Toni Jordan’s mother gambled fast, ferociously, without any sense of fun. The author has come to realise she was dreaming of a bigger life
M
y mother, Margaret, died in 2018 at 75. It was a good death, all things considered. The very end was savage, as endings often are, but she was in her own home and on her own two feet until the final week. For a woman who’d smoked two packs a day all her adult life, who’d never exercised or even walked to the shops, who refused to drink water (“I’d spew!”) and lived on Coca-Cola, paté on toast, jubes and green olives from a jar – considering all that, she did OK.
During my mother’s final days, I had it easy. My sister, Lee, lived closer and is, to be honest, a more nurturing person. She’s caring. Patient. Lee is also better with money than me, but I thought I should at least attempt to help – so at the end, I took charge of Mum’s bank accounts. She lived on the pension and died with a run-down brick veneer villa unit in an over-50s complex, an old car worth close to nothing, and a small amount of cash.
We were surprised she’d left that much. Yes, she’d worked full-time for 50 years, six days a week, and through much of the 70s and early 80s made close to $40,000 a year – or almost $250,000 in today’s money. Once she owned a beautiful home in Brisbane, on a huge block, in a tree-lined street. She took three holidays that I can recall: twice to Melbourne to visit me, and once to Cairns. She never held a passport. Her best dress came from Myer; everything else was from Kmart. She never went to the theatre or even the movies; she didn’t eat in restaurants or drink alcohol. She left no expensive jewellery or furniture, she gave nothing to charity, she wore no makeup, she had no fancy tastes in anything.
