Shuffling off this mortal coil

Morbid? Not really!

Each night when I go to bed I lie awake for some while wondering if I’m going to wake up in the morning, now this isn’t me being morbid it’s just facing reality. At my age it’s probably perfectly normal for anyone with an iota of intelligence to accept that there’s probably not that many more mornings ahead. And I’ve had my three score years and twenty; I know it’s ten but I’ve been lucky.

My Dad was a couple of months past 76 when he went to bed one night and decided not to wake up. I’m not sure that that’s a nice way to go, sometimes I think yes but then I think I’d like to be able to give my children and dog  a last smile and pat before turning up my toes and shuffling off this mortal coil.

My mother was a bit annoyed with my dad, as was her want, for being so inconsiderate as to departing in such a way. He pretty much  woke her with a cup of tea in bed every day of their married life barring the rare occasions when one was away from home.

As I said my mother was a bit annoyed that he died when he did, she had planned for him to be alive for at least another couple of months ’til at least the 2nd August; now I know you’re all curious as to know why the 2nd August.

Well had he done the right thing the 1st of August would have been their “Golden Wedding” anniversary and my mother was anxious to get her telegram/letter whatever from the Queen to mark the occasion. True, she told me when I went down to Melbourne for his funeral, it struck me that she was more upset at losing out on her message of congratulations from the Queen than the death and funeral of her husband of 49 years and 10 months. I kid you not!

I sometimes feel that he did it deliberately, he had such a fine dry sense of humour and that’s just  the sort of thing which would have tickled his fancy. I can almost see him chuckling now, you never heard him chuckle you just saw it: his stomach and chest just wobbled.

Just lucky I suppose.

Both my mother and brother Sonny died a few weeks short of their 79th birthday celebration, both unpleasantly from cancer, my mother had bowel cancer and it took it’s time; Sonny had prostate cancer; he was living in England when diagnosed with this disease and from what I heard ( I had very little to do, in fact nothing, with my brother after 1969 except for a brief while when I moved to Sydney in the mid 1970’s) he opted to be a guinea pig on some trial of a new drug which was supposed to be a cure,it seems he got the placebo and died a rather nasty death from reports I received which I wont bore you with suffice to say any death from cancer cannot be pleasant.

Now talking of cancer,I was diagnosed with prostate cancer at age 70 (same as Sonny) I opted for the “Brachytherapy” treatment which I discussed on these pages some time ago should anybody be interested in reading about my experience. (Prostate Cancer and me).

Well, as you can see I’m still here, and there is no sign of the cancer returning and accordng to my doc there’s not much chance of it coming back now even though my medical records show I have cancer.

A few years before he died my dad had a stroke, not a very big stroke but a stroke nevertheless that incapacitated him only slightly. Now I had a stroke on the 8th October 2011 I didn’t know I was having a stroke at the time, however the ever vigilant War Office did and it’s her fault that you have to put up with my rantings and ravings still for I have no doubt that I would have been dead  had it not been for her belligerence. 🙂

She’s not called the War Office for nothing.

So why this rave? I’ve decided that I shall amuse myself and write blogs that are of not the slightest interest to anybody but me but will relate the ups and downs of the first 80 years of my life and give me something to keep the old gray matter going for a while longer.