Now I understand, What you tried to say to me, And how you suffered for your sanity
The country’s newspapers are shutting down. Makes me wonder what would happen to obituaries when there’s no more newsprint? Will there exist just a paper for obituaries, The Obituary Tribune, perhaps? Not everyone reads obits but more do as we age. I began reading obituaries working Cardiac Intensive Care often as a follow-up to patients who left our unit alive but with heath problems that proved irresolvable. Most of what I knew about my patients was limited to their health or deficiency of same but, paradoxically, they came “alive” in their obituaries. I especially like to read about women who went into nursing and served in the military during WWII. I have a special interest in the U.S. Nurse Cadet Corps.
A record number of RNs joined the military in the 40’s leaving stateside hospitals insufficiently staffed to take care of civilians. Legislation was passed that paid for the education of over 180,000 nurse recruits. These young women comprised 80% of nursing staff and had to perform duties that were not then nor even now covered by the nurse practice act; delivering babies, suturing wounds, assisting surgeons and actually “cutting skin” as one nurse put it. This was at a time when only doctors could take blood pressures. The nurse cadets were issued military-type uniforms in addition to nurse whites and they served their country at home.
We will always get news of celebrity deaths, the wealthy and VIPs on TV but then only for a nano-second and if you’ve dozed off in the recliner it’s just a blip and you missed it. I hate to think of people as just a TV blip or no blip at all. In a short period of time I’ve written three obituaries: my dad’s, my mom’s, and my husband’s. Newsprint obituaries are expensive, very expensive so in the interests of economy you select only the highlights, those facts that defined a life. Who will write my obituary? The books tell me I should write my own so I’ve been making notes. It’s amazing the memories that surface. In my junior year, for example, I was the fastest typist in all the city’s high schools. Whoa! Another fact: when standard typewriters were replaced by electric typewriters I had to consciously slow down because I typed faster than the electric allowed resulting in jammed keys. Those really aren’t the kind of memories that make it to obituaries; interesting perhaps (to me) but not memorable and certainly not worth the expense.
How to capture the essence of a loved one among the facts? I recently read the obit of a woman who made her final passage at the age of ninety. It was more than facts; it contained the essence of a strong, witty, opinionated woman who obviously passed on those characteristics to her biographer.
The rose garden this summer shouted out the quiet essence of the Rose Man. I will continue to explore what I think might be my essence. Maybe my biographer will write that she cried whenever she head Don McLean’s song, Vincent.
They would not listen, they did not know how; Perhaps they’ll listen now.
rosesinjanuarydotcom 