Clara just got the
call that everyone expects to get one day, but for which no one is ever truly
prepared.
Her mother has been
taken ill.
An ambulance has been
called.
It is serious.
They cannot
resuscitate her.
She has passed away.
Clara rushes home.
In turn I receive text
messages then the call from Clara. I am meeting some senior clients but I can
barely speak to them.
"Sorry, my
mother-in-law has just died and I need to be with my wife.” I stutter the words and make my way
apologetically to the exit. The walk out of the building passes in a blur.
Normally the death of
a relative does not upset me too much, but this time I feel a surge of emotion
as I travel home on the tube. My first thoughts are of empathy with Clara. How
can I best support her through the turmoil that will follow over the coming
days?
But I also feel a
strong connection with the deceased woman with whom I never had much of a
relationship when she was alive. The invisible bond we shared because of
our incurable neurodegenerative diseases, has been abruptly severed. Although
her advanced Alzheimer’s was far worse than my Parkinson’s is ever likely to be,
I feel I have just lost a kindred spirit.
I briefly indulge in
egocentricity. In my mind’s eye I peer through a long narrow tunnel and catch a
fleeting glimpse of my own end – still distant, but for an instant sharply in
focus. An ambulance outside the house, family gathering, tears and shock, a
corpse that was once me. A lump of flesh that was only minutes earlier flesh-and-blood, embodying a lifetime of
human experience, creativity and accomplishment. A lifetime of laughter and
love, dreams and desires, hopes and happiness.
Life is made up of highs
and lows interspersed with many long stretches of mundanity. Just occasionally
it is punctuated by dramatic days like today.
My eyes are moistening
and I have a shell-shocked face as I sit on the tube. I look up and notice a heavily
pregnant woman observing my emotional response. I can sense her wondering what
has just happened. She will soon bring a new life into the world as I race home
to witness the aftermath of the end of a life.
Light and dark,
sickness and health, joy and despair, life and death.
All opposites. But
like two sides of the same coin, never far apart.
