SOF Sift A column in which Network members think out loud about SOF and their own quest.
Post Mortem My wife and I each lost a parent last year. Early in the year I lost my mother, aged ninety. Later in the year my wife, Margaret, lost her father, aged 97. Our families have been very different but the outcomes have been so similar.
My side of the family enjoyed a mixed religious background. Mother had been high Anglican but that had long since lapsed, although she retained a vague worry about God and latterly cleaned the brass in her village church. My sister Sarah and I had been through evangelical conversions in our teens. Mine had long since lapsed. Sarah’s has meandered into a vague high, liberal Anglicanism. She is a Reader and likes to regale us with the high moral ground of her sermons, and hates to be challenged. We each lived two hours’ drive from mother.
Sarah and I were joint executors of the Will but on the day mother died Sarah was in hospital undergoing a hip replacement; she was out of commission for six weeks. Margaret and I dealt with the immediate wave of phone calls, the post-mortem, alerting our solicitor, cleaning mother’s cottage for sale and arranging her funeral at the crematorium. Naturally, this involved many three-day trips. We couldn’t live there since we had to manage our own home lives. Most people will understand this and the usual problems around probate, multiple bank accounts, two pensions, complicated share-holdings and tax. Mercifully, the Will was straightforward.
Sarah’s three children offered to help. We suggested cleaning and gardening. They never came apart from a nod at the crematorium. Sarah recovered quickly from her operation. I anticipated some assistance, suggesting she take on the marketing of the property. Instead she went on holiday, while expecting updates from me. When she finally visited mother’s cottage with her elder daughter, it was carefully arranged not to coincide with one of our visits and certainly not to work. They came to mark the items they wanted but they couldn’t remove anything:
Margaret and I had found a local estate agent who needed the house fully dressed for viewing.
The house sale finally went through. Sarah and daughter slipped across to remove their chosen items, not to help with disposing of the mass of unwanted furniture, clothes, ornaments and paraphernalia to charities, council or the interminable tip-trips. They did not even open the mail. Sarah thought I enjoyed opening letters.
As autumn deepened, the business was concluded.
I had tried to be meticulous in executing the Will and ensuring Sarah had her half but she had the temerity to try to manipulate the estate away to children and grandchildren. She failed. There seemed to be very little of the moral high ground she proclaimed. Our communications, which had become shorter and sharper, ceased.
As winter came on, Margaret’s father died. He had been a member of the Brethren. Margaret and brother Stuart had been brought up in fear of hellfire. They made childhood professions of faith. Mother and father made mirror Wills in the 1980’s. Their children were treated equally, although Stuart had quickly overthrown his teenage faith, married and divorced, gained a new partner and had a daughter. Margaret kept the faith while her work took her all over the country until she met me, when we married.
Margaret’s mother was already dead, then father died. Stuart had always lived within five miles of them and assumed responsibility in their old age. As an accountant he looked after their finances with very close care. We visited when we could but when Margaret offered help at their deaths she was refused.
Father’s funeral by a freezing graveside was marked by a speech from a Brethren acquaintance speaking of father’s deep faith, his expectation of heaven and his love for his family.
Two days later a letter arrived from Stuart for Margaret. There had been a new Will: everything went to Stuart’s daughter. Margaret had been kept in the dark for ten years about machinations between father and son, as patriarchal power passed on. Stuart assumed total financial control as trustee and executor, nominally with his daughter, but neither mother, sister, wife, partner nor daughter ever had a voice. Stuart offered crumbs from the table but Margaret was incensed. Normal communications ceased as legal proceedings ensued. As I type, matters are getting interesting.
How death and money can damage families! If you are likely to die, please arrange a simple Will and don’t keep it secret. 23 Sofia 102 Christmas December 2011 Philip Feakin reviews Christian Atheist: