Mary's funeral was an event, the only way Mary would have wanted it. Her daughter, who is the mother of my children, made a heartfelt speech that moved everyone. I would have liked her to meet James. She loved Oliver.
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Maybe you knew Mary as a lecturer at Wits in the music department, you might have heard her on Classic FM, you may have gone to one of her many external lectures, perhaps you were being coached by her or maybe you are one of the many people who call her a very close friend.
I remember meeting Mary for the first time so many years ago. She was at party with her daughter and I happened to be at that party too. She had a presence that you couldn't ignore - a sort of hip and happening confidant. You could tell from the outset that she was special and showed an interest in everyone around her. I have never forgotten that meeting. As it turned out I ended up marrying her daughter a few years later.
Unfortunately Mary died early on Saturday morning (27 Feb, 2010) and it has shaken the hundreds (literally hundreds) of people who regard her as a mentor and close friend. It seems that everyone who meets her regarded her as a close friend.
There will be many tributes written about her over the next few weeks and as I pick up on them I'll tweet them or post them on the blog. But there are things about her that the other tributes won't pick up on - so I'll talk about those.
Mary was diagnosed with melanoma two years ago (just after Oliver was born). The melanoma was quite developed at that point so we knew that she would probably die as a result of it. The doctors couldn't give us a life-expectancy, all they could say was that she could live for three weeks or for three years. At this point Mary went headlong into the treatment going through every type of conceivable cancer related treatment. There was no ways that she was going to allow this thing to get in the way of her relationship with her family and friends. Everyone rallied around her. And it did seem that she was doing very well - in fact at the beginning of the year we were convinced that she might come with us to the States at the end of the year.
Mary the mother
In the last two years Kath would speak to Mary almost every single night for an hour. Mary was an adoring mother and Kath an unconditionally supportive daughter. All those odd little issues that children have with their parents were dealt with - and I think the two became good friends. We spent many long hours with Mary and any parent and child would be fortunate to have had a fraction of that relationship.
Mary the grandmother
My long lasting memories of Mary will be her relationship with Oliver. When we discovered that Kath was pregnant Mary called me with such excitement. She was ecstatic!!! She threw herself into the task of being a grandparent - from buying almost everything a newborn could ever need to ensuring that each of the three grandmothers (Oliver has three) had special names. But this was grade school in comparison to when Oliver actually arrived. She got involved!!! Oliver was spoiled with love, clothes, toys, books, more toys, more clothes (in fact Kath jokes that Mary has kitted Oliver out until mid 2014). Her chronic buying syndrome got so bad that she would keep the toys at her house so that Oliver would have something to play with when he went around there.
Oliver was a few months' old when Mary was diagnosed with cancer. And I think Oliver's presence played a huge role in her fight against this disease. She can now rest knowing full well that she had made a huge impact on the young Oliver - and that we will continue telling him about his extraordinary grandmother.
We are now planning a funeral for her - it looks like we'll need a full time project manager to keep the numerous people who want to help in check. We suspect that Ellis Park might not be big enough to contain the number of people who want to come to this event - trust me, it will be an event.
To me, Mary was a musician (her correct title was Professor Mary Rorich) who had an incredible amount of patience with me playing her my music so that she could teach the correct time signature. She never once dismissed my naive musical tastes and in fact even mentioned Peter Green in the speech she made at our wedding.
The doctor said she was a fighter and she fought hard until the end.
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