"We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep". Shakespeare, of course. From The Tempest.
I heard recently how our greatest living Irishman John Hume now remembers nothing of his achievements in helping bring peace to this island.
But, does it really matter to him?
We know. We will not forget. Nor will generations to come. And he knew once the esteem in which he is held. It had to be gratifying but such feelings too, pass. We are of such stuff.
Our mother, in her 91st year, was admitted to the nursing home in Ballaghaderreen last May and does not yet fully realise where she is.
It does not matter as she is not distressed. It helps that the nursing home is run by family and the surroundings have become so familiar. Most important she is surrounded by company, essential for a woman so sociable.
Her life is now lived almost without memory. “I’m losing my mind,” she announces sometimes, as she tries to recall what she wanted to say moments before.
Her mind is fine, we remind her. That it is her memory which has gone AWOL.
She accepts it too. She adopts an attitude similar to an aunt of ours who grew deaf towards the end of her long life. She would dismiss her inability to hear anymore with a chirpy “…sure haven’t I heard enough!”
Our mother has remembered enough. But early memory still draws her back sometimes to childhood and wanderings around Castleplunkett where she grew up.
In lucid moments she announces, deadpan, “...it’s time I was gone.” We tell her not yet; that she needs more time here to prepare for the awful heat.
We don’t do sentiment in our house, irony is preferred.
Occasionally she will respond as used a town character in times past. He would say he didn’t mind ending up in either heaven or hell as “…I have friends in both places.” She is of such stuff.
Recently I came across an article I’d written many years ago about a visit she and I and my sister paid to the US. My age now is almost the exact same as hers was then. Past and passing. Of such stuff is this little life.
Memory, from Latin memoria: 'faculty of remembering'
inaword@irishtimes.com
