My Father-in-law's Wake

A hot Ozzie autumn evening, the currawongs and magpies calling, and the cockies with their raucous shrieks, so different to the endearing twitter they make as they fly in formation. A day Michael would have liked. He grew to love Oz and the Ozzie character; their generosity and scabrous sense of humour; their quiet patriotism; their robust egalitarianism; their honour and integrity. He spent nearly 15 years in Oz, living with us in a cottage we built for them out the back of our property. Although he came to love Oz he never stopped missing Cape Town where he was born 82 years ago, and where his closest friends remained.

It was a lovely wake, if you can say that about such a ceremony. While we were clearing out the cottage (Bay, my mother-in-law who used to live there has gone to live with her other daughter in New Zealand) we found 6 long red candles that she has been carrying around we think for over 50 years since she apparently had them in Kenya and we lit them and surrounded them with oak leaves - and sprigs of rosemary as well because Michael and Bay loved Ophelia's speech - 'there's rosemary, that's for remembrance'.

My two sons William and Nicholas changed out of their usual grunge gear into black pants and white shirts and sang a cappella 'Danny Boy' which was one of the songs Michael used to sing. My daughter Alexandra then read out a poem from one of my wife's cousins, and then my lady's 'Memories of Dad' in her calm, kind voice - she said her work in community radio was a help as you have to learn to carry on regardless (and there were many tears as well as laughter as she read). William then sang 'Jerusalem' at Mum's request as it was one of Dad's favourite hymns, and his pure angelic tenor lifted us out of ourselves and was balm to aching hearts. Needless to say, the champagne flowed copiously all the while. Nicholas finished by singing an impromptu version of 'Rambling Rose', another of Michael's old favourites, and his lovely gravelly baritone was every bit as good as Nat King Cole's. The children carried us through with their humour and gentleness and their steadiness. Our Jack Russell was the only one who didn't enjoy the singing - a very emotional dog, his head drooped lower and lower until he looked like Snoopy on his dog kennel, his nose almost on the ground, his eyes black pools of woe. He did cheer up when we shared some Camembert cheese with him, though. The red candles burned quietly for 3 hours and as the evening drew to a close, we watched them in silence go out, one by one.

We were reminded again of the importance of family and friends at these times. Omnia vincit amor, they say, even loss and sorrow and grief. Bay and my sister-in-law flew out to New Zealand yesterday morning and it was a wrench for all, but we know that in the long run she will be better looked after there. My sister-in-law has plans for giving Bay a whole new life and we know she will be lovingly cared for. We are planning our first trip over to see her in June/July.

The cottage is dismally empty and sad, devoid of the pictures and antiques that made it so beutiful, and missing the ppl who made it so welcoming.

ὣς ἔφατ' εὐχόμενος, τοῦ δ' ἔκλυε Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων,
βῆ δὲ κατ' Οὐλύμποιο καρήνων χωόμενος κῆρ
τόξ' ὤμοισιν ἔχων ἀμφηρεφέα τε φαρέτρην:
ἔκλαγξαν δ' ἄρ' ὀϊστοὶ ἐπ' ὤμων χωομένοιο,
αὐτοῦ κινηθέντος: ὃ δ' ἤϊε νυκτὶ ἐοικώς.

(If the quote appears inappropriate, I am very aware of the anger of the God.)

Rest in peace, dear friend.

Music and mood

I was talking to a friend of my younger son's on the train a day or so ago. He's studying percussion at the VCA (Victorian College of the Arts) and he was saying how he'd come to understand and therefore like some very intricate drum solos which previously he'd cared for. He said the same thing had happened with classical music. As a boy he'd disliked it, found it boring. Now he loves it.

But how do you explain my passion for jazz, swing and blues from the 20s, 30s and 40s? I grew up in a house where classical music was virtually the only music around, except for my mother singing popular songs as she wandered round the house. She had a lovely voice and was an excellent piano player and introduced me to South Pacific as well as Chopin, the one from her songs the other from her playing. No jazz at all. Then, one day in a tiny record shop in Cape Town I listened to Paul Whiteman and immediately fell in love. It's the joy of the music that gets me. They needed it -- the great depression, war clouds and then actual war, unemployment, poverty and misery. The music made up for it.

Listen to this one, made just before the great crash, and this during the war, not long before Benny Goodman was shot down over Europe. (Man, I wish I could play the clarinet like he could)

I'm needing this stuff right now. The wake is tonight. It's going to be hard.

Reflections on grief and loss

On Tuesday my father-in-law died. I'd known him since 1976, when I started going out with my lady, and he's been a friend ever since. My parents-in-law never struck me as unlikely friends, though soime might have questioned the generational gap -- they were well-read, well-travelled and young at heart. I enjoyed visiting them and talking to them. But Michael had further claims on my loyalty and gratitude. When I was a poor student, they invited me along to their visits to the theatre, the ballet and opera. I shall never forget the first time I saw La Bohème at La Nico in Cape Town. I was electrified, overwhelmed, blown away. I had never seen or experienced anything like it. Michael never went to these shows, but he paid, and the cost was way beyond what my student budget would have worn. How do you thank people for the things they did which permanently changed your life? My spirit soared on the things they introduced me to, and my mind broadened. I shall always be grateful.

We've been going through old photo albums, and I've been seeing sepia photographs of him as a baby and a boy, glossy black and whites of him as a young man, smiling sardonically at the camera, wedding photos and bon voyage photos and all the pictures we take of each stage of our lives. A whole life in pics, a whole extended family of uncles and aunts and cousins, most of whom I shall never meet, for they are long dead.

He'd been ailing for a while. Gradually his body started to shut down. Watching this process hasn't made my grief at his going any easier. Instead, it's been spread out over a couple of years. His decay and death have happened at a time when other people I've loved have died -- my dear Sam; my best friend's wife; other good friends. Somehow each grief, each loss, isn't unique. I am reminded of previous losses, of previous deaths. My beloved father, dead now these 15 years, but still somehow always in my thoughts. Each happiness is unique and special, each grief just a drop in the sea of sorrow and loss which surrounds us.

Yet there is hope and comfort, too. My friends, my children, my wife and my family. Love is the only palliative for sorrow. We know it instinctively with a child when it falls over and grazes its knee. We pick it up and hug it, we kiss the wound better, we show we love it. Would that it were as easy to fix adult grief and pain! Yet how much worse would it be if I were alone. And how will I endure the inevitable loss of those I love when their time comes?

N