any harm have you done some positive good? I think of people like Sarah on here who gives out vouchers and pays for meals as her "acts of kindness" to others she sees as being less fortunate than herself. A lot of others on here oversee elderly neighbours, support friends with cancer, ask us to join with them in praying for others. These are not "goodie-goodies" just fine citizens and really good people. Communities are built on people like them and I am so proud to know them. Just as I am proud to know so many of you, not least because you are weak but try to be strong and fight to return to good health and in doing so you motivate yourself and others.
I have just had a batch of Christmas cards to open today and one struck me as very sad, a daughter writing to say that her Mum has Alzheimers, is in a dementia ward and cannot read or write now. That is sad as she is not a lot older than I am. So I need to really appreciate my present good health. I have a lot to be thankful for, and working arms and legs, a brain that works reasonably well and a good constitution are among them. i have been down for a while but think I am getting my sparkle back at last. Thanks to all who have been praying for that to happen.
And so in this time of seasonal and often artificial good cheer I want to sit down and think about life and death. To really think about what I value, what motivates me and what I can do to help others to see what is good in their lives to. We all have a lot to be grateful for, we just sometimes need some other sufferer, someone in a similar situation, to point that out to us.
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