GOODBYE MUM!

 

Mum and me

Hello all,

It is with a very heavy heart that I make the following announcement.

On Tuesday, 25th November, our family said goodbye to our mother, Soultana Papadopoulos, aged ninety-five. In recent years she had been living in an aged care facility, where dementia slowly took more and more from her — her memory, her hearing, her eyesight, and eventually much of the joy she once found in life. She had reached a point where she no longer wished to continue, and we, her family, hoped only for her passing to be peaceful. In that sense, her death was timely and gentle, something she was ready for.

And yet, the sense of loss is immense. Even knowing it was her time does not soften the ache of her absence. Grief arrives in waves I cannot predict, and there are moments when I am simply inconsolable. I write these words to honour her life, to honour the complexity of loving and losing, and to find my way through the quiet emptiness she leaves behind.

I can understand why some people might be skeptical when a daughter speaks glowingly of her mother. But as the eldest, I was the one who received most of the phone calls over the past week from her contemporaries, friends, and relatives — from Greece, where she was born and lived until she was thirty-four, and from those who knew her here in Australia. Every single person, without exception, spoke of the same qualities. They remembered her loving nature, her generosity, the broadness of her smile, and the unmistakable warmth of her heart. They told stories of her kindness, her humour, and the fun she brought into their lives.

Mum had many talents — she was a gifted dressmaker, an enthusiastic knitter, a wonderful cook, and a devoted gardener. Her garden never followed a theme or a carefully planned style; she simply planted anything she could fit into the soil. The result was a glorious profusion of colour and vibrancy, a joyful chaos that reflected her own spirited nature. Try as we might, we could never convince her to use less water, so in the end we installed a large rainwater tank just to keep her from doing the wrong thing. Her garden became the showpiece of the street, a living testament to her energy, her persistence, and her love of beauty in all its forms.  Mum had a natural flair for putting flowers together that looked beautiful and there was always a vase with brightly coloured flowers on the kitchen table.

She lived in a cul-de-sac in Northcote where all her neighbours loved her. And why wouldn't they? She shared her baking with them, always had treats for the children and she grew enough vegetables to share with all of them.

Mum lived with us, after a serious stroke, for nearly ten years and, during that time she saw, literally, hundreds of ikebana arrangements in the house. But she never commented on any of them, which I found surprising. However, she absolutely loved the miniature arrangements. So, today, I made one in her honour.

With all the grief and the busyness of organising the funeral, and with calls and messages coming from well-meaning friends and relatives, I found that spending an hour, quietly working on the miniature arrangements was quite calming. So I made a second one—just for myself.

Bye for now,

Emily