The deed is done

I thought we were going to scatter my Aunt Lily Tagg's ashes today, but the funeral director had put them in a box, so we buried them instead.

Her other relations approved of my choice of her final resting place at St Margaret of Antioch Church in Barming, Kent.

They were very impressed with its beauty and how well it is maintained. I chose it because the old church is near the river and surrounded by fields. She used to walk her beloved dog Prince there.

Her two husbands, who predeceased her, are in Vinter's Park Crematorium, but I wanted her to be in a place that was about both life and death.

Her good friend May's brother is buried there. He died in the Second World War at age 20.

I used to walk to the church sometimes when I visited her and once I was showing my Aunt Lily some photographs -- coincidentally, I had taken a picture of May's brother's tombstone, and that's how I found out about him.

After her step-daughter said a few commemorative words her step-grandson put the box in the ground. Then the funeral director came around with a box of dry dirt and each of us threw a handful onto the box in the hole.

We didn't linger, but left the church graveyard and went to the Bull Pub for lunch.

Afterwards, the four of them left by car to return to London, and I walked back to the grave site, which had already been neatly repaired and covered over with grass.

There was a small dog running around and I thought about how much my aunt would have fussed over it. If you click on the picture below, you will see the dog more clearly.

I picked some wildflowers in the surrounding field to make a small bouquet for the grave.

I then hastened back along the River to the East Farleigh Railway Station and got on a train to Tonbridge where I made a connection to get to London Waterloo East.

I've always wanted to use the East Farleigh station because I have never done so, but have used all the others nearby: Barming, Maidstone Barracks, Maidstone West and Maidstone East.

If they hadn't suggested lunch I would have gone to the Bull Pub in East Farleigh instead. I was there a while ago when I was out for a walk.

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East Farleigh

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My grandfather's obituary

...day the vicar (Canon A.R. Winnett) was assisted by Canon A.H. Hudson. The standards of the Grayshott and Hammer British Legions were present, and the Grayshott chairman, Cdr. J.C.G Martin spoke the legion Exhortation.

-30-

I wrote this obituary for my aunt

TAGG, Lily (NEE FOREMAN)

Passed away May 1, 2012 age 90 in Maidstone Hospital after a brief illness.

Lily, born in Cranbrook, Kent, on August 9, 1921, lived in Staplehurst, then Maidstone where she was working as a “clippy” bus conductor during the Second World War when she met her future husband Joe Parkes, a coal salesman.

Moving to London in 1947, she worked as a housemaid, marrying Joe in 1950. Lily later became a telephonist and supervisor with the General Post Office, a career carried to Maidstone from London's Bayswater and Sloane Square exchanges, after she and Joe moved in 1965 to nearby Barming.

In 1978, almost 10 years after Joe's death from tuberculosis in 1969, Lily married his cousin Rob Tagg with whom she enjoyed four years before being widowed a second time.

Throughout her careers and after retirement in 1981, dear Lily created happiness and often helpfulness for colleagues, neighbours, friends and kin, including her late brother Fred Foreman of Maidstone.

She enjoyed driving in the Kent countryside, walking her dog Prince by the River Medway and dog-sitting for neighbours in Barming's Beverley Road Estate.

Amid the deep sadness at her passing, Lily shall be ever warmly remembered by many who knew her.

A funeral service will be held on Thursday, May 17, 2012 at 12:30pm at Vinters Park Crematorium in Maidstone followed by interment at St Margaret of Antioch, Barming parish church, at a later date.

Donations can be made by cheque in Lily's memory to Guide Dogs for the Blind c/o Family Funeral Service, 6 Marlborough Parade, Beverley Road, Barming, Maidstone, Kent, ME16 9JN or directly to the organisation.

Family flowers only, please.

Go I know not whither

Fetch I know not what

Not a tribute

Strange couple of months.

First Fred died of cancer in Maidstone.

Then Ant died of cancer in Toronto.

Back to Canada
Family stuff


Back to UK
Work
Aggro
Travel

Christie Pits lightning tree

A man died under this tree last month when he was struck by lightning.



I dropped by today to leave a memento at the base of the tree.



I sat for a while thinking about how much the victim, 28, enjoyed reading in the park.


I think I'll return with a book sometime.



R.I.P.

Ophelia, cemeteries & suicide

A friend of mine killed herself a few weeks ago. I knew her for about 20 years. We met at the Art Gallery of Ontario where she organized special events and functions. I was a waitress in the member's lounge.


The day I found out she'd killed herself, I saw this graffiti in Philosopher's Walk near the Royal Ontario Museum. I wondered how many people would share this sentiment.



She would visit the member's lounge for a glass of wine after she finished work on Wednesdays--the one day of the week that the gallery stayed open late. We liked each other, but we didn't socialize.

We were both very good pals of a talented, yet troubled, artist friend who killed himself in May 2005. I also met him during the two years or so when I worked at the gallery. He was a waiter in the restaurant and a gifted jeweller and artist.

The two spent a lot of time together. She was an excellent friend to him.

She was laid off after 25 years or so of working at the gallery. He killed himself on her last day on the job.

He was quite ill physically and was suffering from depression. He was an alcoholic and abused drugs. He threw himself on the subway tracks at the Queen Street station after checking himself out of St. Michael's Hospital.

The last time I saw him he was so high that he could barely speak. We went to see the film "Ray" at the Bloor Cinema and he passed out and slept through the entire movie. He phoned me at about 1:30 a.m. to apologize.

We tried to meet again a couple of times, but he never showed up.

He had tried previously to kill himself. I had intervened and taken him to the hospital on one occasion. I had also helped get him out of jail when he got into a mess while holidaying in St. Eustatius once.

After he killed himself, she and I got together from time to time.

I hadn’t heard from her for quite a while, but I sent an email to her husband about a week before she hung herself on her back deck.

Apparently, she left no note, but had been suffering from insomnia and anxiety.

The memorial was held while I was away in England.

While I was in London I saw an exhibition of the work of John Everett Millais at the Tate Britain. His romanticized image of Ophelia after she killed herself is shown below.


These are not the first friends I've known who have killed themselves.

A long time ago, when I lived in Ottawa and was in Grade 8, a friend killed himself while sniffing glue.

CEMETERY OUTSIDE ALL SAINTS CHURCH

This church in Maidstone was built in 1395, but the site has had a church on it since 650. I am not sure of the age of these tombstones in the pictures because the dates are worn off.





Construction on St. Mary's Church in Chiddingstone began in the 13th Century.





CEMETERY NEAR ORANGEVILLE

I went to this cemetery in May of this year. It is outside a village near Orangeville, Ont.

A right to learn for learning's sake

By Carl Mollins

The basic mood and spirit that coloured the 70-plus years of Walter Whitfield Mollins, and shaped the gifts of living he spread to so many others, began on the day of his birth in Ottawa.

This writer, his brother, remembers that day near the end of May--a Friday, May 29, 1936, a few weeks before my fifth birthday. Our father came home from the hospital, where our mother had gone for reasons I really didn’t understand. He skipped up the stairs, singing in his musical baritone the announcement to me and my two older sisters that a baby boy had joined the family.

It was pure happiness.

Walt became the life of the family. As well, in reversal of the customary case of the kid brother copying his big brother, Walt in many ways was a model for me.

It was noted, for one thing, that we shared a mutual aversion to shaving. Even in that, Walt’s beard sparked the happier reactions: Folk sometimes compared me to Karl Marx, whereas youngsters often took Walt for Santa Claus.

His sense of humour, pursuit of happiness, his encouragement of that spirit in others, persisted throughout his life and into its final days.

PLAYFUL CHILD BECOMES CULTURED ADULT

His positive mind and manner persevered despite his struggle against the depressive diabetes that struck in early childhood and governed him physically ever after.

In fact, with the diabetic’s need to maintain a balance among daily intakes of insulin and food with exercise, he indulged at an early age in fun and games as a means of burning off excess calories. Many were the laughter-fuelled sessions of skip-rope or hopscotch, of climbing a slippery poplar or, in winter, playing two-person hockey on the home-made backyard rink.



The fun and games contributed in turn to Walter’s active life of happily “doing things,” be it at the piano or with his violin, his paintbrush portraying a landscape, his pen composing a poem, or singing in choirs that toured at home and abroad. Then there was helping Ruffles the dog through a tricks routine.

A good part of the rest of his waking hours would be engaged in fundraising campaigns for charities and performing volunteer services to the community. The most important part of that included his active assistance for the financially or physically or mentally deprived.

LIFE-LONG TEACHER AND VOLUNTEER

Such activity took place both during and following his career as a schoolteacher, an instructor who loved children and worked to help them develop happy lives. Most of his public school efforts consisted of teaching pupils with special needs.

For such pupils, as well as people he later taught voluntarily outside schools, he sought to get them involved, as he was, in the stimulation and enjoyment of participation in the riches of life. In his marriage, he and wife, as a nurse, became a formidable team in caring for underprivileged and ailing neighbours.



Walter not long ago gave voice to his purposes in life in an article by a niece about teaching illiterate people, a project they both pursued. After observing him teaching in Stratford and talking to him about it, she wrote:

“Walter Mollins is working from a belief that everybody has a right to learn for learning’s sake--for the sense of pride, accomplishment and connection that brings, not for any other goal. As he says, everyone has a right to develop a sense of conscious growth . . .

“His approach is to respect and honour people for what they can do. He does not assess based on what they cannot do and try to fill in the gaps. He assesses what they can do and tries to strengthen that and build on it.”

Walter Mollins, in an echo of the day of his birth, thus brought happiness to many people as well as himself and his family. In so doing, he left a great legacy: the hundreds of lives that he enriched in his time. ~

This is a tribute originally given by my father at my uncle's funeral.

Remembrance of things past

My uncle's ashes were buried in this churchyard on Sunday afternoon.


There were about 300 people in attendance at the church, but only about 50 went to see his ashes buried.


Despite the snow, the ground was not frozen so it was easy for the gravedigger to create and fill the hole.


The graveyard scene was quite Gothic. The church bells were ringing during the ceremony.


His ashes were kept in a wooden box made for my late grandmother by a boyfriend and then poured into a hole in the rose garden.


The rose garden is surrounded by a circular hedge. My uncle's name will be inscribed into a concrete bench encircling part of the garden.

STRATFORD WITHOUT UNCLE WALTER


Arriving at the Stratford, Ont. train station on Saturday, the day before the funeral, was strange. My uncle always met visitors at the station and this time he wasn't there. The last time I visited was in the summer.


My uncle lined up these animal crackers one day to feed to his dog Ruffles.


Then he fed them to her one by one.


My uncle was a very intelligent, kind and generous man. He was a retired school teacher who had taught mainly disabled students. He was involved in a wide variety of community projects. He volunteered at the Stratford Festival by giving backstage and warehouse tours. He delivered meals on wheels. He taught disabled people on a voluntary basis.

He was passionate about Shakespeare and his seasoned criticism of the Stratford Festival productions was very reliable.

He sang in the Stratford Concert Choir and toured and sang at cathedrals in England and Europe with the group.


When I last visited my uncle and aunt in August, I was planning a trip to England. My uncle loved England and taught there in the 1960s. He made many visits over the years--the last one this spring. He showed me the scrapbook he'd put together about his trip and I asked him which place in England was his favourite. He told me it was Exeter. I visited Exeter and its cathedral in October.

When I was there, I took a one-hour guided tour of the cathedral. I chatted with the tour guide and she remembered that the Stratford choir had sung there.

She took me outside to show me the Ontario Heritage Foundation commemorative plaque for John Graves Simcoe, first lieutenant governor of Ontario, after I expressed surprise at seeing a memorial to him inside the cathedral.




Although I didn't see my uncle again after I returned from England, I was able to tell him about my trip during a telephone conversation ~