Margaret at Princess Margaret’s
"One of the most interesting memorials I planned was for a woman who was doing chemo the same time as i was in autumn 2006.
a commanding, tall, quite waspy-looking woman somewhere in her 70’s. i call her margaret Margaret here.
I was in Canada’s biggest cancer Hosiptals - named for Queen Elisabeth’s colourful, commpliated sister, PRINCESS mARGARET - for CHEMO FOR stage 4 lymphoma, which had a remission rate after five years of around of 85%. OUR mARGARET had terminally fatal pancreatic cancer and was only doing chemo so that she was well enough to travel to Scandinavian for a cruise…”
this is from David Lowenstein-Vallee’s upcoming Book, “i am (not) Patient: a SURVIVAL GUIDE
She had made all of the arrangements with her lawyer for a basic cremation etc, she even made it clear what would happen if she died on her trip. She didn't want a church service. She didn't want a funeral home. She wanted a party with lots of flowers (that people should take home, she insisted) some of her favourite music, a few people making tributes, lots of great food and champagne, her favourite drink.
Her daughter who was exhaustively supporting her through her battle was great on every front but would not speak a word about what mum wanted after she died.
Over the course of two chemo's we had together (mine was 9 hours over 9 months so i met a lot people) I wrote up an event proposal, like I would for a wedding. We decided that she would give it to her daughter in an envelope when we completed it. The daughter wasn't very pleased to get it and she wasn't very happy with me.
After our second round together and exchanging emails about the party i helped Margaret plan, I wouldn’t hear from her again. The memorial would be in the mid spring, ‘while we still have lilacs but when the peonies are starting” i still remember her saying.
Everything went as planned. Margaret died as she knew she would. I was was invited to the memorial in May but at that point in my recovery, I wasn't well enough to attend.
I got the loveliest note afterwards from the daughter. She was very happy that her mum and I, two conspiring cancer warriors hooked up to IV’s, had colluded.
“It was a hard but beautiful day that made these last hard months a little easier’ for her and the family to bare.
I was back at work, but still feeling the affects of nine months of doctor approved poison. I was struggling with a bride with a big ego and small purse. It was still sad to think of Margaret, especially since I only got to know her at the end of her life. But that day was bright and reading this letter, i realized it was one of the most gratifying things I had a ever done. It wasn’t television. I did it annonymously and didn't take my curtain call. There was no money or awards or celebrities or socialites, all things that i thought made me happy.
Margaret died on the last night of her Baltic cruise as the ship approached Stockholm, per her meticulous arrangements, her body was discovered by her travelling companion as they reached port. Her ashes flew back to Toronto almost the same day she was supposed.
“It was exactly as mother would have wanted it,” the daughter wrote. “My mother died just as she had lived: Beautifully.”
And I think the daughter had made her peace too. Not only did she follow her mother’s wishes to the letter, she was the travelling companion. To the Baltic and finally back home again.