Meet the matriarch of our family, my 97-year-old mother
<p><em><strong>Robyn Lee is in her 70s and lives with two lovable but naughty cats. She has published a book on seniors behaving badly, entitled Old Age and Villainy, and considers herself an expert on the subject. </strong></em></p>
<p>My mother is 97 years old and still going strong, although as she ruefully confesses, her mind is active but her body isn’t. I come from a large family of which mum is the matriarch, which is how I’ll refer to her, or else TM (it’s easier to type). Over the years her sense of humour and pragmatism have given us a good laugh as well as teaching my brothers and me some valued lessons, some of which were rather painful in our childhood!</p>
<p>One of the things TM is very pragmatic about is her eventual demise and we are updated regularly on her will, her funeral (she wishes to be cremated) and other matters regarding that event. Don’t worry, there’s nothing morbid here, quite the reverse.</p>
<p>With one of my brothers as well as myself living in Australia (he has since moved back to New Zealand), TM told us both several times that she didn’t want us to spend the money on attending her funeral. </p>
<p>“I’m not going to know if you’re there or not,” she said to me on one occasion.</p>
<p>“Exactly,” I retorted, “so how are you going to stop us? Besides,” I added, “we want to come for the wake afterwards so we can talk about you.”</p>
<p>I was then threatened with her returning to haunt me!</p>
<p>She had made my youngest brother and my cousin executors of her will for two reasons…they both still lived in close to TM and my cousin was a paralegal so it made sense. After the usual evening wine or three, TM was updating them on her will...again...when my cousin looked at her and said,</p>
<p>“And now, we wait...and we wait...”</p>
<p>When TM related this to me in one of our phone conversations, I predictably reacted with laughter.</p>
<p>“Talk about a black sense of humour,” grumbled The Matriarch. "That's what everyone does when I tell them about that!"</p>
<p>I remember a few years ago, I received a letter from her, which started off, “My dear family,”. </p>
<p>It went on to tell us how much she loved us, how thankful she was to have such a wonderful family and other things in this vein. Alarmed, I promptly rang her to find out what had happened. I had visions of her having been diagnosed with some dreadful illness and being given only a short time to live. When I queried what was wrong, she started to laugh. </p>
<p>Apparently, my brothers and members of my extended family to whom she had also written, had much the same reaction. From what TM said, all she wanted to do was to tell us all how much she loved us, how proud she was of us and to thank us for being there for her. It had an unexpected result in that her phone rang hot with alarmed questions from various family members asking her what was wrong. It was not quite the response she had anticipated.</p>
<p>In the meantime, she'd decided on a couple of songs for her funeral. One of them was “When the Saints go Marching In” by Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, the other “My Way” by Frank Sinatra. When I asked her why she wanted “Saints”, her reply?</p>
<p>“Because I like it.” </p>
<p>Okay, fair enough. Although when she told an acquaintance what she had chosen the reaction was one of horror.</p>
<p>“You can’t have songs like that!” protested the horrified one.</p>
<p>“Why not?” queried TM.</p>
<p>“Oh, no. That’ll never do. I want my family to be absolutely devastated with grief at my funeral and I’m going to have all the sad hymns,” replied the other.</p>
<p>"No,” rejoined TM firmly, “I want my family to remember me in a happy manner. I don’t want them weeping and wailing when I pop my clogs! Therefore, I’m having those two songs, and,” she added, “it’s in my will.”</p>
<p>I’ve been telling her for the last 30 years that only the good die young and at 97, she’s well on the way to proving it. I want to be like her when I grow up.</p>
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