Theresa Chilton 1926 – 2020

Five minutes isn’t enough to do justice to Mum’s long life, a woman who was born in the year of the General Strike, who could remember Coventry being bombed in 1940, and  who lived under eighteen prime ministers and four monarchs. So I thought I would choose just a handful of stories to tell you.
 
Mum was a resourceful, uncomplaining hard worker, who never pined for something better than she had been given.  In 1955, she moved into a cold, empty house in Langley, with Dad, a baby (me), two chairs, a packing case for a table, and a bed. In 1956, she found herself with a toddler, a second baby (Mary), coal still rationed, and no hot water to wash nappies from time to time. She never complained.
The annual holiday (to Bournemouth, for many years in a row) was a tour de force of organisation. Three, later four children, a pushchair, all the luggage in one suitcase, all packed into Dad’s 1955 Ford Popular, for a week of sunshine and picnic lunches in the hired beach hut. We always had sunshine, other people liked to book their holidays when we had ours because of our luck with the weather. A pity the sun didn’t suit all the pale skinned, freckly children, so sunburn was a constant feature. One year, she hit on a space saving masterplan, and packed the entire family’s shoes in her shopping trolley…and then left it behind. That was an expensive holiday, as we all had to purchase another pair!
When we moved from Langley to Bleakhouse Road, she gave free rein to us children to decorate the kitchen. It was 1972, so we chose orange for the walls and black for the ceiling. Her own mother came to visit, was appalled, and said so, loudly. Mum’s opinion is not recorded…
She never learned to drive a car, in spite or because of Dad’s best efforts, and so was an expert on public transport. She knew every bus route and timetable, and later, had a loyalty card with the local taxi company. During the course of her life, she must have walked thousands of miles, quite a few of them pushing a wheelchair, either containing Dad, as his health declined, or other disabled friends or parishioners. She developed a taste for travel in her later years, and visited her Dutch penfriend, and Paris, as well as taking part in several Lourdes pilgrimages, travelling by train and air.  She once went to buy a suitcase for her travels, accompanied by Rosie, who had filled a trolley with some groceries. Passers-by stared as Mum arrived with the suitcase and started to load the groceries in, for ease of carriage. They thought she was some sort of pensioner bag lady. The accident which perhaps marked the beginning of her decline was on the UP escalator at Snow Hill Station, after a day out with Claire. She was bruised every shade of blue and purple, though not a single bone was broken. But her confidence was damaged, and she found going out alone difficult after that.
She had little interest in modern technology or communication. Computers and the internet were not for her, and a mobile phone that did anything more than make calls would have been wasted on her. She once hesitated to answer her phone because ‘she wouldn’t have been able to hear the caller over that noise the phone was making’. Towards the end, she struggled with the television, which seemed mysteriously to lose its tuning, or to become insensitive to the remote control. Her favourite programme was Countdown; she proudly announced she could still solve the number puzzle, without a pencil and paper, on a day when her carers thought she might be a little muddled.
Throughout her life, she loved to cook, and we loved to eat it all, especially the puddings and cakes. On one occasion, an exuberant family member managed to tip a whole butterscotch tart down the back of the dining table. Such a sad loss. On another, she made a trifle to bring to a family party at my house on New Year’s Day. The suspension in Dad’s Fiat 126 (or maybe it was the two stroke engine?) caused the decorative cherries to descend through the custard, leaving only craters.
We always imagined Mum was fairly abstemious in her food and drink habits, but we’ve just found out she was partial to Drambuie in her youth. A block of Old Jamaica chocolate, fetched from the Outdoor, across the road from where we lived in Langley, was an occasional treat to accompany a mountain of ironing, and in her later years, a bottle of Baileys was often to be found in her flat for a Happy Coffee. No dinner was complete without a pudding, and no day could begin without breakfast.
She loved to read, and instilled in us a love of reading too. Bedtime stories continued long past the age at which it might be considered the children were too old. The way home from school lay past the public library, and we went there every week. In her early forties, she went back to college to do some more ‘O’ Levels, and in much more recent times, she was a member of the local telephone book club, run by the mobile library service. She had well defined tastes in literature, and films come to that; nothing to frighten the horses, nor, as she saw it, pointless swearing.
She came from a family of runners, and had been something of an athlete herself, in her youth. She remained interested in sport all her life, following the fate of West Bromwich Albion, enjoying a day trip to the test match, and watching the Olympics. Tennis didn’t seem to engage her, possibly because, having only one functioning eye, she couldn’t play it herself. At the test match, she was seated behind a large lady, who had brought an enormous picnic hamper. Mum, being the size of a bird, and with an appetite to match, had a low opinion of those who overindulged, and said so, quite loudly, although she thought it was sotto voce.
She could always be relied upon to step up to the plate. She was fiercely loyal and strongly principled, and gave help without question. She kept her friends close; her friendship with Florrie Boulter began in 1960, and ended only with Florrie’s death. She delivered one grandchild, looked after several more at  times of crisis great and small, and was a focus of constancy for all of us. We will miss her greatly. But equally, we know that her life had become unbearable to her, who loved to do things, to go out, to visit the theatre, to care for others, to attend her church, to see her grandchildren, and latterly, great grandchildren. When she could no longer do any of these, she knew it was time to leave.
A few words from Tennyson:
Twilight and evening bell, And after that, the dark!
And may there be no sadness or farewell
When I embark.
For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.