The Passing
The ladies at the retirement village must have really liked Aunty Judy. They have made extra cakes for the hour of refreshments after her memorial service. This is good news because Mum and I enjoyed a special baked treat of our own before we made the short drive to the service. Since the legalisation of marijuana and after a steady education campaign Mum now embraces the benefits in chronic pain relief brought about by dope. Mind you Mum was a free spirit in the 60s and 70s so it isn’t a completely novel experience for her if you know what I mean. I have seen some photos that I can’t forget no matter how hard I try.
Mum and I arrive late for the service. The information about the baked goods is whispered to us as we sit down four or five rows back by one of my cousins, the one who in the old days was described as a bit precious. I don’t remember her name but Mum calls her Ruth, which I know is not her name by the way my cousin’s face twitches every time Mum says it. There is a fair amount of twitching as Mum says Ruth five or six times in their whispered conversation that only stops when the last church organ power chord fades away and the priest steps up to speak.
The priest’s softly pronounced “Ladies and Gentlemen” brings a whine of feedback from the speakers mounted in the room’s corners. The ceremony is the usual, a bit of an introduction from the priest who clearly doesn’t know Aunty Judy from Lady Gaga but he has been briefed well enough so he hits the highlights before he rattles off a psalm or two. I can’t help noticing that the cuffs of his pants puddle around his shoes like a stiff batter, but his shirtsleeves have disappeared, retreated into the arms of his jacket coat like frightened white rabbits.
I look around and notice that while some of the really old attendees are crying there are more dry eyes than wet ones. Everyone is sneaking peeks around the room calculating the odds of who is going to be next. We cousins surreptitiously look each other up and down, secretly marvelling or gloating at the partner choices, quality of offspring and career trajectories.
Some of my cousins, Judy’s offspring mostly, get up and tell some stories and anecdotes about Aunt Judy’s generosity and affection. They speak of her love for family get togethers and I am reminded of the time when at a family Christmas gathering, I saw Aunt Judy projectile vomit a wide variety of alcoholic beverages over her back fence. I find myself halfway out of my chair suddenly filled with an immense desire to share this insight with my loving relatives. Before I can get anywhere though somebody in the chair beside me grabs my arm and gently but firmly pulls me down. I turn to face cousin Penny, my favourite cousin on Dad’s side of the family. She is smiling but her whisper is firm, “Are you insane. I don’t care what you were going to say, you’re not getting… She looks at my face, “Wait, are you fucking high?”
I smile but before I can reply Mum nudges me in the ribs and we all turn and face the front.
The best bit is up next. A rather well executed photomontage flashes up on a big screen. Someone has put in a lot of work arranging the images to build and then fade and synchronise with the music. There are gentle gasps, sobs and occasional outbursts of soft laughter as various shared memories wash over us. It is soothing and hypnotising especially since the song they have used is Petula Clark’s version of The Windmills Of Your Mind.” Mum sits frozen in memories. Cousin Penny groans under her breath that a day off work is not compensation enough for those 80s haircuts. I gasp as a family picnic photo from forty years ago comes into focus. It shows a pack of us in a park, a lake in the distance.
I remember a clandestine Truth or Dare game on the afternoon of the photograph. My cousin Maree was sprung with her hands down my shorts. I lean across the aisle to where Maree is sitting with her husband and daughters to ask if she remembers. I catch Maree’s eye but she quickly turns away. Her husband, name Craig from memory, does not seem happy to see me either so I decide this might not be the best time.
Then there is a photo of Aunt Judy dancing in a garish Kaftan made of material both highly inflammable and cheap. She has a plastic tumbler of wine in her hand, and I close my eyes and I can see her swaying and singing The Windmills Of your Mind. Her signature move was to windmill her arms around when the song reached the line about the windmills of your mind. Naturally any wine in the tumbler would shower over those who had come too close. My cousins and I worked out that with careful body placement a mouthful of warm vino was on offer. There are photos of four or five of us mouths wide open like baby birds begging for worms, jostling like girls trying to catch a bride’s bouquet. I am sure there are photos buy they don’t come up on the screen.
Eventually, after some more official stuff that I zone out to, Aunt Judy’s coffin slides behind the curtains and those who can still hear low registers detect the gentle whoof of the igniting gas despite the trumpet frenzy of Herb Albert’s Tijuana Taxi, Judy’s second favourite record. It is time for refreshments. I resist the urge to samba down the aisle and escort a teary Mum to the hall where circulating ceiling fans, urns of boiling water, tea bags and instant coffee await.
Judy was dad’s sister and although Mum thought she was the best of dad’s eight siblings the tears surprise. Is she crying for Judy or herself? Her time is approaching; all her friends are dead so it is just family now and most of them by marriage not blood. I tell myself this line of thought is a bit deep and look to the food table.
The table of baked goods is impressive and Mum, Cousin Penny and I all agree that the spread is superior to Uncle Kent’s funeral last year. Mum wanders off to speak to a man in a wheelchair. He is wearing a white Stetson as big as a family size pizza. I have no idea who he is and I am concerned that in her state Mum might say something inappropriate but Penny, mouth full of crumbly scone indicates her approval of the quality with a thumbs up and after my own bite of a scone with jam and cream I forget about Mum.
Penny has spent her life working in advertising and has never married thereby accumulating both a minor substance abuse problem and a major retirement nest egg. We only catch up at these events but I feel a strong kinship with her. We have many of the same interests. Fortunately she has brought a hipflask of scotch that we put to good use and while we agree that the pastries are better today Uncle Kent’s funeral provided the better entertainment.
During the eulogy that day, delivered dry eyed but with mounting nerves my cousin Frank insisted on talking about Kent’s Curries. Unfortunately on more than one occasion he swapped the e and the u around between the two words. Seriously I thought I was going to die laughing and I was straight. Thinking about it I snort crumbs and Penny has to pound my back.
Penny excuses herself to visit the toilet so I have another cup of tea and agree with Aunty Pauline that the pikelets are very good. I work the room, answering old people’s questions. My answers are often repeated while looking into elderly ears and speaking loudly. This becomes strangely fascinating so I can report that some ears are cleaner than others but there seems to be no significant bias between the sexes. I keep trying to work my way over to where Maree is sitting with her family but cousin Roy latches on to me. Roy tells me more than once, how he has come all the way from Mount Isa for the funeral of his favourite aunt. He is wearing a Slayer T-shirt and I wonder whether Judy was a late convert to death metal. Maybe he wears it as a tribute but I can’t help that feel the skull imagery is no appropriate. I zone out a little to his ramblings and when I come back there is a strange whooing sound in the room. The murmur of conversation subsides.
“Woo-Woo,” someone yells again. At first it is a man’s voice but then a women’s echoes the train noise.
I turn around. It is the man in the wheelchair and my mother.
My mother has taken control of his wheelchair and is pushing it around the room. The man has taken the off his Stetson and is waving it in the air while making what I guess to be train whistle noises. Then he yells “Woo-Woo,” Mum answers with a shrill “Toot-Toot” of her own. They do a whole lap of the room. In between their sound effects they roar with laughter. Everybody else in the room is silent. I debate with myself whether I can just drive off and leave Mum there but I realise that would not be the actions of a good son and heir.
I look for Penny to offer me guidance, but she is doubled up laughing while attempting to video the scene with her phone. My high is causing indecision and I really don’t know what to do so in the end I do nothing. Which turns out ok because on lap three Mum runs out of puff and leaves her position behind the wheelchair to flop on a plastic chair beside the coffee urn. She seems ok but I rush to her with a glass of water and her handbag from the coat and bag table.
I think we may have to leave in a hurry so I grab two more of the excellent scones and drop them into Mum’s handbag.
Meanwhile with Mum’s last shove but without her guiding hands Stetson Man’s wheelchair careers through the doorway into the hall’s kitchen, his Stetson is still waving but his woo woos are less exuberant and now unanswered.
The silence is deafening. Mum sips her water. Dad’s oldest surviving sister, Aunt Raelene looks daggers at her and begins a slow shuffle across the room on her walking frame. They have never been close, not since the day when Mum said Raelene’s cake was so dry you could dip it in your tea and still need to be a cow to chew it.
Aunt Raelene never forgave her although I am not sure why, everybody knows she is an awful cook. Dearly departed Uncle Kent often said, “She must have learnt in the Army, Napoleon’s army!” before pissing himself laughing and spilling his pot of beer in the process. It was probably funny the first time.
Penny saves the day. Striding forward she grabs me and says, “Might be time to piss off while I distract the mob.”
“Yeah. Sure and thanks but do you know who the wheelchair guy is?”
“No bloody idea. No one else seems to either because he is still making his own way back from the kitchen. Why don’t you ask your Mum?”
Penny cuts off Auntie Raelene just as Mum starts to become aware that danger is approaching. Her spider senses must have been tingling. I suggest now might be a good time to say our goodbyes. Fortunately the big morning is starting to catch up with her and she agrees. With as much dignity and up yours as possible we make our way out of the hall and to the car. She buckles up with her arthritic slowness.
“Mum, who the hell is the guy in the wheelchair?”
“You don’t know?” she replies.
“I don’t know, nobody knows. I think you were the only person who talked to him although I did see a few nods from people here and there.”
“He was Aunty Judy’s first husband.” Mum announces.
“First husband, I never knew she had a first husband! I thought there was just old mate who got killed in that warehouse accident.”
Half a tonne of frozen fish landed on old mate’s head when he stood too close to a badly driven forklift. He was only six months short of retirement. Apparently he was trying to place a bet with the driver who was an SP bookie. The family legend is that the horse’s name was Flying Fish.
Mum says, “I can’t remember what’s his name’s name either but briefly before him there was Steven who you saw today. He was actually a good mate of your father’s and mine, sold the best weed as I remember. The police busted him not long after Judy and he had run away and eloped. I think it was a stupid spur of the moment thing, the marriage I mean not the pot selling. It was never going to last and with the two-year jail sentence for Steve it didn’t. There was a divorce, Steve disappeared from the scene and Judy married the dopey bugger who wore the fish on his head.
She pauses, “I invited him because he deserved to be there. He loved Judy far more than she ever loved him or the fish man. With Judy it was all about Judy.”
“But what was the crazy stunt with the wheelchair all about?”
“Oh your father and I and Judy and Steve used to have parties in the backyard. We were all very young and just married. Anyway we used to have wheelbarrow races around the yard. Steve and I were just reminiscing. Thought it would be good fun. You don’t think we were disrespectful, do you?”
“Mmm, hard to say Mum,” I answer. “Guess we will have to see if anyone from the family calls anymore.”
“Bugger them if they don’t. Your Dad would have thought it hilarious, Judy too for that matter. Not too many opportunities to have fun anymore so I am taking them where I can.”
Mum is a little teary again, she reaches in her handbag for a tissue and finds the scones instead.
“Good work darling, you are a thoughtful son. I was just getting a bit peckish too. We will have these with a decent cup of tea when you get me home.”
It won’t be a second too soon.
Photo by Mayron Oliveira on Unsplash
