Night Vigil

I plan to stay up all night.

Pearlie has taken another slump. She is vomiting blood every three or four hours. It started 24 hours ago. We decided not to phone an ambulance. Early this morning we had Doctor On Call and Pearlie informed him that, despite the risk, she did not wish to go to hospital. He agreed with her wishes and only administered an injection to stop the vomiting. It did not work.

Bert stayed with her last night but even though I got to go to bed I only slept for about an hour. I had two hours this afternoon which helped.

Pearlie sleeps a lot but insists on having a pen in her hand and a puzzle book in front of her. She is unable to concentrate on the puzzles.

Tornadoes

When someone you love is nearing the end of their life everything else narrows. The wider world dims and becomes unimportant.

This time last year our mother, our beloved Matty, had slipped into coma and we were, as we say in Ireland, awaiting on. What do I remember? I remember that on the roads from my house to her house the verges were smothered in dandelion blooms. I remember how good our friends, neighbours and relations were. I remember the devotion and care of her priest, her doctor, the Marie Curie nurses and her carers. I remember walks in bluebell woods with one sister or another as we sought respite from her dying.

I knew nothing of the devastating tornadoes in the United States nor of the floods in Colombia. I was barely aware of the Arab Spring. The impending wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton was an irrelevance. Some months afterwards as I leafed through a magazine featuring their wedding I found myself wondering why I hadn't seen anything of it on television. After all, it must have been saturation coverage. Then I remembered. I was at my mother's funeral on that day.