A friend of mine's husband died today. He was 90 and had been ill for several years, and getting worse, so it was a blessing. He was an old miner, he'd lost an arm in a pit accident - he was a traditional trade unionist, a socialist of the kind one now feels are passing away. She once told me he was a womaniser - and he certainly had a bit of residual twinkle whenever I saw him.
They are the mysterious couple who stay together forever and she is about 85 I think - she really looked after him in the last years - hardly going out unless she could get one of their children to sit with him. I dare not ask if she'd always loved him when I talk to her - their marriage was certainly eventful... they had 4 children - or was it 6 - I've never met any of them, but I've heard so much about them, although I'd be hard put to say which was which.
It's quite symbolic, dying at midday on the day of the solar eclipse - new moon.
While he was dying I was chatting with the local rabbi - and a lovely woman who runs the Montefiore Society - but chiefly the rabbi about why Jews weren't bothered about the afterlife... he said, inter alia, that looking for the afterlife was a poor reason for living an ethical life. I think that's true - although I believe it's something. He also told me a great many interesting things - a generally unbelieveably fascinating conversation. He also told me some terrible stories about going on a tourist coach around Israel, where the bulk of the passengers were American Fundamentalists... at one point the guide - an Israeli - mentioned the apostle Jacob - then swiftly corrected himself to James - the American were ruminating on this, so the rabbi turned around and said "You know - Jacob is the hebrew name for James - that's why the followers of King James were called Jacobites".... blank looks, grumbling "Well, I've never heard anyone else say that before..." and general expressions of disbelief. "At that point we decided we weren't going to bother with trying to educate them"... there were other anecdotes that made one wonder whether these people were of normal intelligence.
Love - yes, I was going to say something about Love too. I was going to mention that in the last couple of days the pesky Love Object has been flittering into my brain again. I fear we will be seeing each other at one funeral or another within the next year. I really haven't thought about him at all sometimes for days - which is a relief. For some reason since seeing him in April (or was it May) I've not thought about him so much, perhaps because that meeting answered some of my questions about him - and I feel able to shelve him. I'd love to see him again of course, but I don't look forward to the events which will precipitate such a meeting.
They are the mysterious couple who stay together forever and she is about 85 I think - she really looked after him in the last years - hardly going out unless she could get one of their children to sit with him. I dare not ask if she'd always loved him when I talk to her - their marriage was certainly eventful... they had 4 children - or was it 6 - I've never met any of them, but I've heard so much about them, although I'd be hard put to say which was which.
It's quite symbolic, dying at midday on the day of the solar eclipse - new moon.
While he was dying I was chatting with the local rabbi - and a lovely woman who runs the Montefiore Society - but chiefly the rabbi about why Jews weren't bothered about the afterlife... he said, inter alia, that looking for the afterlife was a poor reason for living an ethical life. I think that's true - although I believe it's something. He also told me a great many interesting things - a generally unbelieveably fascinating conversation. He also told me some terrible stories about going on a tourist coach around Israel, where the bulk of the passengers were American Fundamentalists... at one point the guide - an Israeli - mentioned the apostle Jacob - then swiftly corrected himself to James - the American were ruminating on this, so the rabbi turned around and said "You know - Jacob is the hebrew name for James - that's why the followers of King James were called Jacobites".... blank looks, grumbling "Well, I've never heard anyone else say that before..." and general expressions of disbelief. "At that point we decided we weren't going to bother with trying to educate them"... there were other anecdotes that made one wonder whether these people were of normal intelligence.
Love - yes, I was going to say something about Love too. I was going to mention that in the last couple of days the pesky Love Object has been flittering into my brain again. I fear we will be seeing each other at one funeral or another within the next year. I really haven't thought about him at all sometimes for days - which is a relief. For some reason since seeing him in April (or was it May) I've not thought about him so much, perhaps because that meeting answered some of my questions about him - and I feel able to shelve him. I'd love to see him again of course, but I don't look forward to the events which will precipitate such a meeting.
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