I received the unwelcome news recently that my remaining nephew (my sister's oldest son) had died suddenly - at the relatively young age of 41. I gather the cause was heart trouble, although I at least certainly wasn't aware that he had any sort of history of it. That said, we certainly weren't close: in fact I hadn't seen or heard from him since the day of my sister's funeral back in November 2011. Somewhat ironically, the only real contact I used to have with him was when I'd bump into him unexpectedly in the street occasionally - we were both at the time working in Stratford!
As far as I can make out, he hadn't really had much of an easy life. He dropped out of school under rather mysterious circumstances which I never really did get to the bottom of, although I had my suspicions. He had a failed marriage and then coping with my sister's ill-health in her final years must've taken its toll I would guess. But as far as I could see he always seemed chirpy enough underneath it all. My one enduring memory of him is of this poor little frozen kid on his moped, going round to our house to visit his grandparents!
It's had one rather unexpected knock-on side effect, though. I've now inherited the family photo albums, which belonged to my father, then to my sister and finally to nephew and which his father very kindly put on one side for me to go and collect, realizing their sentimental value. I'd previously borrowed a couple from my sister, back around the Christmas of 2009 I think it was, to scan in some of the old snaps of me (I haven't in fact got any of my own). So now, with around eight or ten albums, plus boxes of dozens if not hundreds of loose photos, many of which I don't recollect ever seeing before, I reckon it's going to take me the rest of my life to finish the task! Rather sadly in a way, I shan't then have anyone to leave them to - but then again I suppose I ought to take the pragmatic view that after my death it's really not going to matter much.
Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts
Thursday, 17 July 2014
Thursday, 11 July 2013
In memoriam
Today marks the 25th anniversary of my mother's death. It may seem a little morbid to want to write about it, but I guess that's as good a way as any of marking the occasion. It was a Monday morning: I'd gone off to work as usual, totally unaware of what was to come. For although I'd known she'd been ill over the weekend, I hadn't realized she was virtually on her deathbed. My boss was very understanding and sympathetic and in a bit of a daze I was soon on my way over to the house - the same house in Kenilworth where I'd grown up as a teenager. My father ushered me into the front room, which they'd converted into a bedroom to say my goodbyes.
It was the first time I'd ever seen a dead person. She seemed very peaceful and I half expected her to wake up suddenly and ask "You got here, then...What took you so long?" or something similar. I touched her gently almost as if try and to rouse her but realizing I couldn't (or shouldn't try), I whispered a few prayers and kissed her for the last time. I remember not really wanting to leave her, but my father was waiting just outside the door and the undertakers would soon be arriving.
The funeral, I soon found out, was booked for noon on the Friday. She'd had the foresight to write her will sometime previously, appointing my father and sister as executors, so they handled all the funeral arrangements as well as all the paperwork connected with the probate: each day the two of them went off to take care of everything, while it fell to my lot to make sure the house was clean and tidy in preparation. Not that it was dirty: my mother had always been extremely houseproud but in her final years her failing health had taken its toll as far as the chores were concerned. I shall never forget how I struggled constantly to hold back the tears: although I'd left home fifteen years previously, everything was still pretty much as I'd remembered it and I only had to touch an ornament or a piece of furniture, or look at the surroundings, for childhood memories of things we'd done together to come flooding back. At night, I slept in the same bedroom I'd had when I was seventeen, just after my sister had left home. It was quite surreal, and almost as if the whole of my adult life hadn't happened.
My sister had asked me to stay over and keep father company for the week, and I was wondering what the two of us were going to do in the evenings. But he seemed content to just sit and talk - or rather he talked and I listened, adding 'yes' and 'no' in what I hoped were the right places. He'd always been something of a story-teller: some of the stories I'd heard before, others were not so familiar, but a common thread was how vivid his memories were of things which had happened long before I was born. Occasionally he'd pause, or his voice would falter and his eyes seemed to mist over, as something would perhaps suddenly remind him of the present and of what had happened - but then he'd look up as if to say "Now where was I?" - and carry on from where he'd left off. Looking back on it now, I daresay he was just trying to get things straight in his mind, much I was doing too, although with considerably less success. It was on the Wednesday evening I think that he told me the story of how he and my mother had first met. It was the way he told it as much as anything that gave me an inkling of how much he was already starting to miss her.
Eventually Friday arrived - the day of the funeral. I remember my father going out to mow the back lawn while we were waiting for the hearse to arrive, which struck me as bizarre, but I guess it was just his way of taking his mind off things. Other than that, it all passed in something of a blur. A Church service followed by a cremation was apparently what my mother had said she wanted: even though I'd never known her ever go to Church, they'd got married in Church so maybe she thought it was 'never too late'? Back at the house, my father "entertained" those of our friends and relatives who'd come to the funeral whilst, not being one to socialize a lot at the best of times (and this was hardly one of them), I mostly busied myself in the kitchen looking after the supply of food, drink and clean plates.
I'm not sure whether it had been something my mother had asked for or not, but my father arranged for her ashes to be interred in Kenilworth Cemetery - in a double plot which would also accommodate his when his time came. This couldn't be completed until the following Monday, so I spent an unspeakably awful weekend with an eerie sense of 'unfinished business' hanging over me. The interment ceremony was for just the close family: the vicar did the customary prayers and as I threw a handful of soil down onto the small wooden box containing the ashes, I was struck by an inconsolable sense of loss.
My mother was gone: the thing I'd feared most in my childhood - the stuff of which periodic nightmares had been made - had finally happened, and nothing was ever going to be the same again. It was the first time I'd lost a close relative, and my mother had always been the one in the family I was closest to. I still find it difficult to put into words how guilty I felt, all the "if only"s - and how I'd never in my wildest imagination anticipated the emotional turmoil I would go through in the weeks and months that would follow. I knelt by her grave each week and prayed for forgiveness. Eventually of course over the passage of time it's gradually healed just as everyone says it does. I don't visit the grave regularly any more, and haven't done for many years, basically because I suppose haven't felt the need to.
But I still miss her and the same mixed emotions which have prompted me to write this long and probably rather rambling entry will, I sense, result in my re-visiting her final resting place once again.
It was the first time I'd ever seen a dead person. She seemed very peaceful and I half expected her to wake up suddenly and ask "You got here, then...What took you so long?" or something similar. I touched her gently almost as if try and to rouse her but realizing I couldn't (or shouldn't try), I whispered a few prayers and kissed her for the last time. I remember not really wanting to leave her, but my father was waiting just outside the door and the undertakers would soon be arriving.
The funeral, I soon found out, was booked for noon on the Friday. She'd had the foresight to write her will sometime previously, appointing my father and sister as executors, so they handled all the funeral arrangements as well as all the paperwork connected with the probate: each day the two of them went off to take care of everything, while it fell to my lot to make sure the house was clean and tidy in preparation. Not that it was dirty: my mother had always been extremely houseproud but in her final years her failing health had taken its toll as far as the chores were concerned. I shall never forget how I struggled constantly to hold back the tears: although I'd left home fifteen years previously, everything was still pretty much as I'd remembered it and I only had to touch an ornament or a piece of furniture, or look at the surroundings, for childhood memories of things we'd done together to come flooding back. At night, I slept in the same bedroom I'd had when I was seventeen, just after my sister had left home. It was quite surreal, and almost as if the whole of my adult life hadn't happened.
My sister had asked me to stay over and keep father company for the week, and I was wondering what the two of us were going to do in the evenings. But he seemed content to just sit and talk - or rather he talked and I listened, adding 'yes' and 'no' in what I hoped were the right places. He'd always been something of a story-teller: some of the stories I'd heard before, others were not so familiar, but a common thread was how vivid his memories were of things which had happened long before I was born. Occasionally he'd pause, or his voice would falter and his eyes seemed to mist over, as something would perhaps suddenly remind him of the present and of what had happened - but then he'd look up as if to say "Now where was I?" - and carry on from where he'd left off. Looking back on it now, I daresay he was just trying to get things straight in his mind, much I was doing too, although with considerably less success. It was on the Wednesday evening I think that he told me the story of how he and my mother had first met. It was the way he told it as much as anything that gave me an inkling of how much he was already starting to miss her.
Eventually Friday arrived - the day of the funeral. I remember my father going out to mow the back lawn while we were waiting for the hearse to arrive, which struck me as bizarre, but I guess it was just his way of taking his mind off things. Other than that, it all passed in something of a blur. A Church service followed by a cremation was apparently what my mother had said she wanted: even though I'd never known her ever go to Church, they'd got married in Church so maybe she thought it was 'never too late'? Back at the house, my father "entertained" those of our friends and relatives who'd come to the funeral whilst, not being one to socialize a lot at the best of times (and this was hardly one of them), I mostly busied myself in the kitchen looking after the supply of food, drink and clean plates.
I'm not sure whether it had been something my mother had asked for or not, but my father arranged for her ashes to be interred in Kenilworth Cemetery - in a double plot which would also accommodate his when his time came. This couldn't be completed until the following Monday, so I spent an unspeakably awful weekend with an eerie sense of 'unfinished business' hanging over me. The interment ceremony was for just the close family: the vicar did the customary prayers and as I threw a handful of soil down onto the small wooden box containing the ashes, I was struck by an inconsolable sense of loss.
My mother was gone: the thing I'd feared most in my childhood - the stuff of which periodic nightmares had been made - had finally happened, and nothing was ever going to be the same again. It was the first time I'd lost a close relative, and my mother had always been the one in the family I was closest to. I still find it difficult to put into words how guilty I felt, all the "if only"s - and how I'd never in my wildest imagination anticipated the emotional turmoil I would go through in the weeks and months that would follow. I knelt by her grave each week and prayed for forgiveness. Eventually of course over the passage of time it's gradually healed just as everyone says it does. I don't visit the grave regularly any more, and haven't done for many years, basically because I suppose haven't felt the need to.
But I still miss her and the same mixed emotions which have prompted me to write this long and probably rather rambling entry will, I sense, result in my re-visiting her final resting place once again.
Sunday, 1 January 2012
Pause for reflection
Time to make New Years' Resolutions? Probably so. I haven't done any as such, because like most people I don't end up keeping them, but as I think one should at least make some sort of effort, I have made some tentative plans. How they match up to the reality I'll maybe record on here as we go along. I've got off to a good start with an entry for the first day of the year, at any rate.
And so how was 2011? It's going to stick in my mind forever of course as the year my sister died, but then I didn't have any control over that. Of the things I did have a measure of control over, they went OK: not spectacularly well, but I avoided any major disasters. I learned a bit more Italian, reminisced a little bit, and wrote a little bit. I can't in all honesty say I achieved all that much, but then who can? I can't pinpoint anything I did in 2011 that I've really since regretted, so I guess that's something of an achievement in itself.
As for 2012, I vouch for one thing only. That this blog will be an Olympics-free zone!!
And so how was 2011? It's going to stick in my mind forever of course as the year my sister died, but then I didn't have any control over that. Of the things I did have a measure of control over, they went OK: not spectacularly well, but I avoided any major disasters. I learned a bit more Italian, reminisced a little bit, and wrote a little bit. I can't in all honesty say I achieved all that much, but then who can? I can't pinpoint anything I did in 2011 that I've really since regretted, so I guess that's something of an achievement in itself.
As for 2012, I vouch for one thing only. That this blog will be an Olympics-free zone!!
Saturday, 26 November 2011
Last farewell
My sister's funeral was on Thursday. Being November it was - unsurprisingly - dull and cold, but then surely funerals are meant to be something of a grey overcast occasion anyway? Maybe.
There looked to be quite a lot of people there, especially as Leamington Parish Church is enormous - more the size of a cathedral. The priest who read the eulogy had been friends with my sister for a number of years, and had in fact phoned me the previous week for some background information on what it had been like growing up together. In fact although I'd quite readily and naturally assumed the role of the brat little brother plaguing his big sister at every opportunity, as adults we got on well together and I don't recollect that we ever fell out with each other. Listening to it, the eulogy I thought captured my sister's character very well, unlike some I've heard where I've sat there wondering if they were talking about the same person! It did strike me though that I hadn't realized the full extent of my sister's ill health, perhaps understandably as it wasn't something she'd ever really confided in me.
There followed a burial at Warwick cemetery, alongside the grave of her youngest son who died somewhat tragically five years ago. That's a little unusual these days, I think: most people are cremated, not least because of the number of graveyards that are actually full. I shed a few tears as I listened to the priest reciting the "ashes to ashes, dust to dust" prayer and I was struck by the finality of it all, throwing a handful of earth down onto the coffin.
A couple of our cousins made the trip up to the funeral, acting as a poignant reminder of how my sister had always tended to carry on our mother's tradition of keeping in touch with "the family" - though in all honesty I'm not sure she'd had that much actual contact, or at least not until fairly recently. We said goodbye at the end, promising that must stay in touch *as you do* though how the reality of that will turn out remains to be seen.
Once the grave is finished with the headstone in place, I shall perhaps go and visit it. I used to visit the cemetery at Kenilworth, where my parents' ashes are interred, quite regularly at first but over the course of the last twenty-odd years got out of the habit, basically because I suppose I ceased to feel the need to. I guess it's something that's a very personal decision: to my knowledge my sister never went there, but I shall probably go again now if only to try in a strange way to come to terms in my mind with the impact of what's happened.
There looked to be quite a lot of people there, especially as Leamington Parish Church is enormous - more the size of a cathedral. The priest who read the eulogy had been friends with my sister for a number of years, and had in fact phoned me the previous week for some background information on what it had been like growing up together. In fact although I'd quite readily and naturally assumed the role of the brat little brother plaguing his big sister at every opportunity, as adults we got on well together and I don't recollect that we ever fell out with each other. Listening to it, the eulogy I thought captured my sister's character very well, unlike some I've heard where I've sat there wondering if they were talking about the same person! It did strike me though that I hadn't realized the full extent of my sister's ill health, perhaps understandably as it wasn't something she'd ever really confided in me.
There followed a burial at Warwick cemetery, alongside the grave of her youngest son who died somewhat tragically five years ago. That's a little unusual these days, I think: most people are cremated, not least because of the number of graveyards that are actually full. I shed a few tears as I listened to the priest reciting the "ashes to ashes, dust to dust" prayer and I was struck by the finality of it all, throwing a handful of earth down onto the coffin.
A couple of our cousins made the trip up to the funeral, acting as a poignant reminder of how my sister had always tended to carry on our mother's tradition of keeping in touch with "the family" - though in all honesty I'm not sure she'd had that much actual contact, or at least not until fairly recently. We said goodbye at the end, promising that must stay in touch *as you do* though how the reality of that will turn out remains to be seen.
Once the grave is finished with the headstone in place, I shall perhaps go and visit it. I used to visit the cemetery at Kenilworth, where my parents' ashes are interred, quite regularly at first but over the course of the last twenty-odd years got out of the habit, basically because I suppose I ceased to feel the need to. I guess it's something that's a very personal decision: to my knowledge my sister never went there, but I shall probably go again now if only to try in a strange way to come to terms in my mind with the impact of what's happened.
Tuesday, 8 November 2011
Last of the line
The news I'd been half-expecting all last week came this morning: my sister died during the night. She passed away very peacefully, which I'll always be grateful for, and considering the quality of life which would otherwise have laid ahead for her, it was probably for the best. My nephew faces the sad task of making the necessary arrangements, but I'm helping him out a bit by getting in touch with our cousins to pass on the news - or trying to.
Over the years, of course, our "extended family" has inevitably dwindled. When I think back to all those boyhood Christmases with rows of cards from aunts and uncles including their respective offspring - and to the occasional big get-together - it rather brings it home to me that I'm one of a decreasing number of survivors. The aunts and uncles slowly became fewer (albeit living till their nineties in a couple of cases) and while I have a couple of cousins' phone numbers, others I'd long ago lost touch with and don't recollect whether my sister had any recent contact or not although she did tell me a while back she was embarking on doing a family tree!
Of our own immediate family, it now just leaves me - my mother and father having died some twenty years ago. I remember having distinct nightmares as quite a small boy that my mother would die suddenly and I'd be left all alone in the world! Silly when you look back on it, and I suppose like all toddlers I really thought the end of the world had come if I suddenly found I'd lost sight of my mum in a shop or somewhere. When in 1988 it happened for real, it did somewhat to my surprise take me quite a while to get over her death but I daresay the passage of years brings with it the realization that human lifespan is a finite quantity and I'm maybe a bit more philosophical about it all now.
So if I look behind me now there's no longer anyone there holding me, but somehow I sense their spirit is still very much alive - and I guess always will be.
Over the years, of course, our "extended family" has inevitably dwindled. When I think back to all those boyhood Christmases with rows of cards from aunts and uncles including their respective offspring - and to the occasional big get-together - it rather brings it home to me that I'm one of a decreasing number of survivors. The aunts and uncles slowly became fewer (albeit living till their nineties in a couple of cases) and while I have a couple of cousins' phone numbers, others I'd long ago lost touch with and don't recollect whether my sister had any recent contact or not although she did tell me a while back she was embarking on doing a family tree!
Of our own immediate family, it now just leaves me - my mother and father having died some twenty years ago. I remember having distinct nightmares as quite a small boy that my mother would die suddenly and I'd be left all alone in the world! Silly when you look back on it, and I suppose like all toddlers I really thought the end of the world had come if I suddenly found I'd lost sight of my mum in a shop or somewhere. When in 1988 it happened for real, it did somewhat to my surprise take me quite a while to get over her death but I daresay the passage of years brings with it the realization that human lifespan is a finite quantity and I'm maybe a bit more philosophical about it all now.
So if I look behind me now there's no longer anyone there holding me, but somehow I sense their spirit is still very much alive - and I guess always will be.
Tuesday, 1 November 2011
Three score years and ten
In the couple of weeks since I wrote about how I'd learned of my sister's stroke, I wondered how she was progressing, rather optimistically hoping that no news was good news. I did become increasingly conscious of an urge to go and visit her - not the easiest of journeys to do from where we live by public transport, although by no means out of the question. Spurred on by an almost supernatural feeling of my late mother telling me to get off my backside and get over there (and it was Hallowe'en yesterday, after all!) - and a more rational tip-off from a friend of a friend who'd seen her recently, I made the trip over to Warwick hospital yesterday afternoon.
Thinking back, it must be almost two years since I'd last seen my sister in person. The extent to which she'd aged made it seem more like twenty. The stroke has evidently done an awful lot of damage. That, coupled with her deteriorating health generally, and the frail figure looking up at me from the hospital bed I'd have guessed, had I not known, might have been in her nineties. She recognized me and knew who I was: some of the time, as I told her about some of the things that had happened, she responded briefly but almost normally - but there were quite long periods when she seemed to retreat into a world of her own, occasionally saying something which probably made sense to her but didn't seem to relate to anything - almost as if her brain was missing a cog or two and kept slipping out of gear.
She's being really well looked after: the staff all seemed very kind and sympathetic, and she's been getting visitors. But I learned from my nephew who as luck would have it happened to pop by and have a talk with her consultant, that short of a miracle there isn't going to be anything much they can do for her - she's on borrowed time.
I still have the mixed emotions I wrote about a fortnight ago, perhaps felt even more acutely now. I'm glad I went, especially as it may turn out to have been the last time I shall have seen her. Exactly at what point nature will take its course I've no way of telling: seventy isn't a particularly advanced age by modern life expectancy standards, of course. But it seems likely she may just pass away peacefully in her sleep which I guess isn't a bad way to go.
Thinking back, it must be almost two years since I'd last seen my sister in person. The extent to which she'd aged made it seem more like twenty. The stroke has evidently done an awful lot of damage. That, coupled with her deteriorating health generally, and the frail figure looking up at me from the hospital bed I'd have guessed, had I not known, might have been in her nineties. She recognized me and knew who I was: some of the time, as I told her about some of the things that had happened, she responded briefly but almost normally - but there were quite long periods when she seemed to retreat into a world of her own, occasionally saying something which probably made sense to her but didn't seem to relate to anything - almost as if her brain was missing a cog or two and kept slipping out of gear.
She's being really well looked after: the staff all seemed very kind and sympathetic, and she's been getting visitors. But I learned from my nephew who as luck would have it happened to pop by and have a talk with her consultant, that short of a miracle there isn't going to be anything much they can do for her - she's on borrowed time.
I still have the mixed emotions I wrote about a fortnight ago, perhaps felt even more acutely now. I'm glad I went, especially as it may turn out to have been the last time I shall have seen her. Exactly at what point nature will take its course I've no way of telling: seventy isn't a particularly advanced age by modern life expectancy standards, of course. But it seems likely she may just pass away peacefully in her sleep which I guess isn't a bad way to go.
Saturday, 15 October 2011
If we knew then what we know now.....
I received the rather disturbing news earlier in the week that my sister had suffered a stroke. My nephew - her eldest son - rang up: she'd been in hospital a couple of weeks, having been admitted with a urine infection. I suppose in a way, if you're going to have a stroke then a hospital is one of the most convenient places to have it, but understandably he didn't really see it like that and was more than a bit miffed that they'd only just told him.
The prognosis is not good. It's apparently affected her left side and she's currently unable to get out of bed, but it's also affected her speech as well as making her a somewhat confused and disorientated. He's of the opinion she'll have to go into a nursing home, and while I know that the hospital staff and therapists will do their best to salvage what they can from the damage the stroke's done, her health was so poor to start off with, that they're going to have their work cut out. She was already set up and about to move into a place at a sheltered housing complex before this happened.
Perhaps irrationally, I feel more than just a bit guilty. We weren't particularly close as kids, and with her being seven years older than me I did more than my fair share of being the brat little brother of my big sister! We weren't really alike temperamentally, either: she was rather given to moods - bouts of the sulks, the silences and the tears - and in that respect took after my father, whereas I inherited my mother's "what you see is what you get", with the occasional blazing row all forgotten about twenty minutes later.
An unhappy marriage and eventual divorce took its toll emotionally I suspect and in the couple of decades since our parents died, her asthma (always worse than mine) deteriorated and she started to suffer falls and resulting loss of mobility - as well as a bowel condition which needs operating on, but with a general anaesthetic making it too risky to do. What with our mother's bad chest and chronic bronchitis, and father's (mild) stroke and eventual fatal heart attack, she seems to have inherited all the family ills.
So... why do I feel guilty? Our childhoods were different: I wasn't packed off to boarding school, although I did as a teenager grow to resent having been shunted around the world from pillar to post, unable to form any lasting friendships. I'm certainly not proud of the immature way I joined in my parents' constant derision of my sister's choice of boyfriends and I guess that over the years I could've seen a lot more of her: we don't live that far away and a phone call - even a long one - isn't altogether the same as contact in person. But... what's done is done.
As far as the rest of it goes, I count my blessings. As an adult, you choose your partner(s) and your lifestyle and I've been lucky on both counts. I know I'm fortunate in enjoying relatively good health, although the reasons for it are a lot more obscure - diet, underlying enotional state, inherited characteristics.... who knows? I don't have the capacity to care for my sister in her old age. Part of me wants to - psychologically - a sort of weird role-reversal of when she looked out for me as a kid, I suppose. However, I'm just going to let bygones be bygones, offer help where it's needed and accept that there are things that I can't change, much as I might want to. The Fates spin out the metaphorical thread of life for us and we just have to accept the knots and tangles until one day it's eventually cut.
The prognosis is not good. It's apparently affected her left side and she's currently unable to get out of bed, but it's also affected her speech as well as making her a somewhat confused and disorientated. He's of the opinion she'll have to go into a nursing home, and while I know that the hospital staff and therapists will do their best to salvage what they can from the damage the stroke's done, her health was so poor to start off with, that they're going to have their work cut out. She was already set up and about to move into a place at a sheltered housing complex before this happened.
Perhaps irrationally, I feel more than just a bit guilty. We weren't particularly close as kids, and with her being seven years older than me I did more than my fair share of being the brat little brother of my big sister! We weren't really alike temperamentally, either: she was rather given to moods - bouts of the sulks, the silences and the tears - and in that respect took after my father, whereas I inherited my mother's "what you see is what you get", with the occasional blazing row all forgotten about twenty minutes later.
An unhappy marriage and eventual divorce took its toll emotionally I suspect and in the couple of decades since our parents died, her asthma (always worse than mine) deteriorated and she started to suffer falls and resulting loss of mobility - as well as a bowel condition which needs operating on, but with a general anaesthetic making it too risky to do. What with our mother's bad chest and chronic bronchitis, and father's (mild) stroke and eventual fatal heart attack, she seems to have inherited all the family ills.
So... why do I feel guilty? Our childhoods were different: I wasn't packed off to boarding school, although I did as a teenager grow to resent having been shunted around the world from pillar to post, unable to form any lasting friendships. I'm certainly not proud of the immature way I joined in my parents' constant derision of my sister's choice of boyfriends and I guess that over the years I could've seen a lot more of her: we don't live that far away and a phone call - even a long one - isn't altogether the same as contact in person. But... what's done is done.
Wednesday, 6 October 2010
Battle of the sexes
A new survey claims today that mothers are "more critical of their daughters than their sons and let boys get away with more". I can only comment from the perspective of having been on the receiving end of this scenario, and in my case I'd say it's rubbish - from what I remember, my mother treated my sister and me pretty much equally from the point of view of getting away with anything, and I certainly don't remember her being unduly critical of my sister.
Having said that, I'd be the first to admit I was a "mum's boy". My mother and I were very much alike temperamentally: I was always given to a 'what you see is what you get' personality, whereas my sister was given more to quiet brooding and occasional sulking and in that respect took after my father. The other thing that needs to be said is that she's seven years older than me, and she doubtless compared the treatment and discipline meted out to me compared to a perhaps stricter standard which had prevailed seven years earlier. Whereas I in turn got packed off to bed earlier, and got less pocket money... always accompanied by a 'when you're her age' line of reasoning.
I did better at school than she did, putting the lie to the modern educational view which regards boys as "under-achievers" compared to girls, and got rewarded for my efforts, but neither of us got spoiled. Looking back on it all, I think it's true to say that in some ways we were treated differently, but that was as much to do with us as individuals, and how and where we grew up, than either of us being favoured over the other.
Having said that, I'd be the first to admit I was a "mum's boy". My mother and I were very much alike temperamentally: I was always given to a 'what you see is what you get' personality, whereas my sister was given more to quiet brooding and occasional sulking and in that respect took after my father. The other thing that needs to be said is that she's seven years older than me, and she doubtless compared the treatment and discipline meted out to me compared to a perhaps stricter standard which had prevailed seven years earlier. Whereas I in turn got packed off to bed earlier, and got less pocket money... always accompanied by a 'when you're her age' line of reasoning.
I did better at school than she did, putting the lie to the modern educational view which regards boys as "under-achievers" compared to girls, and got rewarded for my efforts, but neither of us got spoiled. Looking back on it all, I think it's true to say that in some ways we were treated differently, but that was as much to do with us as individuals, and how and where we grew up, than either of us being favoured over the other.
Tuesday, 30 March 2010
All in the family
The phone rang last night. It was my sister. I'd been meaning to give her a ring: although we weren't particularly close as kids - it was mostly the normal brother-vs-older-sister thing - over the last few years we have tended to keep in touch with each other more regularly. Our parents both died some years ago, and gradually most of the aunts and uncles have passed away, leaving a shrinking "extended family" which I guess perhaps makes you value what's left more than you used to. We had quite a good long natter, anyway, exchanging reminiscences of when we were both growing up as kids.
Which is odd in a way, because her childhood was quite different to mine. We're not very alike temperamentally to start off with: I take after my mother and inherited a lot of her "call a spade a bloody shovel" approach with a natural tendency to speak my mind and forget any upset ten minutes afterwards. She on the other hand was more like my father with his habit of deep brooding and sulking - you could never really tell what eiher of them was thinking a lot of the time. And whereas I got to move round with my parents wherever my father's postings took us, my sister, being that much older, got packed off to boarding school which she hated. I don't doubt my parents felt they were doing the right thing by us both at the time, and certainly in the initial chaos of post-war Europe, there simply weren't the facilities to cater for servicemens' families abroad anyway.
She remembers a lot more of Hong Kong than I do: she flew out to join us for our final year having finished her O levels, whereas I was then still only nine and while I have assorted mental visualizations which are reinforced quite easily by seeing old photos, my memories of events and of our life out there are really very hazy and I suspect not very accurate. She's embarked on writing an account of it, which I'm very much looking forward to reading if only to see how much more of my time out there will come flooding back to me.
Which is odd in a way, because her childhood was quite different to mine. We're not very alike temperamentally to start off with: I take after my mother and inherited a lot of her "call a spade a bloody shovel" approach with a natural tendency to speak my mind and forget any upset ten minutes afterwards. She on the other hand was more like my father with his habit of deep brooding and sulking - you could never really tell what eiher of them was thinking a lot of the time. And whereas I got to move round with my parents wherever my father's postings took us, my sister, being that much older, got packed off to boarding school which she hated. I don't doubt my parents felt they were doing the right thing by us both at the time, and certainly in the initial chaos of post-war Europe, there simply weren't the facilities to cater for servicemens' families abroad anyway.
She remembers a lot more of Hong Kong than I do: she flew out to join us for our final year having finished her O levels, whereas I was then still only nine and while I have assorted mental visualizations which are reinforced quite easily by seeing old photos, my memories of events and of our life out there are really very hazy and I suspect not very accurate. She's embarked on writing an account of it, which I'm very much looking forward to reading if only to see how much more of my time out there will come flooding back to me.
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