My dear mother Ruth passed away last night after a long period of illness. I was privileged to be alongside her, surrounded by the rest of our family, holding her hand as she slipped peacefully away. I know she is now in the arms of her Saviour, with no more pain or anxiety, and I have faith that one day we will be reunited.

Mum taught me many things for which I can be grateful. Here are three:

Stand up for what you believe in. Mum was quite stubborn and always stood on her principles. When she knew she was right, she was relentless. When a certain head teacher had the temerity to tell her that I would never be academic, he was left red faced with embarrassment. It turned out she was right, and he was so, so hopelessly wrong.

Keep learning. Wherever Mum went, she picked up new skills. In the Shetland Islands she taught herself to make traditional Shetland knitwear and earner an income from the sales. While we were living in the Netherlands, my mother learnt to speak Dutch. She was coached by our next door neighbour and would haggle with the best of them down in the marketplaces.

Fight for the weak. My mother did endless work for charity, making and baking, selling  raising money for those in unfortunate situations. She never stopped caring for those in need and poured her love and compassion into helping others.

There is an incredible sense of loss and sadness right now because she is no longer here, and I will miss a lot, but that sadness is tempered by the knowledge of a life well lived, and one full of love and compassion for others.

Goodnight Mum. See you in the morning.

Ruth W. M. Wheeler 21 August 1930 – 6 April 2019

Goodnight Mum by Steve Wheeler was written in Plymouth, England and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.