- Friends are immeasurably more important than family. I hope you know who you are, and that you make the difference between existing and living.
- Putting the rubbish out is a pain in the arse. There is a gap in the employment market for a Putteroutoftherubbish.
- The putrefying bag of green liquid in the bottom drawer of the fridge that I believe was once broccoli, and I strongly suspect may have been Frank's last purchase of a vegetable nature, will not clean itself up.
- The cats are decidedly happier in the depths of so called Spring not to be chased out of the house.
- Frank had many qualities, but sadly the panache of a Greek Cypriot politician in matters financial.
- Checking tyre pressures and filling the screen wash isn't actually that big a deal.
- One I learnt from Eve, via an eves-dropping friend - "your dad dying is like your cat dying, except much, much, much worse."
- For the very many people that have said to me over the last four months "I don't know what to say", I still haven't worked out the correct response.
- Even nice estate agents occasionally deserve to be slapped simply for being estate agents.
- Just because you lose your husband, don't expect anyone to show you mercy in Words With Friends. Actually, bad choice of word. I didn't lose him since that implies that I might find him again, and in the manner of Lady Bracknell suggests some negligence on my part. I accept full responsibility for losing Kate's locker keys and the car log book, but I refuse to accept that I lost Frank. He didn't, in American vernacular, "pass" either. Frank passed his Law Society Finals (just), and a great deal of urine, but not to another level of existence. Did I mention that he bloody well died?
Thursday 28 March 2013
Ten Points of a Learning Curve
In my previous post I said that death is a learning curve. Here's a, non-exhaustive, list of what I've learnt, in no particular order:
Monday 4 March 2013
A Note From a Bad Widow
I'm not too sure where to start with this post. Spouse didn't like me sharing personal shit on tinternet, especially fb, but he leaned to live with it, and anyway, he doesn't have to any more. One of his most repeated jokes was why do men die before women? Because they can. I'm very tempted to have this emblazoned on his memorial.
While friends with religious faith have been very kind and prayed for us, Spouse's death has only served to reinforce my evangelical atheism. If any person is able to explain to me how three children losing their father is part of His master plan then I may reconsider. I don't believe that he is still with us in any sense, apart from in the characteristics, and ideosyncracies that he's passed on to our children, and in our memories.
Kate has his stoicism: when I would wind myself up about something, he would just shrug his shoulders and take a highly practical approach to an issue. Kate has been much the same since she lost her dad. One of her first worries was that Frank always did the "big" food shop in our house, because I would end up engaging my tried and tested, anger management strategy of trolley-barging if there were more than two people walking slowly in front of me. She confided her concern in a friend of mine, and "you shop, we drop" was the solution. She also asked me if I would pay my parking fines off quickly because dad used to get really mad when I left them until the Summons arrived on the doormat. I was touched that she also has Spouse's expectation management qualities, and doesn't think, for a moment, that I'm capable of parking legally all the time, much in the same way that Spouse knew that he could only ask me not to get "too pissed" on a Friday evening.
Eve has Spouse's creative abilities. He excelled in the blokeness code of conduct never to follow instructions. He liked to make things up, and this included his approach to cooking with mixed results. Eve is the same - the word "recipe" is not in her vocabulary. It's comforting to know that unusual combinations of food-stuffs, like marmite and marmalade because they both begin with an "m" will still be consigned to the bin.
I suppose I shouldn't really refer to Frank as Spouse any longer. As Jack keeps pointing out, we're a single parent family now, and he is the man of the house. The first responsibility of the man of the house is ownership of the remote control. Strangely, I'm struggling with the ugliness of the word "widow" as much as I am the ironically euphemistic term "passed away." And I've derived far too much pleasure pointing out that he didn't pass away, he bloody well died, mostly to call centre staff. I'm very sorry to all the Indian call centre staff that I've taken my rage out on, but since they seem to be unable to accept that Frank is actually still dead since the last time I informed them, I can't seem to help myself. It occurs to me that a death certificate is not sufficient and I will continue to receive post addressed to Frank until they see his smouldering ashes sailing down the Ganges.
With death comes a learning curve. Learning not to have someone to piss you off because they haven't put the rubbish out is just as hard as not having your confident in chief always at the ready. But I'm learning to live with it. Jack keeps telling me to join match.com and get another husband. It's refreshing how simple life is when you're nine. I didn't try explaining the fact that I have more baggage than a Saudi family at Heathrow Airport. He has plenty of time to work that one out.
While friends with religious faith have been very kind and prayed for us, Spouse's death has only served to reinforce my evangelical atheism. If any person is able to explain to me how three children losing their father is part of His master plan then I may reconsider. I don't believe that he is still with us in any sense, apart from in the characteristics, and ideosyncracies that he's passed on to our children, and in our memories.
Kate has his stoicism: when I would wind myself up about something, he would just shrug his shoulders and take a highly practical approach to an issue. Kate has been much the same since she lost her dad. One of her first worries was that Frank always did the "big" food shop in our house, because I would end up engaging my tried and tested, anger management strategy of trolley-barging if there were more than two people walking slowly in front of me. She confided her concern in a friend of mine, and "you shop, we drop" was the solution. She also asked me if I would pay my parking fines off quickly because dad used to get really mad when I left them until the Summons arrived on the doormat. I was touched that she also has Spouse's expectation management qualities, and doesn't think, for a moment, that I'm capable of parking legally all the time, much in the same way that Spouse knew that he could only ask me not to get "too pissed" on a Friday evening.
Eve has Spouse's creative abilities. He excelled in the blokeness code of conduct never to follow instructions. He liked to make things up, and this included his approach to cooking with mixed results. Eve is the same - the word "recipe" is not in her vocabulary. It's comforting to know that unusual combinations of food-stuffs, like marmite and marmalade because they both begin with an "m" will still be consigned to the bin.
I suppose I shouldn't really refer to Frank as Spouse any longer. As Jack keeps pointing out, we're a single parent family now, and he is the man of the house. The first responsibility of the man of the house is ownership of the remote control. Strangely, I'm struggling with the ugliness of the word "widow" as much as I am the ironically euphemistic term "passed away." And I've derived far too much pleasure pointing out that he didn't pass away, he bloody well died, mostly to call centre staff. I'm very sorry to all the Indian call centre staff that I've taken my rage out on, but since they seem to be unable to accept that Frank is actually still dead since the last time I informed them, I can't seem to help myself. It occurs to me that a death certificate is not sufficient and I will continue to receive post addressed to Frank until they see his smouldering ashes sailing down the Ganges.
With death comes a learning curve. Learning not to have someone to piss you off because they haven't put the rubbish out is just as hard as not having your confident in chief always at the ready. But I'm learning to live with it. Jack keeps telling me to join match.com and get another husband. It's refreshing how simple life is when you're nine. I didn't try explaining the fact that I have more baggage than a Saudi family at Heathrow Airport. He has plenty of time to work that one out.
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