Terminus Est

[smokingboot]

Maybe a big post, maybe not. Angsty though, and very heavy, but this is a marker and I need to write it down.

So. My mother is a paranoid schizophrenic, untreated, with many years of the illness behind her and a delusional world more real to her than this one. Occasionally she had what seemed to be psychotic episodes. Now, she is entirely gone. Gone physically too, she left the country and her flat, and the housing association wanted it back. They were told (presumably by a neighbour) that she wasn't there anymore, so they told housing benefit who stopped her rent. But the housing association wanted her/me to pay the rent anyway. How? They knew she wasn't their tenant anymore, that's why they told the benefits people!

My mother knows nothing of this of course. She sends panic stricken postcards from Europe begging me to empty the flat or 'everything must be lost.' Gritting my teeth, I spent months trying to get a copy of the keys - housing association didn't have one, little brother did but first couldn't find it and then couldn't get over his Asperger's Syndrome/nervous breakdown/lazy arse crapness to post them to me. I got to her flat only to find his keys wouldn't have helped- British Gas had broken in and changed the locks. A gentleman from British Gas came and broke in again for me. And there I was.

Every paper ever, meticulously filed, my degrees, her pension details, premium bonds, divorce papers, NVQ details...letters to Tony Blair and the Queen about how the watcher was destroying her, placards about the torment - that word three times in one paragraph - the man who made her put her head in the microwave, who introduced various diseases into her system, who injected her with isotopes, babblebabblebabble coherently written by a screaming mind. Were it not for the powerful love and friendship of larians who took a day off and travelled 200 miles to help me, I would have got nowhere.

Little house trying not to be tragic, tiny things, a mother of pearl spoon she loved,serving spoons shaped like geese, pictures of flowers, pretty little things, perfume bottles, a scrupulously clean place, the place of a neat dead person. Plastic sheets covering the lights, so the watcher could not beam things into her mind. Gaffa tape round the corners of the room. So many photographs. Why bother? The past is not our friend.

Things bagged, things done, I said goodbye to the house and thanked it for trying for all those years. I will burn those papers that have no use, and if she doesn't want her lladro porcelains I'll sell them on Ebay. I recall shaking the hand of the housing association representative and apologising to her for all the trouble. I joked, saying that if things went well, she would never see me again. 'Oh,' she said wistfully, 'You looked just like your mother when you said that.'

Comments

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

hmm...I guess Im just feeling a bit let down right now and jaded over parents myself.
One of the reasons I have not being doing much art lately has been that we are both trying to cope with a sudden influx of stuff from my dads place as he moves to London soon-its been a scramble to rescue things we value or need from the loft before he gives or throws them away (we have already lost some of our stuff that way). A lot has been going on emotionally regarding him as well-tons of stress and worry because he is acting very irrationally (even to the point of being a bit dangerous, as well as financially crazy). We have just got to a point where we really don't care about him much any more and just want to rescue what we can.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Sometimes rescuing what you can is all there is left. But every act of creation takes the past through a process of alchemy, turns it into something unique and new. Strange to think of yourself as a wizard of such ability. Love art!

Hugs to both of you, sounds like it's been harsh.

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

You are so right about the alchemy-one of the reasons (along with keeping some for my brother, doing some genealogy research and holding onto memories) I am rescuing all the old family photos is because I want to use them in art (once scanned).

A few family relics of no value other than sentimental may become assemblages- I have some old pipes of my Grandfathers (who died before I was born, but who I am apparently very like) that I want to make into some art. They were another thing I rescued. I remember using them as props when I was playing/little and handling (and smelling) them brings back some good childhood memories I want to enshrine and preserve.

It IS a form of magic :)
Thats the flip side of what has been a rotten last few months (and will probably continue that way for a while alas, at least until my dad actually moves/gets married etc). I have access now to the family past in a way I didn't before (it made it not only easier, but logical, to virtually raid the old family home for things).

How are you managing with things now? Has the act of sorting your mums places left a bad taste overall, or have you some good points?

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Not so bad thank you...there are some reminders of my travels in Nepal, Egypt etc, a white and pink soapstone chess set from Africa, two brass carriages drawn by elephants and horses from Nepal, and most especially a statuette of Ganesh, the Elephant god of India, beautiful and intricate, carved in wood. Other things too, little reminders of the things I accomplished by myself. She had looked after everything, wrapped every chess piece in plastic and paper with patient care, nothing chipped, nothing lost. I am a terribly careless sloven in comparison. It was a tender reminder of the care she took in all things.