With all the media-bashing yesterday over published reports that a suspect had been arrested in the Boston Marathon bombing, it was quite interesting to watch a PBS Newshour segment on the issue last night. JEFFREY BROWN: …And we’re joined from Boston once again tonight by David Boeri, a reporter for WBUR Public Radio. He’s been [...]
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I was digging through boxes of old records this morning looking for an obscure record needed to finish this year’s tax return, and found a totally unrelated note written in my father’s hand. It’s an old-fashioned verse, followed by his explanation. I was surprised by it, as I never thought of my father as very [...]
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No, I’m not talking about spiritual continuity after this life is over. I’m talking about the bureaucratic tasks that remain for those the departed leave behind. It’s the front end of that bureaucratic mess that I’m bogged down in now. Even when someone has done extensive preparations, as my mother did before her death last [...]
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I had to stop when I ran into another photo of my mother and her sister, Marguerite. Marguerite was a couple of years older. She’s the bigger girl in the top photo. She was seven. My mom was five. Marguerite left Hawaii before I was born and lived her adult life on the mainland, stopping [...]
Tags: Helen Yonge Lind
You may die, but your stuff lives on. The last few days brought to mind comedian George Carlin’s riff about stuff: “Your house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it.” You can say that again. It’s what we’re dealing with as we try to get my mother’s stuff of all kinds [...]
Tags: Helen Yonge Lind
Not long ago, my mother had noticed that the mainland fruit company, Harry & David, had a sale on their Royal Riviera Pears. These are my mother’s favorites and, despite sometimes hefty shipping charges and her congenital frugality, they regularly appeared on holidays, special occasions, and of course when they were on sale. In this [...]
Tags: Helen Yonge Lind
My mother died this morning at about 7 a.m. in a hospice house in the back of Palolo Valley. The first photo was taken on Kahala Beach in late 1941. The second taken on Easter Sunday, 2012, during a visit to our home in Kaaawa. Before her recent decline, she wrote her own obituary. Here’s [...]
Tags: Helen Yonge Lind
Another morning with no overnight telephone call from the hospice house in the back of Palolo Valley where my mother has been for the past week. It means she’s still alive. Barely. On Friday, I was sure she would not survive the night. On Saturday, I was sure she would certainly not survive another night. [...]
