REST IN PEACE KATHRYN WHITFORD

I thought to live
two centuries, or three;
yet, here comes death
to me, a child
just eighty-five years old.
- Hanabusa Ikkei

Yesterday at 1:50 p.m. Kathryn Whitford, my wife Mary's mother, died of renal failure and congestive heart failure. She was 85 years old.

What was she to me? Kay Whitford was the woman who gave me her daughter. She was the woman who taught me Advanced Composition when I was in college. This past year, I took her grocery shopping every week and she would take me to lunch and she would take notice of the sky, the progress of the crops, the changing of the leaves.

She had been healthy for most of her life; was diagnosed with congestive heart failure and renal failure two years ago; was hospitalized for a week this past July after a bout of acute dehydration; was hospitalized again overnight in August to deal with the dehydration. It was at this point we learned her kidneys had shut down almost entirely. She knew what she wanted, and it didn't include dialysis. She knew what she wanted, and it did include dying at home with her cats and her martini.

When Mary's parents retired from their careers teaching at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee - her father, an ecologist in the Botany Department; her mother, a professor in the English Department - they retired to a house in Fairwater so that in their old age and dotage, Mary could care for them. Mary's father died suddenly in his sleep in 1991 and we never felt we had the chance to properly say "good-bye." We got to say good-bye to Kay in a myriad and million ways.

In the course of these final weeks Mary got to hear her mother say: "You are a good daughter." To hear her say: "I love you, too, sweet."

Kay kept her sense of humor to the end. Mary is a nurse, and as she prepared yet another meal that her mother would take only a bite of, Kay said: "You missed your calling, dear. You would have made a wonderful nurse."

There was no whining about her fate; there was no complaining about the unfairness of it all. Kay was a strong, determined, independent woman, and she bequeathed these qualities to her daughter and her grand-daughters. I say "independent," you might say "stubborn." She knew her own mind. She inhabited the world of her choosing. We might not always agree with her but always we tried to honor her.

It was her wish, as I say, to die at home with her cats and her martini. Mary was the angel who granted that wish, caring for her in every way, very intensively at the end. We got Hospice involved about a week and a half ago, not so much for Kay as for Mary, a point of reference and support for my wife who was not only a nurse in this situation, but also a daughter.

The beauty in all of this: all the family got home this past weekend to see Kay while she was still conscious and coherent. You could tell she was holding on in order to see them - Mary's brother and his daughter and our daughters. Each got to see Kay several times on the weekend. All of them got to tell her they loved her.

I had gone over to relieve Mary yesterday, long enough for her to come home, get a shower, change her clothes. When Mary left, Kay's respirations were about 40/minute, about what they had been since she lost consciousness. Then they went to 28/minute, then 16/minute. Then 8/minute. I called Mary at home: "Come back. The end is not far off." Mary arrived just at the end. Kay died, and death was like a sigh. It was such a gentle moment in this mixed-up world of ours, that final breathing out. It was such a gentle lifting, her being there, being not there.

Mary called Hospice. Soon enough the nurse arrived - she'd been on her way already and hadn't even gotten the page yet about Kay's death. Mary helped as Linda washed the body. Soon enough the fellow from the funeral home arrived. I helped to load those mortal remains onto the cart. Soon enough the nurse was on her way. And a friend from town, who saw the hearse departing and knew what that meant, stopped on his way home from work to offer comfort. We all had a glass of tea together, and breathed out.

Mary and I went to a Wednesday night fish fry near here, one that Kay was particularly fond of. And Mary had a memorial martini with her dinner, one that Kay was particularly fond of. And we talked and laughed and, yeah, maybe cried a little bit, and remembered her, this woman who bore Mary into the world, this woman who gave me her daughter, this woman who was as good a role model as any grand-daughter might ever wish.

We are putting her on the altar of memory, that place in the bedroom where we honor all those we've lost. We are putting her there where, each time we dress, we will remember who she was and what she meant to us. The dead live on, if they live at all, in our hearts, and we are putting Kay in that place in our heart where she will be with us.

How are we doing? We are doing fine. We have lost so much, but it was not unexpected. And we - all the family, and Mary especially - can take solace in the fact that Kay was able to live as she wished until the end, and to die at home with her cats.

And the cats? The cats knew when Kay died, and they left the room. They were no longer needed there.

Rest in peace, Kathryn Whitford.

Comments

[Dave]

Powerful writing, Tom. I'm sitting here crying as if I actually knew the woman.

[Tom Montag]

Hi, Dave--Thanks. When she reads this, Mary cries at a different point than I cry when I read it. I cry when I get to the part about the cats. They knew they were no longer needed. How, I don't know, but they knew.

[Rachel]

What a glorious elegy, Tom. I love your matter-of-factness and the simple grace of your prose, here more than ever.

Oddly, the line that makes me want to cry is "Kay Whitford was the woman who gave me her daughter." What generosity of spirit you have, to recognize that, especially in our culture which so easily devalues the mother-in-law/son-in-law relationship.

I wish you and Mary comfort in the days ahead.

[Marja-Leena]

I second Dave's words - my eyes are wet, even as I smile. Beautiful.

[Natalie]

Thankyou for this beautifully simple account, Tom. This is how links between people are formed, from the telling of these personal stories, so true and so moving, and suddenly we are no longer strangers, even we are oceans apart.

[Tom Montag]

Rachel, Marja-Leena, and Natalie--Thanks you so much for your good words. You know, you hope it is simple and elegant, but it's your own words so you can never be sure. I am pleased to hear this "elegy" spoke to all of you as well. Mary said the people where she works cried too, the nurses and secretaries in the FDL County Health Dept. Of course, it seems many of them are at the age that they are going through or have gone through something similar. We all do - it's the changing of the generation: someone is born, someone dies. And this is as true in Fairwater as in British Columbia, Massachussetts, or London, England. And at this moment, indeed, we are not strangers.

[Jean]

It was just - well, a privilege to share this. Much love to you and Mary.

[Lorianne]

I'm only now getting around to reading this post *slowly*, as it deserves to be read.

What is it about cats that they *know*?

Mary gave her mother the gift of dying how she wished, and you gave your mother-in-law the gift of a proper elegy. Both gifts are beautiful beyond words.

[Tom Montag]

Jean and Loriane--thank you for your good words. The far tougher job was Mary's, and she did it with love, without faltering. The habit of care is so ingrained that we still catch ourselves as we come into town thinking we have to stop and check on her. I did it last night as we came home from a concert in FDL; Mary did it this evening as we came home from our place in Marquette County. You go - "Oh, yeah, we don't have to do that!"