TO END… OR NOT TO END…
I cannot quite understand it. Here is this woman, 86 years old, very capable, well educated and articulate, good company and in good health, but who is flying to Switzerland next week to have herself euthanised. No, I don ‘t quite get it. Now, I know she says she has been quite worn down by her bully of a husband, and that talk of a divorce brought on this decision. He is going to drive her to the airport next week. It has been suggested that he is so glad to be rid of her that he is making sure she catches the plane. Some friends have been trying to get her to change her mind on this matter, but to no avail. She is very calm, they say, and determined that this is the best way out of this situation. Their home is worth a lot of money, enough for two smaller, good houses. She would be able to set herself up quite well. And the pension is liberal enough to afford a good living should she need it. It has been suggested that she simply take an overdose here and save the trouble of going to a foreign country. But it is illegal here to commit suicide, while Switzerland, I am informed, is the only place where one can be euthanised if one is well and just wants to end it all. As I said, it is beyond me. Here we are, trying to enjoy the rest of our sometimes sad and difficult lives, endeavouring to keep well, doing our utmost to stay alive and healthy so that we can make the world a better place, remaining cheerful against all odds so that we will be remembered as a happy person…and that those we leave behind feel better for having known us. Am I right to feel this way? Some say that it is good because she feels at peace, and will exit on her own terms. Is it the coward’s way out? Surely not. I consider it is a very brave act…but a bit of a ‘cop out.’ I can understand this action if there was great suffering involved, but to surrender a perfectly healthy life is surely escaping the responsibility that we all owe to our loved ones to do our best for one another, to contribute as best we can during our lives.
LIVING WITH A DISABILITY
I have a granddaughter who has ataxia, a form of cerebral palsy. She has a weakness in her hands, her tongue muscle and in the muscles of one leg. This means she cannot run, her fingers will not grasp smaller objects and her speech is sometimes hard to understand. She...
TRUE STORY: MUM’S FEET
It was during the Great Depression, when money was in short supply, that the collector would visit weekly to pick up a small amount of cash toward the sum that was owed. The two young boys who were sitting at the top of the outside stairs glimpsed the gas man...
HIGH SCHOOL FORMALS
HIGH SCHOOL FORMALS I am hearing about the large sums of money spent on the Senior Formals of some private schools. Perhaps this applies to public schools as well. Or not. One mother said the dress for her daughter cost almost a thousand dollars, as well as many...
REMEMBERING OLD SCHOOL DAYS
How I love reading of the old days in the Tamborine Bulletin! Not only does it inform me; it sometimes takes me back to my childhood at Buccan and my school days at Logan Village. This time, I was transported to the one-teacher school where headmaster Mr Alec Brown...
THE CROWS AT BUCCAN
Recent news about crows menacing humans reminded me of my school days when Marty, Joan and I would walk barefoot the five kilometres from our home on Buccan Hill to the Logan Village School. The first hundred or so metres down the long hill were safe enough, but then...
THE MEAT ANTS ON THE WAY TO SCHOOL
We walked barefoot to school at Logan Village. The gravel road near the Quinzy Creek bridge was sometimes covered in large meat-ant’s nests. These big red ants packed a powerful sting of which we were most aware. Joan and I skirted round the nests, but one day, Marty...
THE SILVER THIMBLE
We were leaving the district. Leaving the farm that had been home to four generations of my father’s family. The Great Depression still raged and times were tough for a small dairy farmer of 1937. They would try their luck in the city. A share farmer was arranged, a...
VALE BARRY HUMPHRIES
What a great entertainer! He has enabled us to enjoy such mirth! Such talent! He will be missed. Years ago, when my daughter Katy was a teenager, we were having a day at the Brisbane Exhibition. We had not long passed through the gates when I almost bumped into this...
YOU ARE JUST STARTING TO LEAN A BIT WHEN YOU HAVE TO BLOODY-WELL DIE!
That’s what my father used to say when he was in his eighties. And now I am at least THINKING it. Yes, it is true. It sometimes takes a lifetime to really understand some issues...or someone. Perhaps it is because when one gets older, one might have more time to...
FAIR EXCHANGE
The doorbell woke me from my midday nap. I groggily answered the front door. The pleasant looking young man smiled at me. ‘My wife and I were going past your place,’ he said, ‘and we noticed all the oranges under the tree. I wondered if you could spare a few? They...