Auntie B

This week, Derek’s beloved Auntie Barb died just four months shy of her 96th birthday. She was Derek’s Dad’s older sister who worked for 40 years at BMO and looked after her Mother, Derek’s Gram.  She lived as a single lady, although she had many friends and suitors. 

Barbara wore loud prints, teased her long hair up high and wore an equally loud scarf around it, as well as gobs of costume jewelry. She had a robust laugh that could stop chatter in a restaurant.(My paternal Grandma had a similar laugh – it was wonderful!) She loved shopping at The Bay in Lachine, Quebec, where all of the cashiers knew her name. We knew we’d get Quality Street candy and some sort of Bay clothing in a Christmas package she sent every year. When she was healthy, she would travel to London on the train with her little terrier, Wee MacGregor, in tow, or she would hurry back to look after him. Her neighbours and fellow painters loved her. She was magnetic. A few of her paintings have hung in our home for many years. She had real talent.

Although her many nieces and nephews visited as often as they could, Auntie B’s decline was first noticed by her next door neighbour. Procrastination became clutter and clutter became hoarding. It happened fairly quickly and the neighbour noticed that AB was avoiding getting medical care.

Wearing Hazmat suits, the men of the family emptied her house, filled dumpster after dumpster with junk and kept her most treasured items for her room. They took Wee Mac to get a much-needed shampoo and clipping. He was blind and deaf but his sniffer still worked perfectly. When he was brought to her, she was adamant that he wasn’t her dog. He snuffled in her purse, trying to root out the expected Milkbones, and she was kind, but she didn’t believe he was Wee Mac. It was then we realized how much she had changed.

When we first moved her into a beautiful residence in Lachine, she still exhibited a lot of her legendary feistiness. Riding up in the elevator, she held out her arm and kicked her leg up as high as her hand. “I can still do that!”, she said. Her namesake, my sister-in-law, and I went shopping on AB’s behalf at her favourite Bay store. We bought her everything from a couch to a Bay wool blanket to teacups and cookies. She was well cared for in the residence, and it was a wonderful situation while it lasted. Then as she began to deteriorate, the home called to say she had to go somewhere that provided more care. So we brought her to London – Parkhill, actually – where she lived out her days in a lovely place with genuinely caring staff. We would take turns buying a bottle of her favourite brandy and every evening, a nurse would pour her a “snort” which elicited her biggest smile of the day.

She didn’t recognize anyone for the last couple of years but she was always cordial and willing to be taken out for Chinese food, a roll down the hallway in a wheelchair, or to go through an old photo album and view pictures of her brother Reg, whom she did recall. We went through her old papers and found letters Reg wrote to her during the war, that started with the endearment, “Dear Fatstuff”. They always had a joke or two going on between them. Typical brother and sister stuff. We also discovered birth certificates and marriage licenses for relatives from a couple of generations back. It was a treasure trove of family history. She kept every card, every photo, every letter from family.

Perhaps the best thing she did was to have her affairs in order. She had an up-to-date will, powers of attorney and other legal documents prepared. No real decisions had to be made; just follow the instructions. It’s a huge load off those who are left behind.

We did learn the difference between the Quebec and Ontario governments when it comes to long-term care. There is no such thing as a “cap” in Quebec. It’s all privately run and they can charge whatever they want. If you can’t afford it, you’re out of luck. We toured some of the cheap homes and they were frightening. The poor in Quebec are warehoused in crumbling old homes with substandard care.

In Ontario, long-term care rates are capped and if you can’t afford even basic care, they’ll take you in anyway. When the home in Lachine called to say come and get her, they meant it. Everything was a scramble – hire an ambulance that travels long distance, have someone pack her things at that end and hope she isn’t too uncomfortable on the trip – which she wasn’t. Still, it’s a harsh way to treat a human being, especially one that’s paid thousands of dollars a month for several years. But hey, there’s another warm body waiting to come in so you’ve got to make room.

We all loved Auntie B. She lived out loud. She was artsy, she sang and she loved classical music. And there was that great laugh. She left behind some great memories. As her eldest nephew said, “Don’t rest in peace, Auntie Barb. Light up the room! Get ’em singing and make ’em smile!”