It has been a very tough week, so I hope you will forgive me for taking a break from art and telling you about two wonderful people that were taken away from us this week. The first was my uncle Jules. He was my father’s brother, and was also my godfather. I was always very proud that my parents had chosen him for that role, because he was the most intelligent person I know. He had, perhaps without him knowing it, a big influence on me growing up. Whenever I saw him, he would have a question for me to research. I don’t know how much time he put into thinking up these questions, or if he thought them up just for me, but they were always interesting, never easy, and certainly nourished my curiosity. He expected an answer the next time we met, and he never forgot to follow up. One in particular I remember was “Why are British policemen called “Bobbies”?” Of course there was no Internet at the time, so finding the answer was not as easy as just saying “Hey Google”! I remember that I used to love to babysit my young cousins, because there were so many books at his house on Science and Nature that I could read once the children were sleeping. So it is doubly sad that this brilliant man, who was a surgeon in his professional life, was stricken, like several of his siblings, with Alzheimer’s disease. The last time I saw him, he did recognize me, but I could see from his smile and the things he said that it was the child he was seeing. I am glad I was able to repay him then some of the joy he brought me. I am also pretty sure that he was the one who got me started in watercolor, at least as a child. Though I can’t be 100% sure, I believe it was he who gifted me the wonderfully huge tin box set I remember from childhood and that I talked about here. I am sure however that I owe a lot of my curious nature to the never-ending prompting he provided, and that without it I would not be the person I am today. So thank you, dear uncle, and until we meet again. If that loss wasn’t bad enough, a dear friend and former colleague also left us this week. He had been diagnosed last year with pancreatic cancer. Unfortunately, it was already stage 4 so the prognosis was not good, but I still held out hope, if not for a total recovery, at least for a bit longer than what the doctors had predicted. Jim was a funny and erudite man, who never forgot his humble origins. I am so glad to have been able to be one of the many people he entertained, over a glass of single malt of course, with his colorful stories of camping on the roundabout, or the bicycle ghost, or the unforgettable hippopotamus leech, all told in his charming Glaswegian accent! I will never forget the look on his face when, as “Quiz Master” to a “Pub Quiz” we had during one of our Whisky Society dinners, he realized that I, a mere Computer Science teacher-- i.e. NOT an English teacher--, had the correct answer to a question he had written, which was “What English word has the most definitions in the dictionary?” I guess my pastime of reading the dictionary, no doubt a by-product of my uncle Jules’ questions, came in handy after all!! Every time I have a wee dram, I’ll have a sip to your memory, dear friend! With covid restrictions, it was impossible to visit either of these wonderful people, which made things harder. But it also gave me a convenient excuse, because I confess I am a coward when it comes to dealing with people facing serious illness or death. I guess it’s because I don’t have much experience of it, which one could take as a good thing, but I wish I knew what is the “right thing” to do. My egotistical side wants to hold on to the memory of the person I knew, and not have to deal with the reality of illness and death. I am sure I’m not the only person who feels this way, but it doesn’t make me feel less ashamed of being such a coward. Have you had to deal with these feelings? If so, I would love to hear your advice on doing better in the future, as this will surely happen again as time catches up with us and the people around us. Anyway, thank you for reading. Hug the people you love and tell them while you can. P.S. I intentionally didn’t give the answers to the questions above. Stay curious, my friend!
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AuthorMy name is Claire Bureau. Archives
March 2023
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