[Oe List ...] Marge Kloepfer

[mhampton at att.net]

G'day, Frank,

I remember you well from Adelaide days.

Your witness brought tears to my eyes.

Love and Light,

Grace and Peace,

mary hampton

-------------- Original message from "frank bremner" <fjbremner at hotmail.com>: -------------- 


> Dear Mark and Jenelle 
> 
> Thank you for your reflections. It's given me some things to do as I wite 
> some journal jottings about death, about Death (who in Terry Pratchett's 
> novels rodes a white horse called Binky), and particular deaths. 
> 
> The particular deaths in past years were my mother Hilda, a cousin Jim, and 
> Stuart, the husband of a cousin of my mother - all in the same week, 
> scattered across Australia - back in 2001. Mum died on Anzac Day, a day 
> symbolic (as Jim Bishop has been known to tell) of folly, failure, mateship 
> and resurrection. 
> 
> 
> [An aside: Noel and I were driving Suzanne's VW along the banks of the 
> Delaware River in Philadelphia. It was April 25 1980. The car ran out of 
> gas ("Petrol, as you call it in Australia" said Al Gore recently an our 
> ABC-TV's "Enough Rope" - I was touched that he acknowledged the subtlties of 
> cultural difference) and we fund a callbox and phoned the auto club. 
> 
> "Just like Anzac Day", I said. "What?" asked Noel. I started to explain, 
> but then over WXPN, the radio station of the University of Pennsylvania, 
> came Scotsman-come-Australian Eric Bogle singing the original version of his 
> song "And the Band played Waltzing Matilda". I collapsed in a weeping mess. 
> And then explained. 
> 
> Within a month I was back "home". Just recently I have re-read one of JWM's 
> talks in which he talked about his pride in being an American (or 
> USAmerican, as Methodist theologian Leonard Sweet prefers), and made some 
> notes about why "I still call Australia home". Steve Irwin, Peter Allen son 
> of the "Tenterfield Saddler"- how different are some of our heroes!] 
> 
> 
> Then it was cousin Bob, the closest thing I ever had to a brother in my 
> teenage years - a PhD (Physics) genius - struck down by Huntington's. A 
> year later his father Norm, his heart finally broken by life's events and a 
> heart weakened by malaria caught in PNG with the RAAF in WWII. 
> 
> Then it was Graham, a kindergarten, high school, uni, church youth group and 
> army reserve mate - Hodgkingson's. Denise, wife of another mate of similar 
> background, one day younger than me. - of a sudden heart attack. The other 
> day it was George, from the 1A/2A/3A/4A/5A stream at school - i had planned 
> to invite him to my 60th party. You expect Syd, our Chemistry teacher - the 
> other day at 92 - but not George! 
> 
> Then Gwen, wife of Norm, mother of Bob. A death notice and a private 
> funeral with only her nuclear family - "She was pretty strong on that", said 
> remaining son Trevor on the phonefrom Sydney . "She said she'd become her 
> own person since Norm died", I commented. "Yeah", said Trevor, "She had 
> this to-do list on her dresser which included phoing you to take her 
> shopping." 
> 
> And Leslie, girlfiend of 1972 or thereabouts. We went to the concert 
> version of Jesus Christ Superstar together. She married a farmer in the 
> district where where she first went teaching. Died of bowel cancer. I read 
> about it in the newspaper at 2.00 am of the day of the funeral. Don 
> (another cousin) and Diane went up country to the funeral - they had worked 
> the next farm - and forgot that I knew Les! Pat and Kate, through whom I 
> met Les, went up. No-one asked me whether I wanted a lift. 
> 
> And on it goes. Vera, Mum's sister, is the last of the aunts and uncles. 
> 
> When contemporaries go, "before their time" (whose time?), it reminds us of 
> death sitting on our shoulder. How am I eating? How am I exercising? 
> Should I outline my projects before plunging in too deeply, just in case 
> someone else ....? 
> 
> "I wasn't expecting you" he said to the cloaked figure in the doorway. 
> 
> "NO-ONE EVER DOES" (his words are always in upper case) is the reply. 
> 
> 
> 
> Again, thanks for the item in the Dialogue. It will help me write some late 
> condolence letters. 
> 
> Cheers 
> 
> Frank Bremner 
> South Australia 
> 
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