Death of a Grande Dame

My aunt died this week.  She and her three sons and two daughters-in-law had gathered for birthday-eve dinner at the yacht club.  They’d been having a lovely time until it became clear Aunt Norah was becoming unwell.  There followed the Heimlich manoeuver, CPR, paramedics, ambulance, ER, ICU, the EEG that offered no hope at all, and her death the next afternoon.  On her ninety-first birthday.   

     Aunt Norah was a grande dame and most emphatically did not wish to linger or to continue in a diminished capacity.  Some thirty years ago, she’d told one of her sons and his wife that, should they ever find her in such a situation, they were to barricade the door, pull the plug, and step on the tube.  Furthermore, given her choice of death day, she might well have chosen her birthday—to make it easy to remember.  Uncle Jack, a truly remarkable man, died almost exactly a year ago.  Those of us left behind find comfort that the two of them are together again.

     I spent Thursday helping my cousins and their wonderful wives make disposition of Norah’s worldly goods.  Heroic work had already been done.  The task of the day was to spend time together as family, to grieve and work and eat and laugh and to make things go away.

     Processes are already in place for estate items of some significance. Generations of family art is being divided.  A grandson’s wife wants the Waterford and the cabinet in which it’s displayed.  Norah’s remaining silver is arrayed for the choosing.  Her jewelry is being inventoried.  My cousins invited me to identify anything my sisters and I might like, and I did.    

     Which sort of leaves everything else.  Some categories were no-brainers, like linens.  What was perfect went to family.  What was in good enough shape to resell went into bags for the thrift shop where I volunteer.  Lesser items are headed to the Humane Society, which always needs towels and blankets.   

       One cousin-in-law went through the kitchen cupboards, disposed of any staples that had expired, and made a surprisingly modest give-away pile of what remained.  The other cousin-in-law repeated the process in the bathrooms, ending up with a substantial give-away haul.  Safe House should be pleased.  A neighbor came to the door and requested Norah’s V-shaped walker.  Odds and ends went hither and yon.       

     Every time my youngest cousin found something he didn’t know what to do with, he put it in a drawer.  When I found items like those already in this drawer, I added them.  The resulting junk-drawer assortment occasioned great interest at the tail end of our work bee.  There was very little sentiment and more than a little curiosity associated with the collection.  We all got together to see what was there.   

     A hot-pink super-bling LED flashlight.  Several fire-engine red LED flashlights.  A weapons-grade non-LED flashlight.  Two pairs of forceps suitable for use around the house.  (Uncle Jack was a physician.)  Quite a few magnifying glasses, including one switchblade style that my cousin-in-law practiced tossing hand to hand and dramatically deploying, for a James Dean-style scene.  The delay in the action of the device after she pressed the buttons yielded repeated “takes” and welcome comic relief.

     The mood grew pensive as we filled carts with the boxes and bags leaving with me. 

     “I sure will miss the yacht club,” I sighed.

     “We’ll all miss the yacht club,” my cousin answered, and the whole group sighed.  We’ll miss doing with Norah the things we’ve always done with Norah.  My cousins and their wives will miss her from the fabric of their daily lives.  We’ll feel Norah’s absence in our thoughts and hearts and outlook on the world, a world that seems diminished with her gone, and the richer for her having been a part of it.  With her church, community, and regional involvement, she exerted quite an influence over that world.  She was a grande dame, our grande dame.  And now she’s gone.

6 August 2021