Passages: Bruce Durocher II

On Sunday morning at 7 AM, my friend Margaret's husband Bruce passed away after a five-year struggle with colon cancer. Bruce was a film enthusiast of the first order, a reader, a maker, a master of the obscure detail, and a science fiction fan. He always had something he'd want to share. His first instinct was always to be generous, offering help if it seemed to be needed. And he very much loved Margaret.

Bruce went into the hospital last Wednesday with a serious case of jaundice. I visited him on Thursday night at the hospital. We talked about movies. He told me, "I'm glad you came. I've always liked you," which nearly wiped me out right there. He was lucid and present and could carry on a conversation, though obviously in great physical discomfort. I went back to the hospital on Friday evening, and he couldn't say anything except to answer direct questions about his physical state. He was having spasms and a great deal of nausea. By the time I left, the doctor had dosed him up pretty significantly and he was sleeping. He passed away a little more than a day later.

Margaret is with her family for the week; she's in good hands.

As almost always seems to be the case, I feel like there were things I wanted to say and didn't. I don't do well at deathbeds, apparently, but then I suppose no one really does. Or perhaps I was in denial, despite understanding at a fundamental level on Friday night that I was standing at his deathbed. Bruce has always come back from his hospital visits; he seemed to tolerate his cancer treatments better than almost anyone I've seen. Margaret said that up until two weeks ago, his only real symptom was fatigue. It rapidly became clear, though, that he wasn't coming back from this one.

You'll be missed, Bruce. Rest easy, man. You deserve it.

Five things: The circle of life edition

1) Bad sleep: The end of last week was challenging and emotionally exhausting. I had plans for the weekend that I very much wanted to execute on and so I pushed through, but my sleep was poor and Ezekiel didn't help.

2) Road trip and party: On Saturday, I caught a lift with MD and JF south to Portland for a party celebrating the near-year anniversaries of the marriages of MD and JF, DD and WI, and calendulawitch and markjferrari. The party was at WI's parents house, which is situated on a low rise above a river, with beautiful gardens and lots of forest around them. The ranch-style house was gorgeous. We had a delicious potluck dinner on a table decorated with centerpieces from Mark and Shannon's wedding last year. We made s'mores over the firepit. We all talked a lot. I don't think I had nearly enough alcohol. But the company was good, the food quite fine, and the party a reminder that life goes on.

3) Closing the circle: I stayed the night at kateyule and davidlevine's place. We got up early to have breakfast with radiantlisa. I haven't seen her in a year and it was nice to catch up. She looked good; she looked happy, and she's clearly got a good start at starting over again. She returned to me a piece of art that I'd made for jaylake years ago, a collage inside a silver pocket watch case. When I opened the packaging to look at it for the first time in years, I discovered that he'd attached a chain and fob to it so that, apparently, he could wear it like a regular watch. For some reason, something about that discovery lent closure to a lot of things I've been feeling and thinking about Jay over the last year. I need to find the right place to display the watch in the house now.

4) Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell: D&K and I watched the first installment of BBC America's production of the eponymous novel. It's a handsome adaptation and I enjoyed it quite a bit. I'm delighted that it's on a cable channel I actually can watch, and I'm looking forward to the next episode. With something like Game of Thrones on HBO, to which I do not subscribe, my options are to wait a year to see the season, rely on the kindness of friends (and who has time for this?) or rely on less reputable means to see the series. I've done this last before but it has lost its appeal. I was glad to be able to watch it with D&K. Our impressions of the piece were similar: good production, good performances, and a nice, economical adaptation of a book with a reputation for being a little too long for its actual content.

5) Light!: After a hiccup in delivery, I've finally received the new light fixture for the kitchen. JF has kindly offered to install it for me next week. It's a pretty thing, and I'm looking forward to enjoying its light (and to not sitting under a bare bulb as though I were in an interrogation room anymore).

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Note to self: next things to post about:
--Ancestry.com and Grandpa Morris' letters to Grandma Sadie
--The Night Circus

Family archeology: Letters from my grandfather

I recently rediscovered a looseleaf book full of acid-free pages that I put together to store a treasure trove of pictures and correspondence from my father's side of the family. Last night and tonight, I've taken some time to scan and transcribe some of the correspondence therein. It's fascinating to read my paternal grandfather's letters to my grandmother before they were married. He is a devoted suitor, an entirely different man than the one I knew as a child. Most of the letters date from 1915, the year they became engaged to be married--100 years ago! I can't seem to load an image of the letter that I wanted to share (I'm getting a file size error, though it's no more specific than that), but here's the transcript. It mainly concerns the acquisition of invitations for their engagement party. (ETA: Actually, the letter isn't dated. It was in an envelope that, as it turned out, belonged to a different letter, matched by dates. This letter may concern invitations to either their engagement party or their wedding. It's unclear.)

Dear Little Girl.

I just received a telephone message from Mr. Bernstein that he will not be able to entertain me to-night on account of feeling very ill; therefore you will not have to hurry in coming over to the house to-night.

About the invitations. The kind that we ordered was not made up on account of the price. He wanted $6.00 for 100 and I couldn’t see into it. Therefore a prettier and plainer card was ordered. That is the arrangement my father made.

Sadie, I’d rather give you the other couple of dollars and have you buy a better hat or a better shirt or anything else that would be necessary for you to wear. Now I hope this will be satisfactory for you as I think it is a very good idea. They will be thrown away, the good invitations as well as the other.

My best regards to your folks and Sophie.
I remain as ever
Morris
Lots of love to my dear little girl

Now, there are any number of things about this letter that I love, but the thing I love about it the most is that this is my grandfather, a man whom I knew to be cranky and bitter and generally pretty unhappy. To see him write such a letter with obvious care and thought, and to sign it the way he did, is just amazing to me. At the same time, that second paragraph contains an interesting contradiction. My grandfather says that he couldn't see the price, but that his father made a different arrangement--so who made the decision to get less expensive cards, my grandfather or my great grandfather? (I should note that I have one of the invitations--the card is plain as can be, no adornment, but of a good, thick stock.) My great grandfather had a far worse reputation than my grandfather did, so I wonder if a choice presented as a pound-wise decision was actually someone pinching pennies. I can't be sure, but the generosity of the offer from my grandfather to my soon-to-be grandmother is very sweet.

And here's the invitation (click to embiggen):