death

Miss Laura Mae’s House Part 6

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“Kathleen, I hate to bother you, but Oly is comin’in on the bus Friday. Would you mind takin’ me to pick her up?” I listened in as Miss Laura buttered my biscuit.

“Sure, I’ll be glad to. Is that the one whose husband just died?” Mother asked.

“Yes, he’d been sick in bed a long time,” replied Miss Laura. “I was poorly when he died and couldn’t make it for the funeral, so Oly told me to just wait an’she’d come stay awhile after she got him buried. We never got to visit much. She was just a baby when she married an’ and I only got to see her once in a great while.”

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I was fascinated with the idea of a baby marrying and couldn’t wait to see her. Maybe we could play together. As I stood on the step with my biscuit, I was lost in thought. imagining a pig-tailed girl my age steeping off a school bus, the only bus I knew a thing about.

Mother pulled in at Mitchell’s Cafe out on the highway on Friday. We sweltered in the July heat as Billy and I tusseled in the back seat. Mother and Miss Laura Mae fanned themselves as heat monkeys danced on the pavement. Dust fogged in the open car windows as a long gray vehickle with a picture of a skinny dog pulled up.

“Here she comes!” Miss Laura Mae clutched her big black purse and heaved herself out of the car as the bus door opened.

I sat up and watched for a little girl in a wedding dress to emerge, but no one got off but an old lady in a flowered dress. Miss Laura Mae hurried over, catching her in a huge hug smashing their identical pushes between them. Her curly white hair was caught up in a hair net and she wore the same black lace-up old lady oxfords as Miss Laura Mae. The bus driver pulled her bag from a bin on the side of the bus. Mother helped her load it in the trunk.

“Kathleen, this is my sister, Oly.” Sadly, I abandoned my hope of a playmate.

“Nice to meet you, Miss Oly. How are you doing?”

“Oh, I couldn’t be better,” said Miss Oly. “I ain’t baked a biscuit since June 6th, the day my Ol’ man died!”

Miss Laura Mae and Miss Oly laughed out loud as Mother replied, “Oh, that’s nice,” as she cranked the car.

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How Not to Get in Good With the Snotty Girls

imageAs I ran to the playground, I spotted my “sometimes friend” Betty Green deep in conversation with Rita Lawson, the principal’s snotty daughter. The choice of friendship each day was Betty’s. Her mother and mine were friends, so when when we we at my house or hers, chances are she’d be nice to me, unless she wasn’t.  I was a friendly kid and would have played with a rattlesnake. When Betty saw me running up, she turned her back, making it clear she didn’t want my company when she finally had Snotty Rita all to herself.  Ignoring her cue I tromped right in. “Wanna play chase?” They didn’t. They were both squalling and loftily resumed their tearful conversation, bonding over shared grief. It seems each had recently discovered the existence of a baby sister, dead and buried long before either of these two snotties were born. I listened in awe, caught up in the drama, knowing I had nothing to offer on the altar of their shared grief.

I rushed in and questioned Mother as soon as I got home. “Did you ever have a baby that died?”

No she didn’t. I had heard women whisper of losing babies. I had no idea what that meant, but it might be worth a try.

“Did you ever lose a baby?” She was hugely pregnant at the time and quite touchy.

“No, now get started on your homework. If you don’t have any, help me with supper.”

I recalled lots of homework. Remembering an ancient picture in a box in Mother’s closet, I prowled till I found it. Aha! This will surely get me in the dead baby club!  I slipped it into my math book, the first time that book had been opened at home that year.

Betty and Snotty Rita were still best buddies at recess the next day. I ran up, ignoring their cold looks, as I pulled my prize out of my jacket pocket. “Look, I have a picture of my dead baby sister. She died before I was born.” The sad image of an angelic baby in a white Christening dress, laid out in a homemade wooden coffin, her eyes closed in death was undeniable. Her black hair curled around her tiny face. They examined the picture somberly, giving me sympathetic looks as tears sprung to their eyes. I enjoyed their friendship for about thirty seconds until Betty turned the picture over and found scribbled, “Carrie Louise Perkins, born and died July 7, 1904.” I was out!!!

My Condolences

imageOne of the hardest parts of  being a nurse is comforting and supporting the bereaved family at the time of death.  Normally, family members are heartbroken, grieving at the death.  On a few occasions, I witnessed something different.  Mr. Jones, an elderly patient owned a successful insurance agency. Every morning, he donned freshly laundered silk pajamas.  When discharged,  He wore a fine finest suit, shirt, shoes, and hat and took great pride in being noticed.  He bragged of buying a new Cadillac every year, dining at the most prestigious restaurants, and enjoying a membership at The Country Club.

His son, Junior Jones was in his late fifties and had always worked for Daddy.  It appeared Mr. Jones was none to generous nor kind to Junior.  Junior dressed in cheap clothes and drove an ancient compact car.  It must have been miserable since he was so tall he had to fold up like a jackknife to fit in it.  When Junior came to the hospital to consult with Daddy about the business, Daddy was condescending, snide, and critical, never showing Junior the least respect.

One the morning Daddy died, we’d called to notify Junior his father’s death appeared imminent.  Junior came streaking into his father’s room just moments before Mr. Jones’ death.  I offered my condolences.  Junior ignored me, opened the drawer of the bedside table, dug out the keys to his father’s Cadillac, his father’s checkbook and left the room without speaking.  A nursing assistant who was a friend of the family walked him out to the parking garage.  He handed her the keys to his small car and drove off in his father’s big, black Cadillac.  That was different!  I guess he’d had enough.

Jolly Funeral Policy

Connie and Marilyn's Toddler PicturesAgents selling funeral policies were a fixture in the rural South.  Our budget was too tight for such luxuries, so Mother tried hard to keep us alive.  Myrtle Harper sold policies for Jolly Funeral Home and Watkins products.  She was a nosy do-gooder who carried sunshine from house to house, dispensing information about people’s financial situations Continue reading →

Trial by Fire

fireI don’t write much about the history of my father’s side of the family because they simply didn’t have the strong oral tradition that my mother’s family did.  This is such a loss.  My paternal grandmother was abandoned by her mother, raised by her grandmother till she was nine.  She spent the rest of her childhood in the home of an uncle whose wife made Continue reading →

Fido Buys the Farm

imageJoe found his dog lying out behind his car, not moving.  He grabbed Fido up and ran him in to the vet.

Vet:  “”I’m sorry.  Your dog is dead.  That’ll be fifty bucks.” Continue reading →

Who’d Have Thought It?

three in a bedMany years ago, when my father died in the wee hours of the morning, all five of us children and our spouses gathered back at home with Mother.  She asked that we all spend the night, so she could have one night with all her five children under one roof.  It was a challenge, but we managed to find beds for eleven.  Every bed and sofa was taken.  It must have been a sight. Continue reading →

Goodbye, Randy

A dear friend died this weekend.  He’d suffered for years, rarely complaining.  He was the best father I’ve ever known, even doing little girl hairdos with matching bows to socks and dresses.   His cardiac illness was first diagnosed twenty-three years ago, when his girls were tiny.  Thankfully, he recovered some cardiac function, enabling him to guide his daughters into warm, lovely adults.  Though it has to break their hearts to lose him, what a blessing it is his family had that twenty-three years.  The girls knew a great father instead of always hearing what a wonderful father he would have been.

What a blessing to be whole again after so many years of pain and struggle.  We’ll miss you, Randy.  Our tears are only for ourselves.

Five Photos, Five Stories – Day Two: Snowcovered Gum Trees

Challenge from  Author S B Mazing
I am taking you up on this. Thanks.

authorsbmazing's avatarAuthor S B Mazing

FPFSChal5I took this picture when we first went skiing here in Australia. Up until today it amazes me when I see a gum trees in the snow. For me growing up in the Swiss Mountains The trees lose their leaves or then it is the trees with the needles. But skiing amongst snow covered gum trees was something special…

Skiing in Australia is pretty good, you know. Many Australians and non-Australians asked us how we can deal with the poor skiing down here, coming from Switzerland. And I usually tell them that it is not poor at all. The slopes are great and the way they look after them and groom them is outstanding. Cut yourself some slack, Aussies, your ski resorts are actually pretty good.

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A couple of days ago I received the following invitation:

Hi SB

I’m about to invite you to join in a challenge I…

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