A Tough Day…

We buried my mom today.  After a moving funeral, we laid her to rest about 80 feet from the church that she loved so much.  The service was moving and saddening. 

 

In keeping with her Free Church of Scotland roots, two of the hymns were actually unaccompanied sung Psalms (121 and 23) and that’s when I started to let loose with some tears.  The church was packed and a friend of the family for 30 years read a eulogy.  We had her interred and then went back in for a social time.

 

The wake was more physically exhausting, the funeral more emotionally exhausting.  As Mom’s only living child I thanked everyone publically for coming to honour her and talked about how fitting it was that she was surrounded by people she loved in a place she loved, as we remembered both her many strengths and challenges.  Many, many people came up to me and spoke about how kind Mom was to everyone she met and how she worked (so often behind the scenes) to make the community a better place.  Children felt safe with her.  She paid attention to kids with a patience that defies my abilities as a parent.

 

I’m dizzy at the thought that there are so many things she’ll never be able to tell me about herself and the her views of the world.  My mom and I were alike in so many ways, different in so many others.  I’m terrified that she won't be there for me, our kids, and my Dad.

 

I think I’m still in shock over what I’ve lost this week.  I can’t yet my head around what life is going to be like without her.  This was so sudden- it was last Sunday before we really knew that she was going to die, five days after she’d entered the hospital.  I spoke to her on Wednesday night, but didn’t say goodbye.  That’s unfortunate…  More later.

 

B.

Mom passed away at about 10:51 PM on Tuesday. Her life ended peacefully, surrounded by her sister, Dad, and me. Her heart and breathing were slowing all evening and finally gave out.

Her illness progressed so quickly this past week... But she hasn't been in much pain and now no longer has to fight. Dad is doing okay.

B

“Its been the worst day, since yesterday.”

LA Irish Punk Band Flogging Molly

 

I had always pictured that I’d have some time to say a real good bye to those with whom I’m closest.  My mom is dying and I don’t think I’m going to get that chance with her.  That said, we part on the best of terms, loved and respected.

 

On Tuesday she entered the hospital after  a prolonged illness at home.  At first we thought she had H1N1, then some kind of bacterial infection, but it now looks like her old nemesis cancer has come back.  No H1N1, no infection… The results of a CAT scan appear to show a number of signs pointing to cancer.  We didn’t know, but I’m not sure there was much we could have done if we had.

 

Mom was last awake coherently Wednesday evening and I saw her then and we had some time alone.  Right now, Mom is asleep all the time.  She’s still being treated but nothing seems to be making a great deal of difference aside from keeping her stable.  She is fading, though.

 

Sorry to just dump this news here, but I do try to write about what I’m going through.

 

B.

John Daley, My Great Great Uncle - Killed in Action Nov. 6, 1918

Private John Daley, Kings County, Prince Edward Island
Born March 23, 1891 Died in combat Nov. 6, 1918, age 27 years.

John Daley was my maternal grandmother's uncle. He was killed five days before the end of the Great War. The army he fought as part of was ending the period known as "Canada's Hundred Days," a period during which it was at the forefront of some of the most decisive, important victories of the war. He's buried along with 881 other Commonwealth soldiers in the Valenciennes (St. Roch) Communal Cemetery in Northern France, close to the Belgian frontier.

He was killed 2-3 days after the Canadian Corps took the area from the German Army, who had held the area from the war's early days. Uncle John' s unit is listed is listed as the Nova Scotia Highlanders (or the 85th Battalion) although they may have been attached to the Manitoba Regiment at the time of his death. Many young men from Eastern Prince Edward Island had gone to Nova Scotia to enlist.

The tragedy in his death itself, in his death at 27, and in his death in the war's last days are obvious. Other suffering caused by his death is not so obvious. In 1917, his brother Abram drowned after falling from a vessel in the Northumberland Strait, leaving his widow and two daughters. They were my grandmother and her older sister (who had been blind from birth). The family's understanding has always been (in my life time) that John would have supported them after the war and they would have been spared the poverty that they had faced. In the end, my grandmother and her sister had full, happy lives. This was despite the poverty they faced as children- poverty they overcame but with some price. Specifically, the costs of school for the blind for my great aunt, meant less money for education and medical (dental) care for my grandmother. The math was that simple. These were not life-threatening deficits, but certainly life-shaping.

Save for the effect of a single shell or bullet in the cold November of 1918, I believe John Daley would have helped as he could.

B.

Commonwealth War Graves Commission Link for John Daley:

http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=577383

Canadian Department of Veteran's Affairs Link for John Daley:

http://www.vac-acc.gc.ca/remembers/sub.cfm?source=collections/virtualmem/Detail&casualty=577383

Week of Remebrance Musing: War Plan Red and Defence Scheme No. 1

Its fair to say that we're able to think about war and remembrance primarily only at this time of year due to the fact that war isn't a part of most Canadians daily lives. That fact is due to our great relationship with the U.S. Note that I said great, not perfect.

What if that wasn't the case? Fortunately, we will likely never know. But, such scenarios have been imagined by writers and thinkers. In fact, the United States developed a plan for a theoretical invasion of Canada, as part of a larger campaign against Great Britain. Called "War Plan Red," it was only a planning exercise, but for about five years it was an approved military plan. Here it is in detail on Wikipedia: War Plan Red. Sadly, it centred on the U.S. seizing the Maritimes

What's more surprising is that it had a Canadian counterpart. Yes, we had a plan to invade the U.S. in the event of a planned American invasion of Canada. It was called "Defence Scheme No. 1" (click for more info). The best part is that it pre-dated formal American plans to invade us.

Happily, what might have been shall never be...

B.

Unwanted News

I received a call tonight about 10:30 from the grandmother of a boy whom I’d mentored for the better part of five years.    I had met him through a community agency (which is in no way connected to where I work now) and at their request basically hung out with him on weekends from 1993 until about 2000 (although I was out of province for two of those years).

 

I’m not sure I was the best of influences, but I wasn’t awful and he had a real lack of positive males in his life.  Things petered out in 1999-2000 (I forget when exactly) and he and his family moved west.  We didn’t really stay in touch, but I did here from his grandmother about 4 years ago to say that he was doing well and, I think, that she felt I’d been a good influence.

 

Tonight her message was more difficult to hear.  My little buddy died this past July.  Now over twenty, he died in an accident.  I’m being vague because I want respect his privacy even now, but he died in a boating accident doing something that thousands of people do everyday.

 

Wow…  I’d be a stretch to say that he was still a part of my life, but he was certainly part of my past.  He was a nice kid, whose life could have gone either way.  Apparently he was very well liked in the community and by his peers, was gainfully employed and still in meaningful relationships with those who cared about him.  He was going to succeed and have fun doing it.

 

So, I’m a little stunned right now.  The news was awful and felt like a blow to my head and soul at the same time.  There’s not much more I can say.  I may take tomorrow off to just do some thinking and remembering.

 

B.

Chinese air force commander calls for militarisation of space - dnaindia.com

Every once in a while, I'm reminded that I'm actually living in the future, errrr.. well the 21st Century at least. Here's a story that grabbed my attention"

Chinese air force commander calls for militarisation of space - dnaindia.com

Not awesome news, but with three nations now having human space programs, these issues will not go away. For all of the brutal craziness of the cold war, the treaty that banned space-based weapons programs made the Earth and its near space better places.

B.