As the light fades on a November day, I am preparing to drive the short distance to Wenhaston, to see Serena in my slotted time. Thanks to Annette A, I am on the Whatsapp group formed to spread us out and to fit in with the family, who are now in situ full time. This is the process. Is Serena the first contemporary friend who is dying in this conscious time, ie not an unexpected sudden heart attack like Bob, and is this why this leaving process occupies my mind at it’s root, whatever I am doing to the fore. Or is it Serena who has touched me surprisingly, I am not a great or time long friend like many others here who have known her since 1970’s, but I feel a connection to her. She’ll not make it to a co-housing home, something she’s been searching all the 20 years I’ve known her and we shared this dream, she far more strongly than I; she almost made it to a project in Dorset and I’m so glad she’s not there now, and here in this Suffolk land, among her friends of many a year. Remember when I had my embolism last year, she came around with a cooked lasagna? Food has always been important. ‘Organic banana’s, Rachel’. she instructed me last week. ‘And those semi cooked lentils, the ones I can eat’. The cancer is in the stomach or there abouts.
Death has many guises these November days. MJ’s father was successfully euthanased, a new verb, on Monday. According to MJ, a remarkably peaceful process, but the path to it was complex and a struggle, the family divided, MJ the translator between her fathers wishes and the rest of the family. Meanwhile we in the UK have a potential new bill proposed to legalise assisted dying – despite stringent conditions and safeguards, it is appears unlikely to pass. Coercion is one of the main fears it seems.
Monica, the last of my mothers generation in Hull, died, aged 90+. Her funeral, on the 12 December, will be a gathering of my generation cousins, the current elders. Our turn next.
What rubbish nonsense do we talk about? Mind the gap, a mantra on the tube. In this case Birnam wood has come to Dunsinane, or rather Kaliwood to Serena, we concluded of the truck of woodland gifts, moss, a birch polypore. She drifts in and out of our conversations. I lift her, my hands on her back to support, and I’m shocked to feel the bone close to the surface of the skin. ‘Ah yes, a strong woman of course’ she says. Her belly is unnaturally huge.
Why did you move up here, I asked.
‘I wanted something different to John… but we had a good connection. He took me on trip to Iran, he in search of wine of course.
Ah Chateau Mousar I said, but then corrected, no that’s Lebanese.
And Serena departed to Morocco, with Roger, and we all found place names like Marakesh, and Agadir, and over the Atlas Mountains. A smile on her face.
Sophie forewarned me. I popped into see Vashti and Serena’s family to deliver a loaf Wakelyns bread, freshly baked. Go in and see her, said Vashti, she’s had a lot of visitors today, but just for a while’. Her face skin was blue white, and immediately I recalled the conversation with Sophie this morning, Sophie my cleaner, a carer, with lots of end of life experience. ‘Has the skin changed colour yet? she asked when I began telling her about Serena. No, I said then.
By Sunday I felt a noticable lessening of Serena consciousness as if she was leaving. Brian came by after visiting her. ‘Her eyes are mostly closed’ he said, she sounded peaceful.
I was in Lidl, checking for the lidl app, when I saw the message finally came though from Annette. Serena died this morning. I could not engage with Michael and his Gavi story. Pippa gave me a Laphroig whisky and we saluted Serena. Fitting I said as I thought she came from scottish ancestry. Amazing how little one knows of one’s friends. Unable to settle at anything I contacted Marion but went to see Virginia, and in her kitchen we pieced some jigsaw pieces of her life and personaility together. Like Keith Payne she fitted into so many different lives. Serena was the 3rd friend of Virginia to die in a week. Keith being the second. There would have been a time when I would have collected these stories, but now I just absorbed them, grateful for the company, the exploration, the need of companionship. Marion and Jenny joined us no doubt feeling the same, in need of Serena linked company.
After the town council meeting I read through our text message exchange, Serena’s so dancing and light. Mine so limiting and abrupt. Until the end that is, when I kept tempting her to the wood and cabin. Here she is the last time in the wood, fittingly for Samhain. I knew when I took this photograph it may become precious. Emily behind her close by to hold and care, Mell leaning into her, Serena beside the wise owl. Armoral and Rose-Ann and Gill, attentive to what she was saying, older than her, the original Elders. Jackie, sitting on a log, a carer for Serena for a short while, and now caring for Michael, also attentive to her words as she held the talking stick, a piece of wood wound with honeysuckle.
Kalikellett 