When we first moved into our present house some 17½ years ago now we could not fail to notice a modern hotel situated some 200-300 metres away from us on the other side of the main Kidderminster Road. This was then known as the Bromsgrove Hotel but older residents of Bromsgrove knew it by its previous name which was the Pine Lodge Hotel. It was built in the style of a Spanish hacienda and we enjoyed many good Sunday lunches all of those years ago. It had facilities such as a small swimming pool and my daughter-in-law with whom we shared our house at that time negotiated a special family-rate membership of the sports facilities there, of which we availed ourselves only once or twice. I think it is fair to say that the fortunes and the reputation of the hotel have waxed and waned over the years and within a few years of our acquaintance with it, it was taken over and became the Holiday Inn. Approximately seven years ago, my sister-in-law and niece stayed there when they came to visit me after I had been in hospital and their stay was comfortable enough. To bring us up-to-date, our long established ex-Erasmus student who has become a life-long friend stayed there when she caught a flight from Madrid and managed to see Meg an hour and a half before she died, which was excellent I feel for both of them. The day after Meg’s death, I attended a pre-arranged birthday tea party there and the level of service proved to be excellent and we even took away six ‘doggy bags’ of left-overs. hen I was having a brief chat with my very friendly neighbours, they suggested that we hold our post-funeral refreshments, otherwise known as a ‘wake’ in that hotel as they themselves had recently attended a funeral party there and they thought it was excellent. Hence my son and I immediately walked over the road and saw their Events organiser and were delighted to be able to book our slot for Wednesday June 11th and were even shown the room which was to be made available to us. I am not sure why this did not occur to me immediately – a case of ‘familiarity breeds contempt’? But the advantages are legion as it is so easy to find being on the main Kidderminster Road, there is ample car parking and some of my ex-colleagues who are attending the funeral are already booked in for the night. There are all kinds of details yet to be worked out, but we know that these funeral events they have organised many times in the past and therefore will put on ‘a good show’ for us. The slightly romantic or nostalgic part of me is repeating to me that Meg would have loved these final celebrations of her life in quasi-Spanish style surroundings given the style in which the hotel is built and of course its proximity to our house means we can easily walk home and/or invite people in to spend time with us. We are awaiting further contact to be made with us so that we can give numbers and supply further details but this is another part of the jigsaw that is falling into place.

After my son and I had formally registered Meg’s death and picked up our copies of the relevant certificates, we popped into the adjacent building which now houses our GP practice and I tried to make an appointment to see the most senior partner in the practice for whom I have a great deal of respect. I particularly wanted to see this particular doctor because it was he whom we consulted at the very start of Meg’s final illness some 6-7 years ago now. In addition, he attended me when I was discharged from hospital and very skilfully dressed my post-operation wounds when I was too ill to attend the surgery. In addition, I used to help out with the training of young medical students from the University of Birmingham to whom they wanted to expose a ‘real’ but to some extent model patient so that they could develop some skills in dealing with patients as part of their medical training. But this particular doctor seemed to be mysteriously unavailable with nobody on the reception desk quite knowing what his movements were or how we could make an appointment. This seemed very strange to me so I had to settle for the doctor who had discussed the details to be entered on Meg’s death certificate with me but she was on holiday for at least a fortnight so this too will have to wait until she returns. There are just some details about Meg’s final illness which I need to clear up to my own satisfaction as there are some things in Meg’s medical records the full significance of which I was unaware. However, I have to reflect that Meg’s quality of life was pretty high in her last year or so of life and I am pretty convinced a lot superior to conditions experienced by other dementia patients when nearing the ends of their lives. In particular, Meg experienced completely what is often termed a ‘good’ death, surrounded by family, friends and even ex-students. Upon reflection, what I rather tremendously dubbed as our ‘Music Lounge’ meant that Meg could enjoy some magnificent music via the excellent concerts provided as result of our YouTube subscription and we tended to play some Mozart, and latterly Fauré practically every day. Also, we did manage to locate some classic Joan Baez concerts and Meg certainly derived a lot of pleasure from listening to these which reminded us both not only of our student days but also of the Joan Baez farewell concert which we attended in Birmingham a few years ago now. Incidentally, we showed some of these Joan Baez recordings to some of the young carers who had never heard anything like it in their lives before. In Meg’s final months, she received some excellent care and was always handled with tenderness and respect. The 4-5 young carers developed a deep affection for Meg, (and she for them I am pretty convinced), and they certainly enhanced her end of life experience. When Meg was being made comfortable in her specialist chair, the young carers used to put around her a blanket in my possession which was a deep blue on one side and a white faux fur on the other side. It looked for all of the world as though it was a robe that had been requisitioned from the House of Lords itself and so after they had put it carefully around Meg they used to call her ‘Queen Meg’ which she enjoyed tremendously. So taking a long view, I am constantly being told that no husband could have cared for Meg more that I actually did and, thank goodness, I have managed to achieve before my own health gave out. Otherwise, to quote the great political philosopher, Thomas Hobbes, then Meg’s life would have been ‘poor, nasty brutish and short’ but instead I think it was the complete reverse of this and I am so happy that she did enjoy the end of life in some peace and comfort and not an anonymous hospital bed/ward which we managed to avoid.

Yesterday, after I returned home from my Hampshire trip, I naturally unloaded the car and was delighted to discover the black tray-style purse which I had mislaid for at least a month now was now found. This was a classic case of how things get lost/mislaid as it is made of a shiny black leather and had slid completely and fitted snugly in between the (black) upholstery of the car and the (black) fabric of the front seat. Aware of the fact that ‘black on black’ is a fatal combination, particularly in the case of cars, I always tend to buy new phones that are a vivid and non-black colour to ensure that this not reoccur as I have been fooled before. Upon retrieving the purse, I decorated it with a few coloured ‘dot’ style stickers to make sure it does not go wandering again. It did not contain any house keys but did contain one or two small keys which I could deploy to lock a rather fine leather briefcase which I keep in the study to house things like recent medical records and hospital appointments. After I had made myself a cup of tea, I thought I would rummage through the contents of another briefcase which I knew contained some medical and other files pertaining to Meg to see if I could remind myself of the exact day upon which had retired and when she had first to leave work because of her back problems. I did discover something that I really did not wish to know. In the briefcase was a medical file which detailed some blood pressure readings sone of which were taken at least eight years ago and one set that dated back eleven years. Apart from one or two solitary prescriptions, this seems to have gone largely untreated because at the time Meg was suffering from other apparently urgent problems such as her recurrent back pains and quite frequent and crippling migraines. I did then go on the web and discovered some research papers that indicated that untreated hypertension in late middle age (Meg would have been in her late 60’s) could be the precursor to dementia but, if caught and treated in time, could delay the onset or the severity of symptoms in anything from 30%–50% of cases. This troubled me greatly and I had to think through all of the implications of what I had just discovered. I did go next door to inform the neighbours that I had returned from Hampshire and they, very kindly, regaled me with a glass of sherry and made some very helpful suggestions as to where we might hold the wake that will take place after Meg’s funeral in just over three week’s time. I think it is fair to say that after I had read in Meg’s medical files, I was rather a sombre and reflective mood for much of the evening.

My son was due to call around today and we have been quite busy with a round of engagements that we need to fulfil today. However, the Hampshire trip has shown me how cluttered a house can become and, returning home to my own domain everything seems to me a model of neatness and good order, which of course I intend to continue. Yesterday morning I did arise at 6.30 am then sat in my friend’s lounge until he appeared some time after 9.00am. I entertained myself by ‘liberating’ a book summarising great philosophers and their systems of thought but after two and a half hours of such reading, I was contemplating writing a note to my friend and then leaving the house without saying goodbye. Fortunately he appeared and we had a long and leisurely breakfast and I left at about 11.30 and the threatened road works/closures on the A34 did not manifest themselves so I had an easy a journey back as the journey the day before was fraught.

Later on in the morning, my son and I walked over the fairly adjacent ‘Holiday Inn’ to enquire about its availability for post-funeral refreshments and eventually we saw the Events organiser. The really good news is that they are available for an event on Wednesday, 11th June so we have booked our slot and seen the room in which our refreshments will take place and we think it will be excellent for us. This particular inn is built in the style of a Spanish Hacienda in any case and we used to eat there quite regularly when we moved to our present house nearly eighteen years ago now. In the late morning, my son had a formal ‘slot’ booked with the undertaker. The lady who dealt with us was sympathetic and practical and I thought she handled things beautifully. My son and I had the slightly strange experience of choosing not only a favourite dress which Meg is to wear but also some underwear as well. To my mind, this is a little strange as after the funeral service in the church, Meg’s body is to be cremated so she will not be wearing the clothes for very long. Also I want to remember Meg as she was and not as she is now so I certainly do not wish to see her dead body in which bad memories might drive out good ones. But I am very inexperienced in such things as I have never had the occasion to make the practical arrangements of a deceased wife – one every 57 1/2 years is quite enough. My son and I did all of the formal registration of a death in the early afternoon so we are relieved to be at this stage in the process. Later, I telephoned a very good ex-University of Winchester friend who I actually saw the other day and will see again in about three weeks time and as she is so much more experienced in these matters than I, she was a great source of sensible and practical advice. Then I popped around to see my next-door neighbour to thank him for the suggestion of the ‘Holiday Inn’ for our post-funeral refreshments. We are delighted that we followed his suggestion of a choice of venue and I am sure that we are doing the right thing at the end of the day.

Knowing that I had a journey down to Hampshire to make this morning to attend the wonderful birthday of my ex-colleague’s 80th, I arose at 6.00am as I have been wont to do for the past year or so, mainly so that I could be prepared for when the carers called around to get Meg prepared for the day ahead. But when I return from Hampshire, I may start to revise my daily routine and get up at 7.00am rather than 6.00am which has been my custom over the years. On the other hand, there is something to be said for arising early and getting things like a daily exercise routine in place as well as domestic concerns such as keeping abreast of emails and financial records. I had the experience today of packing an overnight bag in preparation for my one night stay away in Hampshire but this experience was not entirely novel to me. At the time that I was preparing papers for my PhD, I occasionally had an overnight stay and this was sometimes extended for a few days if it was a trip to a European city on the conferences organised by a professor/entrepreneur who is now a lifelong friend. So I suppose I can exercise my ‘conference mentality’ memory and I will recall the habits associated with packing an overnight bag. The only large item which remains in our main lounge is the camp bed which the Eucharistic minister and her husband let me have on loan throughout the last year so that I could be at Meg’s side should she experience any distress in the middle of the night. Fortunately, such occurrences were quite rare but if I had slept upstairs and Meg was in distress, there was no way in which I could have known about it. So it has served its purpose admirably and now I am sleeping in my conventional double bed and I think I am getting a better night’s sleep as a result. The other day when we were preparing the ‘Order of Service’ and not quite completing our task, my friend asked me to consult my family bible. I grabbed this and the book next to it and this turned out to be a missal (Catholic prayer book) When I looked at the flyleaf, there was a dedication from Meg which read ‘With my love and prayers’ and was dated May, 1966 and so must have been a 21st birthday present from Meg and not long after we had decided to marry.

The latest mad idea has emerged from the Trump regime (or should I say ‘cabal’). Up to a million Palestinians could be permanently relocated from devastated Gaza to war-torn Libya under plans being worked on by Donald Trump’s administration, NBC News reports. The idea has been discussed with Libya’s leadership, sources told Sky’s US partner network, and would potentially see billions of dollars in frozen Libyan funds released. The North African country remains divided in two – nearly 14 years after the overthrow of dictator Muammar Gaddafi sparked a civil war – with two rival governments fighting for control. By any stretch of the imagination, this has got to be ethnic cleansing and the term is now being openly applied to what the Israelis/Americans seem to have planned for the Gaza strip. It is one of the most incredible facts of the history of the last century that the Israeli peoples, having been subject to ethnic cleansing in the Holocaust are now said by many to be guilty of ethnic cleansing themselves in their policies towards the Palestinian residents of Gaza.

I set off for Hampshire in plenty of time and at just after 12.00pm. I was in danger of arriving half an hour early for the party. So as I had plenty of time, I stopped in a lay-by for a breath of fresh air. I noticed a little gap in the hedge and proceeding from this was a little beaten track down quite a steep little slope. I think this was an excellent opportunity to answer ‘a call of nature’ but I soon found myself propelled through the air in a rugby scoring type dive and landing full length in a huge bunch of nettles. I have to say that I was completely unhurt but when I examined what had occasioned my fall, there was a bit of a beaten down wire fence about a couple of inches above the ground and a trained saboteur could have positioned a trip wire more expertly. The rest of the trip was a bit of a nightmare because the SatNav took me not on the route I was expecting but on the M27, then off it, then on it again on roads totally unfamiliar to me. The SatNav failed to locate the address of my friend which is a large farmhouse in a track obliquely of the road and I had to stumble about trying to find it. To cap it all, the telephone number had friend had supplied had just that morning been disconnected but when, in desperation, I stopped to ask for help I was only about 50 metres away from where I needed to be. The garden was pretty full when I arrived but I was soon joined by a couple of close ex-University of Winchester friends and we finished off having an excellent afternoon chatting with each other and with guests invited to the celebrations on my friend’s 80th birthday. As I was staying the night, I spent the evening in long conversations with my friend and his new ‘squeeze’ who was somebody with whom he had re-established contact from his postgraduate days. I managed to play them a little bit of a video clip of Meg’s address to our Harrogate (family) party some seven years ago before the ravishes of Meg’s final illness had intensified. Perhaps because of the WiFi connection this cut out about a third of the way through the clip but at least they were able to see Meg ‘at her best’ as it were. Because my University of Winchester friend and his new ‘amante’ had both experienced the death of their own partners in recent years, they understood why I felt the need to share the videoclip of Meg with them. We ended up talking until after midnight but had some late night supper of quiche and salad to sustain us.

Yesterday turned out to be quite an interesting day. After I had got up and written a bit of my blog, which I generally do first thing in the morning, I engaged in a bit more of my tidying up activity. To help Meg n her last few years and months of life, I acquired a variety of walking aids including a sort of triangular walking aid that I have seen many elderly frail people utilise in the nearby park. But unfortunately Meg never got on with this and when I tried it out with her, she tended to steer it into the side of the path so it had to be abandoned. So now I have stored a couple of these walkers in an upstairs walk-in wardrobe were they are out of the way but accessible if and when I ever need to use them myself. In Waitrose, there were more hugs from the regular members of staff who had seen me for the first time since Meg’s passing and I treated myself to one of their ‘free’ cups of coffee as I had actually taken my mug with me so that as a card holder, I could have one of these. On my way back up the hill, I called in at my Italian friend and we spent a pleasant half hour in the warm sunshine, drinking coffee and reminiscing about the lives of our respective spouses. After I returned home, I received a phone call from our solicitors so after I have collected the death certificate on Monday, we can make a journey to the nearby town of Kidderminster to collect the original of Meg’s will on Tuesday morning. For lunch, I did not want to do any cooking so had quite a healthy lunch of a tin of tuna, enhanced with ‘Thousand Island’ dressing and some mayonnaise and then eaten on a base of rice biscuits. When I am on a more even keel, I intend to cut down on carbs quite radically and I think rice biscuits are a good way of doing this.

I knew that the Ukrainian lady with whom I was in contact to dispose of spare medicines and dressings was due to call around at 2.00pm. She appeared very promptly and she was accompanied by a friend who was herself a refugee from the Hungarian uprising of the 1950’s. I think that apart from the fellow feeling, she came along as the Ukrainian lady did not speak English particularly well. I raced around getting whatever medicines of which we still had some supplies both in the bedroom and also in a downstairs kitchen drawer so we finished up with a bag full of medicines as supplied by the District Nurses, a bag of medical aids of various kinds such as slip sheets and my final collection of the pills that Meg has taken over the years. To cut a long story short, the two ladies were absolutely delighted to accept all three bags of supplies and one item they thought they would find particularly useful. Meg had developed a pressure sore on one heel which had developed what is called a ‘deep tissue injury’ and the District Nurse had supplied two large boot-like appliances that protected the whole of the foot. These had proved to be very comfortable for Meg and she actually slept in them for the last week or so of her life. The two ladies thought that they would prove excellent for injuries to wounded Ukrainian soldiers amongst whom I suppose foot injuries can be quite common. So they left my house more than happy with what I was able to supply for them and they were actually to be loaded onto a van and would be winging their way towards the Ukraine as early as tomorrow morning. In exchange, they insisted on giving me a jar of Ukrainian jam and we promised to keep in touch so that as and when extra medical supplies come our way, we always have a good home to pass them onto.

Knowing that I was going to be away for the next couple of days, I thought I had better mow at least one of the lawns. I did the first one in two tranches, treating myself to a choc ice on between the two cuttings of the first lawn. Refreshed by a bit of a rest, I managed to cut the back lawn as well so felt I had done a good afternoon’s work. I must say that as I mowed the lawns, I experienced a great deal of happiness that I had managed to get these medical supplies into the hands of those who desperately needed them. I also enjoyed telling Meg’s departed spirit what had happened to some of her now redundant medications, and I am sure that she would be so happy that these were not just thrown away but were to be utilised almost immediately. I have been promised some photographs to ‘prove’ that the medicines have got through to the correct places but even if the photos fail to materialise I am sure the medications will be put to excellent use.

I have to ensure that I am well and truly loaded up with gifts and goodies for the birthday part celebrations when I am to leave tomorrow, I have a plant, a large cake, wine and some other comestibles to donate to my host tomorrow and I am looking forward to meeting up with old and loyal friends. The journey is of the order of about 135 miles but I know it very well and I will just toddle along giving myself a break at the half way point. Yesterday evening, I had a video chat with my sister in Yorkshire and after the funeral is over, I am going to go up there to spend a few days with members of the family not seen for years. I was also delighted to receive a text message from the Ukrainian lady thanking me for the donations of medicines and dressings. She indicated that she was going to send me a lost of the things that are particularly needed and this will be useful because some of these items I might be able to spare from this house as I carry on with my de-cluttering efforts.

Yesterday, as we had anticipated, the crew made their appearance from the NHS Equipment Supplies agency to collect the various large pieces of equipment that has populated our house over the past year. They were a friendly and business-like pair and had a huge white van at their disposal so that it was quite easy for them to stow way the various pieces of equipment. I told them how during the course of Meg’s illness, I had found the occupational therapists, physiotherapists, wheelchair specialists and district nurses little short of excellent whereas,in my opinion, the various doctors were as useful as chocolate teapots. What was so interesting was they absolutely agreed and indicated without going into details how they could tell exactly similar stories of their own. I was left with a fairly large bag of NHS supplies, some still in its unopened packaging, which they indicated they could not take away but they did take away one or two things where they indicated they could throw it away for me. I informed them how glad I was to see them and how removing all of the NHS ‘gear’ would help to restore a sense of normality. After I had breakfasted which is now quite a quick affair I made a phone call to the Occupational Therapy team to see if they would like to collect any of the unused equipment. Very apologetically, they explained how they were unable to accept the return of any of this material citing ‘infection control’ and it was agreed between us that to throw it away seemed a criminal waste of scarce resources but those are the protocols in place. I followed this up with a call to the care agency that had been looking after Meg and they indicated that they could certainly use some items such as slip sheets so I am retaining these until a care worker calls who can take some of these supplies away. This afternoon, I am due to be paid a visit by the Ukrainian lady with whom I made contact the other day and I am hopeful that a lot of the excess medicines and dressings can wing their way towards the Ukraine where they are desperately needed.

Our Eucharistic minister called around this m morning, by arrangement, as we were going to put together the elements of an ‘Order of Service’ for Meg’s funeral, a task for which she is eminently suited having done it for other parishioners and members of her own family. When several years ago, Meg and I had planned out some of the elements of the music that we would like for our funerals and which our daughter-in-law had kept assiduously, we had only specified music tracks which were mainly drawn from Mozart’s Requiem and some Handel but had not specified any hymns – I think it is true to say that neither Meg nor I were great hymn aficionados in any case. But we quickly settled on one hymn by John Henry Newman (‘Lead, kindly light’) as he is practically a local saint. While there is no definitive record of St John Henry Newman’s formal visit to Bromsgrove, his life and work were intertwined with the broader region of the West Midlands, where Birmingham and surrounding areas are located. It is therefore possible, though not explicitly documented, that he may have briefly been in Bromsgrove at some point during his ministry and travels. and his connection to the region makes a visit plausible but unconfirmed. As well as this, we chose a processional hymn and two pieces of Bach which are particular favourites of both Meg and myself. So we are probably going to have three particular pieces of music which were actually played at our wedding in September, 1967, so this seems entirely fitting. Our planning was rather attenuated by the arrival of the BHS Equipment Supplies team which had to take my full attention but the Eucharistic minister has most of the essential elements in place. And, as a sort of bonus, I have managed to locate, pay for and download a copy of the ‘Lacrimosa’ from the Mozart requiem that we will need to play through the Church’s sound system. The remainder of the morning was taken up with a series of to-and-fro telephone calls where in order to arrive at a date for Meg’s funeral, we have to coordinate the availability of the undertakers themselves, a ‘slot’ in the crematorium and the availability of both the church and the parish priest. But we now have a date of Wednesday, June 11th at 12.00pm (late in the morning to help those travelling a long distance) and although it is the best part of four weeks away, it is a good to have a date agreed so that we can spread the word far and wide. In fact, I spent most of last night going through the ‘Contacts’ list on my phone to make sure that anyone would needed to know would have a good prior intimation of the date. Our planning was rather cut short by the arrival of the NHS equipment team but the essential elements are in place and plenty of time for any ‘fine tuning’

After a quick lunch, I sallied forth to take a bag full of teddy bears and other soft toys to the Salvation Army store on the High Street, from whence many of them had come in the first place. Whilst in the vicinity of Waitrose, I bumped into a very old Pilates classmate who I do not see regularly now as she now attends a class on a different day of the week. But out mutual Pilates class teacher had informed her of Meg’s demise so we agreed to make contact again after she had returned from a cruise upon which she was shortly to embark. In the evening, I had a telephone consultation with my son informing him of the appointments made with the undertakers and also the Bromsgrove registration office where I have a ‘slot’ on Monday next allocated to formally record Meg’s death (some nine days after the event) I received a mild scolding about doing the undertaker’s work for them but I am not skilled in such matters as the sequelae of the death of a family member. I paid a brief call to my next door neighbours to inform them that I would be away in Hampshire next Saturday and Sunday and they were not to worry about my absence – in the event, I was glad to have done so because, in the absence of any other information, they would have been worried about me.

Later on today, I am anticipating that the Equipment Agency part of the NHS will call around and reclaim all, if not most, of the various equipment which has been supplied to us to make Meg comfortable in her final days. Thee include a special hospital bed, a specialised air-flow mattress, a hoist and slings, a specialised chair, a wheelchair and a host of smaller items. I have been looking forward to this as, once removed, I can restore our living accommodation to what I might term the ‘new’ normal. Anticipating this, our domestic help abandoned her normal duties and together with my son set to work with gusto reclaiming the one half of our main lounge which had been converted into a downstairs bedroom. They started by removing the temporary blackout curtains I had installed this time last year. As Mg started to be put to bed at about 7.30 starting late last May, the sun was still very bright so I bought and installed these as a matter of urgency. Admittedly they looked decidedly makeshift for the whole of the last year but they served their purpose in helping Meg to get swiftly off to sleep. Then the screen I had purchased to separate the room into ‘lounge’ and ‘bedroom’ areas was removed and, later in the day I was to deconstruct this but it took almost as long to disassemble as it had done to assemble in the first place last year. In fact much of the early afternoon was spent doing this and I finished off with a supply of screws (saved), and some plastic fitments and linen panels (junked) and a large number of metal poles which I un-slotted. My son and domestic help turned to their attention to a stainless steel trolley that looked all the world like a hospital trolley and practically the whole of its contents were discarded. Then some bedding was discarded, the blankets were saved and stored safely in a room upstairs and attention was turned to Meg’s day-to-day clothes. I have to admit that seeing these discarded including her favourite jumpers was painful in the extreme but had to be done otherwise they would have stayed there as a permanent reminder of Meg and therefore needed to go. So the ‘good’ clothing was bagged up so that it could be donated to the AgeUK and as well as this we were left with a huge bag of items for disposal, a huge bag of medicaments and specialised drugs and dressings brought along by the District Nurses so that Meg’s immediate needs could be addressed. We also finished off with a large bag of about a dozen soft toys, principally teddy bears some of which we had as ‘sleeping companions’ as she was put to bed. All of these came via charity shops or were donated to us so to the charity shops they will be returned. In the afternoon after I had dissembled the screen and was left with a series of metal poles, I thought these would not fit into our normal wheelie bin so I loaded up the car and set off for our local tip which is quite some distance away. So I managed to dispose of these metal parts appropriately and also the large bag of ‘rubbish’ items. On the way home, I called in at our local AgeUK shop and was delighted that it was still open and would accept my large plastic bag filled with clothing and other items. So at the end of the day, I was left off with the bag of medicaments as well as the bag of soft toys for eventual disposal.

My son phoned in the afternoon and was delighted with the progress I had made and then I had a welcome and surprise phone call from one of my ex University of Winchester colleagues who is immensely knowledgeable about these things having recently having to cope with the death of her mother and an extremely ill sister) My friend is really keen on recycling and made the most excellent suggestion upon I acted. She informed me that once the medicines were returned to the NHS they would just immediately be destroyed which she thought was criminal and suggested that I see if there was a local Ukraine relief society which would be desperate to accept the donation of drugs and medical supplies. I did find a person in a a village quite nearby and we established email contact – she is due to call around on Friday afternoon to pick up the large bag of medical supplies for onward transmission to the Ukraine. Naturally, I am delighted about this as I am sure that Meg would have been and I am sure my friend will be when I see her at the party organised in Hampshire on Saturday which I can now attend. When the room has been cleared of medical equipment, we can do a final deep cleaning and subsequent rearrangement of some items of furniture next week when our domestic help calls again.

The disposal of those items of clothing with which the deceased family member wore frequently is always particularly painful. Meg had two woolly jumpers one decorated with sheep and the other a wonderful design which made it resemble a cricketer’s jumper and in my mind’s eye, I shall always remember Meg in one of these two, obviously worn a lot in the winter months and on our trips out. But to be honest, it takes friends and family members to dispose of this apparel because it can be very difficult for the bereaved person to experience this final ‘letting go’. But as I think Lady Macbeth may have said ‘If ’tis to be done it is best done quickly’ so my son and domestic help have done a magnificent job in removing these frequently worn items from my purview. In time, wardrobe items and underwear will need to be cleared out but these do not have the same emotional pull as those items in which one pictures one’s departed one. To quote another expression that comes to mind ‘What the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve over’ and this proverb is found literally all over the world. It might have first been uttered in the 14th century by a certain St Bernard but I find it to be particularly true and apposite today.

STOP PRESS

Meg’s funeral Wednesday:11th June 12.00pm St. Peters Catholic Church Bromsgrove B60 3LU followed by a visit to the crematorium (brief) at 1.15 The reception afterwards will be held locally – details to be announced later.

Yesterday proved to be on of the most interesting of days but not quite as predicted. I am eager to get back to normal or more accurately to a ‘new’ normal and so thought I would resume my earlier habits of always walking down the hill to collect my newspaper. I was a little dismayed to discover that my physical shape is not good as a year of pushing Meg around in a wheelchair preceded by some 6-9 months in which I had to regularly pick Meg off the floor (on one or two occasions up to four times in the day) he taken an evident toll on my health. In particular, my daughter-in-law has now noticed that I walk with a slight leaning stoop and, what has been happening is that in pushing the wheelchair around I had been using at as a sort of huge walking frame and was evidently leaning into the wheelchair itself particularly when transporting Meg in the uphill sections on the way home. So although I completed the walk, I was pretty tired after I had done the round trip and, in some ways, more tired than if I had had a wheelchair in front of me. I am philosophical bout this and I do not regret for a single moment the efforts that I undoubtedly made to give Meg a good quality of life in which I have generally succeeded but now I have to think about my own health and fitness. My intention is to get a telephone consultation with a doctor, explain and situation to him and then request not pills but a course of NHS funded physiotherapy in the adjacent Catherine Adams physiotherapy centre. As part of the same efforts to repair my health and get back to a ‘new’ normal. I also decided to renew my participation in the Pilates class which I used to do each Tuesday but has. been abandoned for over a year. My son very kindly offered to run me down to the clinic in the car and to pick me up afterwards which offer I gladly accepted and really needed. What followed then was remarkable. My fellow class members were reduced from the customary four to three on this occasion but I knew each one of them well. There were hugs and kisses all round and it was indicated to me how much I had been missed, particularly for the jokes and humour which permeate the session. One of my fellow classmates is a veterinary nurse who works in a practice at the bottom of the hill and unbeknown to me had often actually witnessed me pushing Meg upon what was the steepest part of the hill so knew completely why I had not been able to attend classes. I thought it was going to very difficult to do the class exercises but it was. nowhere as difficult as I thought. Our teacher explained to me that my ‘muscle memory’ was. being activated so she was not surprised. At the end of the session, my teacher updated me with her own bad news as she had lost her own very active father first to a broken hip, then to bowel problems and finally a massive stroke so she and her mother had gone ‘through the mill’ as they say. Evidently e have a lot of fellow feeling for each other and even more than we had before. So by returning, I am boosting her income a smidgeon and she was so pleased to see back that she offered me the rest of the six week block at a 40% discount, I had obviously gone to the class for the physical benefits but left it surrounded by a huge comfort blanket of affection from my fellow class members (all women, incidentally). Needless to say, this is an additional source of motivation for me to continue the classes each Tuesday.

In the afternoon, I continued with the tasks of what my niece in a subsequent long conversation with me was to call ‘sadministration’ or, in other words, those procedures that have to be completed after the death of a family member. She remembered well what she had to do after the death of her father (my brother-in-law some two or three years ago now). I got through to the Teachers Pension Agency as. mall portion of Meg’s pension continue after her death but there is the inevitable (12-page) form to be completed. After I had completed as much of the form as I could, I needed to eventually supply the original of our marriage certificate although the documentation does refer to a certificated copy counter-signed by a relevant professional. In no way did. I wish to trust the original marriage certificate to a government bureaucracy so thought I would actually get an ‘official’ second copy. This proved to be. more complex procedure but I was directed by the government’s own website to anther application which would locate the year, quarter, district, volume and then page number where our own marriage certificate details could be found. This I managed to do and sent my application expecting it will take about week to be delivered. But the government’s own General Register Office reckoned that. this was the best and cheapest way to get me a replacement certificate so I trust. that when it turns up it is exactly what it purports to be.

Finally, the late afternoon and early evening were. to bring three wonderful surprises. The first of these was an extended and quite emotional telephone call with me niece in Yorkshire and this was to be followed by a surprise and unanticipated visit from my University of Birmingham friend. We discussed, inter alia, when the very first signs of Meg’s progressive illness had started to become apparent to us and it was probably at least six years ago and probably even longer. Then I received a telephone call from a very good University of Winchester friend who did not know of Meg’s demise. He was part of the birthday club of about five of us who all birthdays in May and his own is next Saturday. Hearing that Meg was. no longer with us, he promptly invited me to his party and offered to put me up for the night in his (large) farm house which invitation I very promptly accepted not least because several, other intimate friends will be there and so my presence will be a real surprise for them I would imagine.

Yesterday was the first day of the rest of my life, so to speak, as Meg my beloved wife of nearly sixty years of acquaintance and over 57½ years of marriage finally succumbed to the ravages of dementia and had died peacefully and surrounded by friends last Saturday. But today I am going to reflect the events of last Sunday which was the occasion of my 80th birthday and therefore quite a significant landmark in anyone’s life. I knew that some of my wonderful friends from down the Kidderminster Road were planning a special celebration for me and although most of the party was to be a surprise as I did not know who was going to attend, I had to be let in on a few details so that some forward planning could take place. Indeed, whether the event could take place at all was rather in doubt as Meg was still alive but failing fast and nobody can predict precisely when they are due to meet their maker so we were all in somewhat of a dilemma. But I have to say that Meg exercised the most exquisite timing in her departure from this world. In the first place, she managed to hang on so that our very dear friend and one time Erasmus student had time to arrive from Madrid and make her final goodbyes. We also had time to fit in the celebratory meal which my son and daughter-in-law had planned for the day before my birthday and had then died so peacefully and surrounded by family and friends on the day before I was due to turn 80. So Meg had ensured that I could celebrate my birthday with my very dear friends whilst she was looking on benignly from another place. So Sunday, the actual date of my birthday commenced, after some early morning blogging, with our Erasmus friend calling for me at about 10.00am so that we could walk down into Bromsgrove. It was a most beautiful warm and sunny spring day with weather much better, paradoxically, than in Madrid and as walked down the hill, I knocked on the door of our Italian friend who happened to be in. She very warmly invited us both in and we had the opportunity the opportunity to discuss things European which was a common bond between us all. Actually my Italian friend actually has some Spanish and perhaps in the future we might be able to visit Spain together but we did converse today in English. It was so wonderful for my two close friends to actually meet like this and I am sure it was to be the first meeting of many. Then my Madrid friend and I proceeded down the hill and I could indicate the houses where all of my close friends actually lived before we paid a visit to Waitrose with which my friend was familiar as it had featured in so many of my past blogs. Having picked up my newspaper, I knew it was to mainly the weekend staff rather than the regular ‘partners’ but I did espy a partner who I know particularly well and who hails originally from South Africa. Every day he used to enquire about Meg and regularly saw me pushing Meg around in her wheelchair. I had to impart to him the sad news that Meg had passed on the day before. So this entailed a great hug of consolation (naturally, I was in tears) as well as a bunch of yellow roses pressed into my hand. Even the assistant who I knew only vaguely by sight had her eyes filled with tears as she served me, as my sad news was being communicated to other staff -this is not what one would normally expect from the staff of a supermarket but, after all, I am the store’s oldest customer having being first in the queue when the store opened on my birthday probably eight years ago now.

My Irish friends called for me just after 2.00pm and we made our way to the nearby ‘Holiday Inn’ for the birthday bash which was a ‘tea’ which we had jointly planned. This turned out to be one of the best celebrations one could possibly imagine. The hotel had provided us with our own private space and we had two large tables, one eventually groaning with food. I had taken along the favourite framed photograph of Meg and myself on our wedding day so that this could be placed upon the table and Meg could be said to have participated in the proceedings. What made it so wonderful was that my Madrid friend could actually meet in the flesh as it were all of the people that she knew about via this blog but of course are not directly named. So we had my Italian friend who, of course, we had met earlier in the morning and then my two Irish friends, my French friend, and my two Catholic friends. In addition, I had also invited along my University of Birmingham friend as well as the Eucharistic minister and her husband who I have go to know so well after her frequent, fortnightly visits. So all there was a gathering of ten of us and the tea which started at about 2.30 went on until at least 6.30pm if not later. The hotel supplied us with copious amounts of sandwiches and little delicacies and as much tea and coffee as we could want. There was no alcohol but we honestly did not miss this. Half way through the proceedings, I proceeded to tell a series of jokes and stories starting with those of a local flavour and then continuing with some stories from Spain before concluding with the extended story about my experinces when I worked at the National Lending Library for Science and Technology from 1962-64. One could scarcely imagine a happier or more joyous occasion and my Madrid friend now knew exactly why I wanted to ‘stay put’ in this loving and supportive local environment which as the above account reveals has such a decidedly cosmopolitan flavour. In fact my son phoned me to ask if I had enjoyed my birthday celebrations and I had to inform him that at the time of his phoning, it was still going on. The hotel supplied us with a large number of ‘doggy bags’ to take home the excess food and I think that we filled about six of them until eventually the proceedings came to a natural conclusion after about four hours. My Madrid friend and I spent the whole evening in the kind of intimate and close discussions which happens between close friends who have known each other for years. She has fortunately got a direct flight direct from Birmingham to Madrid and she knew that she had to resume her academic duties first thing on Tuesday morning.

In yesterday’s blog, I had the premonition that it was not going to be a normal day so I actually completed the entry for the following day very early in the morning. But here is a much fuller account of what transpired on Saturday, 10th May, the day before my 80th birthday. During the night before, as I slept on the camp bed besides Meg which I have done for practically a year now, I noticed that Meg’s breathing had become shallower and more rapid, although she did not appear to be in any pain or distress. After I had got up, the rapid breathing intensified and I called the District Nurse (as I had been urged to do) and she came along after about a three quarters of an hour. She confirmed that Meg did not seem to be in pain or distress but thought that the rapid breathing might be a sign of an underlying anxiety and administered an injection. Both the nurse and myself suspected that the rapid breathing signalled that Meg’s life was ebbing away. In the late morning, my son and daughter-in-law called around as we had arranged that we should have a family meal and a Chinese meal had already been delivered the day before. So we ate this largely in the kitchen instead of the refurbished dining room and I explained that our good friend, one of ex-Erasmus students and now a lifelong friend, as soon as she heard about Meg announced that she was going to jump on a plane to be by Meg’s bedside. Her flight had taken off from Madrid at 6.30 in the morning and she came via Paris and then flew into Birmingham airport and caught a train to Bromsgrove. After booking into the ‘Holiday Inn’ only a few hundred metres from our house, our friend came around and Meg was still with us. I left her completely alone with Meg for 10-15 minutes so that they could have their last communication with each other and this absolutely wonderful that she had managed to do this in time. Our domestic help called around with some birthday ‘goodies’ for me for the following day and then, only an hour and a half since our friend had arrived from Madrid, Meg’s spirit finally departed (my son noted at 2.39 in the afternoon.) Naturally, we were all filled with grief but with an admixture of relief for Meg and almost a sort of happiness that Meg had experienced what in Catholic theology is known as a ‘good death’ with her family and loved ones all around her and with no pain, distress or agitation. It was actually just an ebbing away of her life in a peaceful and tranquil fashion and was all that anyone could really wish for. The District Nurses had to be summoned because it is they, these days, who certify that a person had died. Then the undertaker had to be called and it took them over an hour to arrive but they were superbly professional in their tasks. I had already made contact with them to make some prior arrangements several days ago and had got their details immediately to hand in a nice, royal blue folder which I had tastefully labelled as ‘Meg’s Care Arrangements’. Meg was transported into their vehicle and I deliberately kept the kitchen door closed so that I was spared the upset of seeing Meg’s body leaving the house. Instead, I went into our downstairs bedroom, adapted from our ‘L’ shaped lounge and just said ‘Goodbye, sunshine’ which was the name by which I often addressed Meg. Then the family sat outside in the bright sunshine whilst my daughter-in-law went next door to give the news to our next door neighbour.

By this time, it was approaching 6.00pm so my son and daughter-in-law made the suggestion that we all leave the house and walk over to the ‘Holiday Inn’ where they serve food and drink practically all day. Here, the four of us (myself, son, daughter-in-law and our Madrid friend) had a drink and ordered a meal of a variety of Asian delicacies that we could all select and eat as we chose. We had a really happy and enjoyable hour and half, not at all morose and not with our heads filled with things funerial but a really fascinating and enjoyable conversation. I know that none of us can exactly predict the timing of our own death but we felt that, one way or another, Meg had completed a superb act of timing by hanging on until she could see our friend who had flown in from Madrid but then departing this mortal coil (in the words of the Bard) on the day before my 80th birthday celebrations which are scheduled for the following day (Sunday) and which we do not think that Meg would have wanted us to have cancelled or postponed. I had only just returned to the house on my own when our wonderful Welsh neighbour called around and we discussed what how the days events had unfolded and how wonderful it was for Meg to depart this world surrounded by family, friends and even an ex-student which seemed so fitting under the circumstances. I did relocate the clock radio and the ‘Alexa’ smart speaker to the upstairs bedroom and then spent quite a lot of the evening going thought the ‘Contacts’ list on my phone and informing them all about Meg’s demise. I did not go to bed until about 1.00am and did not sleep particularly well but actually got up at sunrise (5.20 in the morning) In a strange kind of way I do not feel that Meg actually departed this house yesterday as with her advancing dementia and the fact for the last week or so she was asleep practically the whole of the day (as well as the night), then I felt that her actual spirit had fluttered away almost surreptitiously over the preceding weeks and months. And, of course, I had even got Meg’s work desk tidied up and freed from clutter for the first time in years so that this was left in good order as well. My son has made the telling observation that once hospital beds, specialist chairs, hoists and wheelchairs have been returned to the NHS then we can reorder the furniture in our living space and restore a sense of what is going to become, for me, the new normality.

Late yesterday afternoon after the front grassed area had been cut, my son and I settled down and had some quiet time with Meg who was sleeping largely peacefully. My son stayed with us until the point at which a Chinese meal which he had ordered arrived. Our plan is to keep this in the fridge overnight and then to have it as a family meal with my son and daughter-in-law later on in the day. This then keeps the following day, Sunday which is my 80th birthday absolutely clear so that the party that has been organised for me by my friends down the Kidderminster Road can take place in the hotel which is conveniently situated about 200 yards away. At the appointed time, two young male carers who know Meg very well came around and all they had to do was to ensure that Meg was comfortable so that, hopefully, she could have another peaceful night. They were the epitome of love and tenderness as they have been attending to Meg’s needs for the best part of a year. One of them is going to have a career in the army and is well certificated in First Aid as well as military First Aid so he is very well informed about things like the rattle in Meg’s throat which alarmed me somewhat yesterday but has now largely abated. The Asian male carer even kissed Meg goodnight which, of course I doubt is. sign of the affection in which Meg is held. After they had left, I consulted my phone and found the magnificent news that the one of our Erasmus students who works in the Complutense University of Madrid had organised a flight and was due to leave Madrid at 6.30 in the morning. Her text told me that she was coming via Paris and I have to make the supposition that this was the best way to arrive at Birmingham airport later on Saturday morning. I checked the arrivals schedule for Birmingham airport for morning flight and, indeed, two flights from Paris are due to land in the morning so I trust our dear friend is on one of them. She has evidently managed to get a visa in double quick time which is of course excellent news hen time is of the essence which it is at the moment. I cannot express how wonderful I feel that our ex-student and now lifelong friend is making this journey but it is a sign of the affection that in which Meg is held that they wish to jump on a plane and pay Meg a visit. It had been our intention to do exactly the same in the opposite direction to attend the funeral of the professor at the Complutense, Mariano Baena, upon his demise but it came at a time when Meg and I could no longer just jump on a flight and we only found out after the event of his funeral in any case. Our friend is so well organised that she has even booked a room in the hotel across the road although we could easily have accommodated her here had she so wished, and we had more time to discuss practical details. No sooner had I absorbed these details when the doorbell rang and it was our very good Irish friend from down the rod who called round with a huge bunch of lilies for Meg and also a flask of holy water brought all the way from Lourdes (devout Catholics will often ask friends who have been on pilgrimage to Lourdes in France to bring them back some Holy Water for occasions especially like this) You may call this peasant religion but it is really emotionally uplifting as well as a great source of comfort. My friend and I had a lot to discuss and for me to show my friend as well. The most important thing I managed to show her was the card signed by her Erasmus conference colleagues which was full of apposite comments such as ‘We miss you Meg’ which of course has an added poignancy at this time. I have plans for this which is, after consultation with translation facilities on the web, to take each of the comments on the card (written in English, French, German, Spanish and Italian as the conference participants were all linguists) and then to make a little display showing the comments in their original and then the translation and this will be a fitting tribute to Meg in what her probably her finest and happiest hours. The second thing I had to show our friend was the photograph I discovered when I was tidying up the study and it is an A4 photograph of myself and Meg standing in front of the (huge) Lincoln memorial in Washington, USA. I had attended the conference when I was accumulating conference papers for my PhD and I willingly paid for Meg to accompany me but I think this must have been the best part of thirty years ago. The third bit of memorabilia I showed our friend was the original organist’s notes for the music played at our wedding in September, 1967, and this bit of paper is more than 57 years old. The final thing I showed our friend was to play a rendition on the IBM ThinkPad of the recently downloaded Handel aria ‘Waft her, angels, through the skies’ which, of course at the moment reduces me within seconds to floods of tears. We had had some really practical things to discuss for the forthcoming ‘surprise’ birthday bash to be held by my friends for me in the hotel across the road in view of the circumstances that pertain at the moment. Meg died peacefully, and in no pain, at 2.39 on Saturday afternoon, surrounded by family and friends and at peace with the world.

These are strange times for me to be living through at the moment because there are not many occasions when one has to say goodbye to a lifelong partner whom I have known for nearly sixty years and been married to for over 57½ years But I have my tidying up agenda as well as longer plans to visit family (in Yorkshire) and friends (in Spain), Yesterday, I had turned my attention to the table Meg used in the kitchen as her desk and is now occupied by several files, stuffed full of medical and social care details. I have completed the task of clearing the desk top but the final task is to go through each of the bulky files and prune then down. I have processed one labelled as ‘Health’ which contains stuff accumulated over the years that can now be safely discarded.