Whether losing weight, losing a friend, or a pet, or your car keys, loss is the beginning of a process of rebuilding. As you lose, so must you find. And unsurprisingly, you always find what you need to make it through.
Over the last two years I have lost my parents. I have found, though, a deep and loving relationship with my brother and his wife, that though always there, has strengthened immensely. I have found a deep chasm in my being that has been left gaping and raw with their loss, but so many people have tended this wound in so many ways, that it heals, slowly, or at the very least does not grow bigger. I have found the part of myself that says I can stand alone in the world, without those who created me. Beside that part, is the bit that says I don't need to.
We will all face losses, both good and bad. From the rubble we learn to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and look around with glasses tinted a little differently. Life is never quite the same again, that is the abject truth of loss. But it goes on. And there is lots to gain from from that.
Find Your CORE
Two years ago, my Mum passed away. Cited below is my eulogy for her funeral.I reprint it every year to remind myself that she isn't just around the corner, but speaking her name keeps her alive.
Angela Faith Jones April 8th, 1941 - February 20th, 2013
Life is an interesting thing. It is given freely, lived with consequences, and lost. Life is a constant change, an unpredictable tide, and yet when an accounting is taken, not much remains that is unsurprising.
Thank you for coming today to celebrate and remember the life of Angela Faith Jones. I knew her as Mum, as did Shayne and Simon. Many of you knew her as friend, surrogate mother, neighbor, confidante, patient. She was known also as daughter, aunt, sister and more. However you knew Angela, you know that she inevitably touched your heart in some way.
Born in 1941, at the height of WWII, in East Ham, London, England, Angela was born amidst turmoil and wartime strife. She often recalled playing in burnt out structures after the war, and spoke of air raid sirens and food rationing. Born to Albert George Addington Staines and Dorothy Esther Staines (nee West), Angela was the youngest of three children: Jeannine (passed away from thyroid disease at age 6) and brother David.
She was a strong willed, intelligent and inquisitive girl, a talented and celebrated violinist with a wonderful ear for music. Quick to laugh and break into song, she was always ready to get into a game of cricket or football, jump on the dance floor, or for the less rough and tumble, a great game of Boggle or Scrabble. She enjoyed being a part of whatever the people she loved were doing. Reading was a particular passion, loving Dickens, Bronte and Elliot, and other popular favourites like Dick Francis, Agatha Christie and more. She loved classical music, but could sing along to the hits over the decades. One of her greatest pleasures was enjoying the soothing sounds of Zamphir and his pan flute. I did enjoy our own personal drum corps parade, with pots and pans around the house, singing patriotically, “Land of hope and glory”, complete with rousing cheer and bow at the end.
Angela married Alan Jones, and from this union was born a rich base of friends in England and the arrival, in time, of their three children, Shayne, Simon and quite a bit later, myself. Being the youngest by far allowed me the priviledge of being her ear for many embarrassing, funny and animated recounts of the boys exploits. My favourite stories, though, were of her own adventures driving a transport lorry around the round-a-bouts of London, a trailblazer of sorts, sitting on some ledger books to see above the dash.
Angela certainly was a woman who faced a challenge head on. Move the whole family overseas to Canada? Done. Adjust to new country, climate, health challenges, financial difficulties? Absolutely. Rise to the challenges presented in the coming years, raising three children mostly alone? Yes. Perhaps it was her inbred stubborn streak, but letting these difficulties get in her way was against her nature.
Did I mention she had prehensile toes? Yep – with each toe working independently, some very creative puppet shows were born.
Angela loved to garden, loved the miracle of seed to blooming plant, loved to breathe in the fragrance and feel the coolness of the earth. She had a knack of “throwing” everything in and having it look perfect at almost any time of the growing season. She loved to give away clumps and clippings of her plants, with the promise that they would look even more beautiful in your garden.
She joined the workforce in Canada full time with VHB Industrial batteries as Office Administrator, and continued to work there until health concerns became too much and she had to retire. Hard working, organized and articulate, she was a master at convincing people without them even realizing they were being convinced. Also world reknowned for the “persuasive” letter or conversation which may, in the nicest possible way, have put someone in their place. She was well loved in the workplace, and enjoyed the challenge and responsibilities set her.
Angela covered many people with her love, took people under her wing and protected those in need of something special. Human or animal, our home growing up was a constant refuge for anybody who needed it. Even when Simon brought home “Siberian Desert Mice” (most of us know them as rats) she opened up her heart and eventually they too won her heart, pride of place in the house and an array of regal names, naming them all after English Kings. Mammal, reptile, bird, never turned away, neither were confused teenagers, heartbroken friends, downtrodden neighbours or suffering strangers. This was perhaps her greatest legacy – the trail of souls who left her care more fully whole than when they came.
From her birth in 1941 to present our world underwent astounding change. Air mail was incredible when invented, and now we communicate in a matter of seconds via email. Air flight has made unbelievable progress and we have men in space and have been on the moon. She saw the advent of television, technicolour and animated to current 3D films. With each decade came great change, and Angela always embraced it. She loved the Mary Tyler Moore show, but also wholly embraced the girls of Sex and the City. We often watched Star Search together, and now I understand she enjoyed watching American Idol with her neighbor Sharon. She moved with the times as best she knew how.
Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
This is what we shared, my Mum and I. Not only the mutual middle name, passed down from mother to daughter, but the ability to believe that all things are possible. A faith in the basic goodness of human life. A faith in the knowledge that doing the right thing is always better than doing the easy thing. And through the lessons that she taught me, I have gained a most important skill: faith in myself.
If a person’s worth is measured in those who she loves then surely it takes only a quick glance at her beloved grandchildren to see the sum of Angela’s parts. I remember the day Tristan Alexander was born, how she paced up and down the hospital halls in anticipation of meeting him, and how every time she ever looked at him you could see the joy she felt the first time they met. She adored little Zoe and always inundated me with stories of Tristan and Zoe’s many adventures, accomplishments and loving Nana tidbits about her time spent with them. I know how proud she was of them and I wish for them always to remember the feeling of her loving protective arms around them.
Although sharing her beloved baby boys, Shayne and Simon, wasn’t easy to reconcile, I know how pleased she was and how much she loved their wives Cynthia and Andrea. It is a joy for a parent to see their child love and be loved in return.
Life is an interesting thing. We live, as a people, to be with each other, to support, to love and cherish in times of joy and times of hardship. If Angela was here with us today she would be angry that we all came out and had “all this fuss”, but I know that she would have a twinkle in her eye, trying to work out how to make a joke or play a trick to liven up the room, and would also be happy that she brought us all together, to love and support one another, to share stories and songs and to remember.
My Mum hated saying goodbye. She always said it was too final, and I agree.
Until we meet again Friend, Nana, Mum, Angela Faith Jones. Until we meet again.
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