Part of me doesn’t want to post this, but part of me does.

So much of my blog has been about Mum and while there were many people at her funeral early this month who heard this in person; maybe there are others who read this who would like to understand who Mum was before she became the star of Tuesday TV.

So, I wrote Mum’s eulogy.  It felt like the final thing I could do for her.  This is it:

Google tells me that in the eulogy I should take you chronologically through Mums life and her achievements.

But I figure that you already know the order of things in Mums life.

And achievements that are ‘things’ that don’t mean anything at this point.  So, I thought I’d take a slightly different angle.

Our Mum, Wife, Nanny, Sister, Aunt, Cousin, Friend…

She was a bit like a Cadbury’s chocolate éclair, wasn’t she?

Bear with me here.

Eclairs have this strong, hard, tough, – some might say occasionally irritating – exterior.

I think you’ll all know Mum had at least one cancer.

She actually had four different types.  All unrelated to each other.

A total of at least five times.  And somehow she survived them all.

She also survived a massive stroke between the third and fourth cancers and did the dementia dance for the last few years.

Strong, hard, tough.  

If you hold them in your hand, or just keep them close, Eclairs get a little softer, a little less hard on your teeth.

______________________

There’re not many benefits of someone getting dementia, but one for me was taking Mum to see family and friends over the last couple of years and listening to the stories they told her to remind her of the past – a place that became easier to access than her present.

And then, when I called you to let you know Mum had decided she had a better place to be, you told me more stories and details.

______________________

Like at secondary school when she took Jean under her wing as others gave Jean a hard time. Mum and Jean maintained that friendship over 60 years.

And in the last couple, have been to the pub together more times than I have…

Strong, but soft.

Riding her bike with Joanne – her then young niece – on the back.  Joanne tells us she was rather sturdy with her ‘butcher’s hands’, and Mum was always tiny.

But you know…

Strong, but soft.

Befriending Erica – then a young German woman new to the UK with very limited English conversation skills.

Erica used to pick up wool from the wool shop Mum worked at.  Mum apparently had no issues with the language barriers and invited her out.  And that was the start of another 60 plus year friendship.  Apparently wool conquers all…

But not always…

In their 20’s Mum decided to teach her colleagues – including Shirley and Gerry – crochet in their lunch break.  I’ve been told in recent weeks that Mum was ‘very patient’.

Frankly, I find that very hard to believe.

I have a memory of a good few years back when I was told that actually everyone was scared of Mum in those lessons, and nobody progressed very far.

That sounds more like Mum.  She tried to teach Sally, Anna and me at different times.

There is no evidence of Sally achieving anything.

Anna’s coaster became a triangle made of wool, sweat and tears.

And I ended up buying a book and teaching myself.

Mum was amazing at crochet, knitting and sewing (and I mean really amazing), but truly, truly terrible at trying to teach anyone else the skills…

In contrast to her love of wool, in her 20’s Mum had a sense of adventure and ability to do stuff that I still find surprising.

Weekend camping trips to Cornwall with Shirley, her husband, Mum and Dad…in a Mini.

And just one two-man tent.

Apparently, Dad (6ft 2) slept in the Mini and a second tent was acquired the next day.  How they fitted two tents, four people and presumably at least a spare pair of pants and socks each in a Mini is beyond my comprehension.

But was obviously good training for the holiday with the five of us in a Mini Metro years later though, when the twins (still very small) were infamously transported from Kent to Tintagel in Cornwall in a cardboard box in the boot…

On another escapade in the Mini, Dad told us that they borrowed a roof rack from Mum’s Dad.  It was in pieces and Dad didn’t have time to put it together properly, so he used string, much to Granddad’s consternation.

But Mum went along with it.

And there was the holiday driving through Europe where Dad hadn’t considered foreign road signs or etiquette and wrote the car off at a crossroads in Switzerland….

She took all these things in her stride

Still, she got her own back when she and Jean drove to get some bread on a camping holiday in France (Dad informed us ‘it was 200 yards – who needs a car for 200 yards?!’).

The car was quite close to the tent.  A tree was quite close to the car…The tree had exposed tree roots. As Mum drove away the car caught, pivoting on the tree roots.  Dad said Mum and Jean ended up walking.  And there was a fair bit of see-sawing involved to free the car….

I don’t think I ever saw Mum drive a car if Dad was around. I imagine that could have been that point in France that decided that…

______________________

Mum loved walking.

When I was young, and a walk looked imminent I tended to develop a tummy ache.  Mum always told me that funnily enough a walk was exactly what I needed to fix that…  and I never learned.

As we got older, we realised that not walking with Mum was not an option and Easter walks and Boxing day walks and a fair few in between were non-negotiable if you didn’t want to get on the wrong side of her.

(Dad rarely came owing to the issue of having a ‘bone in his leg’.  Apparently a much more convincing get out than a tummy ache).

We never ever took a map.  And I do not remember any walks with Mum where we didn’t get lost.

There was at least one where we ended up in the back garden of someone in Ide Hill with Mum assuring us that ‘it’s definitely this way….’

______________________

Walking also resulted in finding things – bits of wood, interesting stones, trunks of trees that would all look good in the garden…

One holiday to Greece Mum knew that there was no way Dad was going to let her pack a large lump of rock she thought would look great at home into their suitcase.  So, she emptied out most of her handbag and popped it in there.

It was hard to lift the bag and throw it over her shoulder as if it was its usual weight, but she managed it.

(Stubbornly tough)

And the first Dad knew of her shenanigans was when a large piece of rock appeared on a windowsill back at home.

She wasn’t so lucky a few years later when she put rather a large number of ‘interesting pebbles’ in her large handbag; a very stern official at the airport made her remove all but one.

That one is – I think – on one of the tree stumps in her favourite place – the garden – that has collected many ‘interesting bits’ over the years.

______________________

And of course, Cadburys chocolate Eclairs have that almost surprising, hidden, delicious melt in the mouth chocolate centre.

That side of Mum was never more obvious to me than when Cash – her grandson – and Willow – her granddaughter – were born.

She knitted prolifically, she played, she smiled from ear to ear around them and (I suspect the bit that made it so lovely), she gave them back to their Mums.

Cash remembers his Nanny playing on the see saw with him at the playground.

Willow remembers her Nanny playing games on her iPad with her – somewhat bittersweet as this was when Mum had dementia and they played as equals.

But she didn’t just have a soft centre for them.

Mum didn’t dish out hugs and kisses the way some Mums do.  She showed her soft centre in other ways.

I didn’t appreciate it at the time (I was small), but my sixth birthday landed not quite three weeks after the twin’s birth.  Despite that disastrous timing, Mum still managed to make me a fairy castle birthday cake that year.  A feat involving sponge, butter cream, upside down ice cream cornets and iced flowers.  She must have been beyond exhausted.

One of the best things to come home from school to was the smell of Mums home-made chocolate chip cookies.  They were as amazing as her knitting.

And if I’d been really good, I was allowed four.  FOUR.  (Sally and Anna inform me they were only allowed two each. I mean, they are practically one person, so that seems fair).

And then, when I was at university I got a parcel from Mum.  It was a shoe box.  And it was full of runner beans from Mum and Dad’s allotment.  I’m pretty sure it cost more to send them than it would for me to buy them, but the gesture was so very lovely.

It turns out Mum sent Sally a parcel to university too.  Hers contained her favourite – Applewood smoked cheese. I think Sal got the better parcel…

Hidden in that centre Mum had a funny and fun side too.

We were remembering the other day how she found it hilarious if someone fell over – Anna most recently on a local walk with Mum, me while being chased by goats on one of Mums epic walks in Ithaca, Greece, Sally when she tripped, or struggled pushing her wheelchair.  Mum had a lot of time for our lack of balance…

Mum developed a seriously sweet tooth in the last few years and liked nothing better than a trip out for coffee and a cake.  She might not have been fast on her feet by that point, but we all learned very quickly that she would ‘forget’ she’d eaten her own and swipe your cake if you were not fast enough…and then deny eating anything at all, sometimes believing that, sometimes with a naughty glint in her eye…

______________________

There is a sadness that Mum has gone.  But Mum really went a good while ago.

And she was living her best life right up to that last week – table tennis on the Monday, chocolate biscuits straight after breakfast when I went to see her on the Tuesday.

We made sure that Mum was never alone in her last few days with Sally, Anna, Dad or I with her every single minute.

A lady bird flew in her room on the Thursday night, then disappeared.

Early on Saturday morning Anna spotted two robins on the chairs in the garden below Mums window.

A little later that morning, we found that ladybird from Thursday again and Sally set it free out the window.

Mum died an hour or so later.

If you believe that sort of thing, maybe the robins were Nanny and Grandad – Mum’s Mum and Dad coming to fetch her, and the ladybird we released was Mums spirit.

Or maybe that’s just too fanciful.

But I hope that its true.

For now though, Mum / Mummy / Nanny / Old Thing / Mummy Walker : Night night. Love you. See you in the morning.