farmdoc's blog post number 441

Today’s Sweetheart Vivienne’s father’s 91st birthday. Here are some of my thoughts on this day.

This is the first birthday Saul’s had since he lost his adored wife Lucy, so ending a fairytale marriage lasting 65 years, seven months and two days.

It’s a measure of the man that he’s spending his 91st birthday in New York during a world trip lasting several weeks. And he pushes his sister, with whom he is travelling, in a wheelchair. (She has a knee problem.)

He’s a bit smaller, slower and less focused now than he once was. But he’s nothing less than astounding for a man his age.

I first met him when he was 43-years-old. So I’ve known him for over half his life.

On Sweetheart Vivienne’s and my wedding day he was 49-years-old. That’s 13 years younger than I am now.

The Australian newspaper called Victor Smorgon, who died last Friday, the ‘elder statesman of Australia’s Jewish community’. That mantle’s now Saul’s. And rightfully so.

At 91, Saul continues to meet with prime ministers and ex prime ministers. And he continues to do voluntary charity work.

When one of his brothers turned 90, that brother joked he’d no longer buy green bananas. I’ll bet you anything that Saul still buys green bananas.

Saul’s done many, many wonderful things in his first 91 years. But easily the most wonderful one of all is producing Sweetheart Vivienne.

Happy birthday to you, my dear father-in-law.

farmdoc's blog post number 279

Wikipedia tells us that in Judaism, shiva (or shiv'ah,from the Hebrew שבעה meaning ‘seven’) is the week-long period of grief and mourning for the surviving first-degree relatives: father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, spouse. (Grandparents and grandchildren aren’t included.) As most regular activity’s interrupted, the shiva ritual is called ‘sitting shiva’. The shiva period lasts seven days. The first and last days are part days but count as whole days. Though shiva does not begin until after the funeral, the funeral day is considered a full day of shiva. On day seven, shiva ends in the morning following services. Shabat (i.e. today) is counted as one of the seven days. Therefore the shiva period for Lucy began last Sunday and it ends this morning. Since I returned home to Mole Creek from Melbourne last Monday, I’ve spoken by phone with Sweetheart Vivienne every day except Thursday (when I was away on a work trip). She’s described, I think, mixed feelings about her week of sitting shiva. I’d be surprised if it was otherwise, because most if not all things in life have their advantages and disadvantages. I hope, but currently don’t know, that the upside for her has outweighed the downside. Since last Monday I’ve longed – ached – to hug and comfort her in person. Now she’s stopped sitting shiva, I should get to do it soon.

farmdoc's blog post number 275

Thud. Thud. Thud. Those first shovel loads of soil hitting the coffin lid. All so definitely, horribly final. Until then, everything seems dream-like. Unreal. Then that thud. Every time I hear it, it gets me. Last Sunday it got me again. Because early last Saturday Lucy Same, Sweetheart Vivienne’s mother, my mother-in-law, died, bringing to an end 65 years, seven months and two days of marriage to her adored Saul. History is replete with famous partnerships – Woodfull and Ponsford, Rogers and Astaire, Abbott and Costello, Hewlett and Packard come readily to mind – but famous long-term marriages are thin on the ground. Or if not, I can’t think of many. My in-laws’ marriage, self-evidently long, was also famous. At Sunday’s funeral, an Australian Government Minister as good as said that the Labor Party wouldn’t be in government today if not for Lucy and Saul. Heady stuff to some. But not to them – two people bound not only in love, but also in belief. Models of integrity undistorted by vanity or self-interest. Their marriage was – is – a role model for anyone’s. Everyone’s. Sweetheart Vivienne’s and mine included. Yesterday ours reached 41 years and one month. I hope we’ll be blessed with many many more years together. But I don’t know that. No guarantees apply, sir. But I do know I treasure every moment I spend with her. If you’re not sure why, click here. Lucy lives on in Sweetheart Vivienne, and therefore in our darling children and grandchildren. If that’s not cause for celebration, I don’t know what is.

farmdoc's blog post number 240

I’m relieved I won’t be there. Not because I don’t want to be there. But because I couldn’t bear it. Today Lucy Same, my mother-in-law, turns 84 years old. And she doesn’t know it. She doesn’t know anymore what a birthday is. It’s a pity. A tragedy. It tears my heartstrings to see this formerly intelligent, articulate and interested woman reduced to this. By that horrid disease she has. I wouldn’t wish dementia on my worst enemy. I definitely wouldn’t. I used to have a fine mother-in-law. I know I’ve never been the type of husband she envisioned for her darling only daughter. But before she disappeared into her cognitive fog she always treated me decently and respectfully. Even lovingly. And she adored our darling children and grandchildren. I thank her for all that. I haven’t thanked her up to now. And today, when I want to, she can’t receive my thanks. When I visit her, I see her dozing, sitting, eating, drinking. Sometimes her face is expressive, sometimes blank. Sometime expressing appropriate emotion, mostly not. To wish her ‘Happy Birthday’ seems the ultimate banality. So what do I wish her today? I don’t know. Given her personal cataclysm, I suspect the most appropriate way of acknowledging her birthday is by remembering what she was like before. And quietly shedding a tear.