Marianne Talbot
Yesterday the home rang to say mum had fallen over. They found her on the floor. No harm done. After a hot drink she was fine. But it brought home the fact that one day I might get a more serious call.
That’s what happened with dad. Four of my friends were due for supper. Everything was ready, table laid, wine opened, then the phone rang. It was Richard. Dad had been taken into hospital after a choking fit. I should come straight away.
There is nothing worse than being 200 miles away and carless at such a time.
I rang rail enquiries, and amazingly there was a train in 45 minutes. Just time to fling a bag together and hare off to the station. One of my friends arrived as I was unchaining the bike. I left her, rather bewilderedly, in charge of a supper party, which apparently went well, though dampened by the reason for my disappearance.
On the train I tried to collect my thoughts. But they wouldn’t be collected. They skittered and slid from one irrelevance to another. Some things are too big to think about.
An hour into the journey my phone rang: dad had died.
For some reason that doesn’t make any sense now I think about it, I was given the news by a friend rather than by one of my family. This particular friend had lost his own father when he was 6. He was almost more distressed to give the news than I was to receive it.
The rest of the journey is something of a blur. I remember the conductor, face a picture of sympathy, coming to say that my sister had rung to say they’d be waiting at the station (maybe they didn’t have my phone number?). Then, clearly desperate to help, he brought me tea and a muffin. I felt I had to eat it. It was like sawdust.
Richard and Judy were at the station. On the way to the hospital I became panicky thinking I might be confronted with dad’s body before I was ready. It wasn’t a problem of course. I sat at the nurse’s station (yet more tea) until I was ready. Then I went in.
And funnily enough, it was OK.
Poor dad. All the juice had gone from him. He was so thin, so racked by emphysema, that his death was a blessing. Even mum couldn’t find it in her heart to want to call him back.
The week of the funeral was strange. So much, and yet nothing, to do. The funeral itself was comforting: the church was full and I felt we had done dad justice. He was a good man.