Category: Mom’s health chronicles

Sept. 9: I’m sure that times will come when I am more sad, but since the funeral on Friday, I’ve just been tired.  So very sleepy.  I feel like the pool that is my well of energy had the plug at the bottom pulled out, and I am calmly feeling the water pour out.  I’m almost looking forward to it all draining out, leaving me languid and limp.  Or maybe that’s already happened.  In any case, it’s going to take me a little while to physically, mentally, and emotionally recover from the last month.

I already miss Mom lots.  I just changed my American Girl, Kirstin’s, clothes from her summer to her fall outfit, and I have a painful pit in my stomach knowing that I can’t talk to Mom about it.  She always liked hearing about what clothes Kirstin was wearing.  On the other hand, maybe now I don’t have to tell her.  She just knows in whatever way she is right now.

Maretta’s future mother-in-law, Marilyn Zilic, sent me the following prayer when we were at HospiceCare.  I had heard it before, and it is a nearly perfect interpretation of where I feel like Mom is right now:

Hopi Prayer

Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there.
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on the ripened grain.
I am the gentle Autumn’s rain.
When you awaken in the morning hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there.
I did not die.

Sept. 9: I feel so relieved and peaceful now that the various visitations and church services for Mom are complete.  As we drove home from the cemetery on Friday afternoon, I felt limp and relaxed and so very relieved and emotionally drained…quite a mix of emotions.
From Saturday, September 1 through the morning of September 6 I had been working harder and more focused-ly than I usually consider possible.  We all so wanted the events on Thursday and Friday to do Mom justice.  We wanted to honor and celebrate and mourn her in a way that would help people get a whole picture of the person she is (was…I’m still working on the past tense thing).
Pictures of the Bethel visitation and prayer service and the reception at Terry’s are in the gallery.
Pictures of the St. Peter’s visitation, funeral, and the burial are also in the gallery.

On Thursday, I think we were all surprised at how many people poured through Bethel for the visitation.  The room was absolutely full of beautiful flowers (see many of them in their own album in the gallery).  Several teachers from DeForest were there, many, many of Mom’s relatives, friends from far and near, oodles of Mom’s co-workers from American Girl, even more of Dad’s colleagues from the Republican Party…it was stunning.  And exhausting.
I thought the prayer service that Pastor White was nice.  Mom would have really liked the cloth that was used to cover her casket.  It was Williamsburg-esque.

After the prayer service, we headed back to Terry’s for a yummy dinner prepared by Lisa.  It was nice to have more of a social opportunity to interact with some of the people who had traveled to town to help remember Mom.  And the delicious desserts were an added bonus.
I drove home that night exhausted and in some degree of disbelief that we had the full actual funeral to get through the next day.

Friday morning dawned gray and rainy.  We met at St. Peter’s at 8:30 and saw that Ryan Funeral Home had again done a nice job of setting up all the tables of memorabilia to showcase Mom’s rich life.  Mom’s casket was again open and set up in the center of St. Peter’s church.  It was quite strange to be in a space that was so very familiar and yet doing something that felt so bizarre and in some ways so terribly wrong…saying goodbye to our mom.

Just a note on the open casket concept.  I think it’s nice that people get an opportunity to see a person when they are dead.  I can imagine that it is hard to really accept that someone is dead when the last time you saw them they were fully alive and healthy.  But I really am weirded out by the artificialness of the embalmed body.  For me (and I know that I’m a weird biologist-who-likes-the-grittiness-of-life-and-death), I’d much prefer the old fashioned parlor viewing that occurred right after the death.  And for a burial, I’d love to have a green burial.  I like the idea of washing and tending to a body when the person has died, but I didn’t at all like seeing Mom the way she was made up and posed in her casket.  It just didn’t look or feel like her.  And I found that to be pretty disconcerting.  It also made it a little easier to let go, though.  I don’t feel like any of Mom is left in her body.  What made her her has gone elsewhere, so saying goodbye and burying her was easier that way.

I thought that the funeral service was really nice.  I keep finding myself humming the hymn “How can I keep from singing,” which we sung half way through.  My favorite aspect of the whole set of events was the time of sharing that came after the Catholic mass.  My sweet brother Joe helped to MC, and several people spoke.  I plan to get electronic versions of their comments so I can share them on this website.  Dad started it out, followed by Mary Read, Nancy McElmurry, Paula Kopp, Terry Haller, Heather Lerner, and last, Joe.  For me, it was incredibly moving (I went through a pile of Kleenex), joyful, and painted a full picture of my wonderful mom.  I hope that those who attended left feeling like they knew and loved her better.

We had a luncheon at St. Peter’s following the reception.  I had asked that some of Mom’s crowd-pleasing dishes be made, including tatertot casserole and macaroni & cheese & tuna & peas.  I also figured that Mom would have really liked lemon squares made with real lemons, brownies, and Minute Maid lemonade.  After the sad and joyous funeral, it was nice to wander around and talk with some of the many people who had come to pay respects to my mom.

Sometime during the funeral, the sun came out, and the day turned beautiful.  A somewhat smaller group processed from St. Peter’s Church, up Highways CV and 51 to the Windsor cemetery.  There wasn’t a cloud in the sky above us when they moved Mom’s casket from the car onto the grave site.  I stayed until the casket was lowered into the ground and the vault was lowered down as well.  Dad stayed until she was all tucked in.

It’s a beautiful cemetery.  There are photos in the gallery from our visit out there earlier in the week.  It will be a nice place to visit.

Margot and I first met in the fall of 1968. We had one of those friendships that just happens and is a gift from God. It was like we had always been friends. Over the years whether we talked daily or not for two months we always picked up where we left off.
I lived in the Episcopal Church Rectory and  had to answer the phone either St. Andrews Rectory, Mary Culver Speaking or just Mary Culver speaking. Ashland was a small town and I was amazed that anyone wanted to be best friends with a Pk ( PREACHERS KID. ) That is a prelude of what I am about to say.

To everything there is a season. A time to be born and a time to die.Margot and I used to say this to each other often (probably because it was a hit song at the time)Little did we know what a true saying it was and is and how it would impact our lives over the years ahead. As I was driving home the other evening I heard a bit of a song by Celine Dion. I am what I am because you loved me. It describes the impact Margot had on my life.
I would like to read to you Margot’s own words to me from our senior year book.

Dear Mary Culver Speaking,
To whom am I speaking?Oh, she’s not home right now. I see. Well, would you deliver a message for me? Thank you.
Tell her Dearly called ( my mother named us Dearly and Darling. I always wanted to be dearly and thought my mother liked Margot better).
I wanted to make Christmas cookies one friday night and was wondering if she was going to the game. If not perhaps she would like to take a walk through Northland College, fall down the hill,paint “70” on the football field with a christmas tree or on the railroad trestle and sign our names,pick lilac sand talk about life and death. ( If we don’t get waylaid by a Hummer).Or perhaps she would rather go for a ride in her car, whether it is a fun ride or just runs. ( to those of you who didn’t grow up in a small town a fun ride was going over an elevated railroad track to fast and getting that tickly feeling in your stomach and a run was making the circuit up and down the main street in town)
We could always go to a party….(.this is my memory…the only time I ever saw margot get mad was over the senior lock in at the Elks club.My parents were leaning toward yes we could go and hers were leaning to ward no. Margot wore wooden clogs in those days and she threw a fit and kicked her foot. the clog went flying off and to this day I bet there is still a dent in that ceiling.)
anyhow, we could go to a party…..like the street dance or Sue Leaky’s party or a pre Sweethearts Ball party or a surprise birthday Party.(I threw Margot a surprise Sweet 16 sleepover)If she would rather, we could go downtown (it is a Friday night after all) and look through all the stores, then go ToJans and get some material and I could make her a formal. And we could always go on a picnic….ask her whether she Prefers Prentice Park,Lake Park or Copper Falls. Maybe she would like to sleep over….we could ask Josh ( my 80 lb german shorthaired pointer)to join us…..and we could giggle and talk and laugh and fall asleep holding hands, ( do you know that whenever we stayed with each other that is just how we went to sleep no matter what our age),unless, of course,we slept outside, in which case we would have iced tea and soda crackers.
I hope she is able to do something and isn’t laid up with a ripped off toenail or a lost appendix or a tumor in her wrist.

Have her call me,won’t you? I don’t want to lose touch. And tell her this is lovely weather if it doesn’t rain. She’ll understand.

Love,

Margot

Rest in peace my friend…..

Terry Haller Remarks

I am Terry Haller, and I am a close friend of the Babler family.  In fact, I have been like a second father to the kids.  Imagine a strange man come over to their house every day for a period of 30 years – and they never once called the police!  Indeed, their family was my family too, and Margot was the central focus of that world.

One of the greatest American playwrights was Thornton Wilder, and he was actually born in Madison in 1898.  He lived here with his family where his father was editor of the Wisconsin State Journal.  His family’s home was located on the same land where my Maple Bluff home was located, and in 1984, when I purchased that home, one of the first things Margot and I decided to do was to tear out some moldy pine paneling in the basement recreation room and discard it.  We later discovered to our horror that this paneling had been transplanted from the Wilder’s living room when the latter home was torn down in 1926.

Wilder’s greatest play, Our Town, was also Margot’s favorite.  This play is far more than a staple of high school theater departments.  Indeed few if any works of literature have better served to illustrate the relationship between everyday life and the eternal.  The play tells the story of a normal family in the simple days of early 20^th century rural America.  The first part deals with daily life, the second with love and marriage, and the final part with death and remembrance.  It is from the third part of this, Margot’s favorite play, that I read now.

Emily Webb, who has just died in childbirth, asks the God-like Stage Manager from her grave to relive her twelfth birthday.

This wish is granted, but the experience is too much for Emily.  She cannot bear to deal with the mundane details of everyday life, knowing how precious they actually are and knowing what the future holds:

MR. WEBB: Offstage
Where’s my girl?  Where’s my birthday girl?

EMILY: In a loud voice to the stage manager
I can’t.  I can’t go on.  It goes so fast.  We don’t have time to look at one another.

She breaks down sobbing

The lights dim on the left half of the stage.  Mrs. Webb disappears.

I didn’t realize.  So all that was going on and we never noticed.  Take me back – up the hill – to my grave.  But first:  Wait!  One more look.

Good-by, Good-by, world.  Goody-by, Grover’s Corners … Mama and Papa.  Good-by to clocks ticking … and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee.  And new-ironed dresses and hot baths … and sleeping and waking up.  Oh earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you.

She looks toward the stage manager and asks abruptly, through her tears:

Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? – every, every minute?

STAGE MANAGER:
No.

Pause

The saints and poets, maybe – they do some.

EMILY:
I’m ready to go back.

She returns to her chair besides Mrs. Gibbs.

Pause

And so, on a rainy September afternoon, Emily Webb, having died well before her time, returns to her grave and to the ages.

Farewell, Margot.

My name is Heather Lerner.

I was an only child and I really wanted siblings. As a kid I would go shopping with my mom and try to convince other kids to come home with me–especially if they seemed to be arguing with their siblings or parents. I’d tell them we have a nice family, nobody argues or cries, but none of the kids ever did come home with me.

In high school I became close friends with Althea and little did I know that in doing so I would also become part of a family I’d always dreamed of. It wasn’t long after I met Althea that she invited me over to the Babler household and in rapid succession I gained two brothers, two sisters and another set of parents. Throughout high school and summers and holidays during my college years I spent many hours at the Babler house, playing and cuddling with the kids, Michael, Maretta and Joe and talking with Margot. We went canoeing and ice skating together and to American Player’s Theatre and I reveled in my newfound family. After my own parents went to sleep I’d spend the evening hours with the Bablers, enjoying peaches and cream, cookies, and hot cocoa made by Margot. Margot helped me through the difficult and formative years of late high school and college. A time when I was trying to figure out who I was and what I wanted in life. I was always amazed with how Margot knew when there was a universal right answer, like choosing the color eggshell or ecru rather than white for interior walls, and when there were many right answers but only one right answer for a given person. She also knew that the one right answer had to be discovered by the individual and was adept at helping me navigate my thoughts to find my own right answer.

I hope that some day I can be the kind of mother Margot was to me.

I just want to tell one story that Margot loved to tell and told often. I chose this story because it emphasizes how Margot’s warmth embraces so many people and I am not the only person she drew into her family effortlessly.

In college when I brought my then boyfriend, now husband, Michael, to Wisconsin for the first time, we spent his first day driving all over Wisconsin meeting family. He was really tolerant throughout the day, but it was a lot of people to meet and impress. After a whirlwind of a day it was late when we got back to my parents’ house and Michael was starting to take off his shoes and sigh in relief when I stopped him saying that we had one more place to go. But I promised it would be a good one. Michael looked at me and I could tell he was tired and thinking…”I thought I loved you….” So, at probably 10 p.m. we headed over to the Babler’s house for my nightly ritual of playing with the kids and talking to Margot about the great truths in life. Like, always add butter, sugar and/or cream to make a good recipe.

In 2001, Margot attended our engagement party where she met Michael’s grandpa Hahn and discovered that he and she are related. In her genealogical diggings she found that she and Michael are cousins, so in marrying Michael I actually married into the family that I had felt a part of for so long.

One night a year or two after meeting Margot, Michael and I were back in Wisconsin and had arrived at home after another whirlwind day of holiday festivities with family. As I started changing into my pajamas Michael was on the phone with Margot. After he hung up he looked at me climbing into bed and said, “well, I’m going over to Margot’s, you can go to bed or come with me.”

We are in the right place today as we were last night at Bethel….. because Margot is a Child of God.

She comes from a religious, devoted, loving, caring, down-to-earth, family and extended family. Many of her values and ways of living life she learned from them and watching how they lived their lives. It made me feel good as I met them because they are much like my family and extended family. It was because of the way my Mother and Dad raised me and my family and extended family that Margot and I could have such a common bond.

[This paragraph not included in remarks because of length of time: Part of her family legacy included clergy. In our living room we have an example – a rocking chair that has a plaque with the following legend, “Presented to – Gotthold Heinrich August Loebor (1853-1944) – by his congregation – Saint Martini Lutheran Church, Milwaukee, Wisconsin” Her roots run deep.]

I also found myself learning from her family. Her Mother, Lorraine, affectionately known as Mum to our family, often explained to me how to listen to God. It has helped me and I use her advice in my life because she is right.

This is the right place to be today…..
It where our family sat over there, near of St. Peter, most Sunday’s unless out of town or at Bethel.
Sometimes there was a pew full of wiggly kids. (Margot had to remind me it would get better)
Sometimes they sat quietly eating Cheerios (when very young) or paging through their illustrated Bible.
We celebrated our Christmas’s here. We usually attended the Children’s Christmas Eve service at 4:30, often with a child serving in the role of Shepard, Wiseman, or Mary – or in a choir. We grew up here. We had family or friends join us. Margot and Joseph joined the Bell Choir, which became know to us as “Joe and the Ladies”, or Joe accompanied Bill with his oboe. We ask for guidance here, help and forgiveness. We prayed for our children and their future. 15 months ago Margot and I remarried here. And the last 27 months, we prayed for guidance here and were blessed with a basket of Miracles. We were heard. During those last two years Margot and I would discretely hold hands through most of each service.

Margot’s relationship with God is best expressed as Love. She knew God loved her and embraced Him. She fashion that Love into her life and into a world into which anyone is welcomed. Her family and school friends have always been in her life, then she included me as well as many college friends, then welcomed each of her children and many new life friends many who are here today.

Driving up to the Hospice Center last Wednesday after a short time away, it occurred to me we were actually living in Margot’s world – the world she created from love, friendship and the gentle ways of her person. That may seem strange to say. As her husband, I always thought we were on a mutual path between two people, making their way together. What I discovered was that some time long passed, it had really become the life she created – and – like the gravity of a planet-world carrying along its moon, I was fully living within her sphere. The same was true for many, many others to a similar or different degree. I smiled.

When you look at the photos on Althea and Bryan’s family website, it is no accident that there are lots of people in them. They are all people that traveled in Margot’s world and mine. They are people that first came to her from work, college days, from neighborhoods, through her children and school, from her interests, through friends, and people whose hearts she just captured. During the last two years, she also made friends with people who were also fighting cancer, sharing her good fortune in living and successfully battling back this disease for so long.

You know Margot is magical.

For anyone who has had children you will recognize this thought.
When you first think about having children, you image what they will be like, their personality, how they look, and maybe how they will approach life. When they actually are born you marvel at who they are. They are much more wonderful that you could have ever believed.

When I thought about what my life partner would be like, I had an image. Then came Margot. If God have given me a magic wand, I could not have begun to approach the wonderful woman that she is.

I remember the first time I met her. I was a college student bagging groceries in the Whitewater Piggly Wiggly. John was working the Young Republican table on the campus when she stopped to sign up. After talking to her for an hour he decided she would make a good candidate. (John has picked people over the years for county boards, municipal government, mayors, and the legislature, so his judgment is good.)

John thought I should meet her. I saw John breezing into the store with the good-looking college girl trailing him. She was statuesque, confident, and fresh. He introduced her. I can’t remember what we said, but I remember her firm handshake, delightful smile and elegance. It was brief. As I watched her leave, I said to myself, “she is great!” After a pause, I also said, “R- i – i – i – g-h-t!!! Just forget it.” But I couldn’t forget.

She did run for office, Student Publications Board, and defeated a campus radical that eventual burnt down “Old Main”. While we worked in common on campus politics, it was some time before we became romantic.

We fit together so well, I didn’t really try to analyze it in those days. Today, I know more about what attracted me to her.

What Margot wanted more than anything was to Love and be Loved. Her notes to me were always signed, “Love Me”.
Margot valued more than anything being a wife and mother. And she excelled at being a Mother. She wanted to find her family, have them grow into strong, independent, and be adults that would Love each other as well as be her life long friends.
She also wanted a wide circle of friend that would be as close as family who she could love and with whom she could share life’s adventures. She accomplished all of her life’s goals but one, to share more time with her friends and next generation. That’s what attracted me to her and made me want the same goals in her world.

35 years ago August 12th, Margot’s Dad – Joseph – led her down the aisle of a Beloit Church. He gave her hand to me for her new married life. On the last day of this summer, just one week ago, on a quiet star-studded night, I held her hand again and prayed as she gentling passed. Taking her other hand, invisibly, was her Dad now leading her into God’s world. She was never alone and she always with people who loved her. (Thanks Tom)

You know the best thing about today…. Margot’s world will go on. That’s is one of the things we are here resolved to do. While her help will be felt only in the softest ways, we will do what she wanted. Love each other, cherish our families, hold our friends close, lean on our God, never miss the beauty in nature or in what people create, look for goodness, purge anger and worry, and look for ways to heal. As she told me over three decades ago, she wants us to remember her and smile, to be happy for her (as soon as we can), and make her life’s work in love flourish. And then, when we have exhausted all of the life we can possibly live, she will take our hands on that journey and greet us with the biggest hug. Love you Margot. Love Me.

My name is Paula Kopp and Margot and I were cousins.  When I think through my memories of Margot, the first thing that comes to mind is how important family
was to her.  No one is more supportive of the role of mother than Margot.

When we moved to Madison six years ago, Margot was so welcoming and so excited to finally have a cousin who lived in Madison.  Our move wasn’t easy for me, and even more difficult for our children.  Margot was such a great support to me.  In her usual style, Margot was full of advice.  But advice Margot-style was
never a lecture.  She had a way of relaying a similar situation and how she handled it but always reminded me how I should do what was best for our family.
As I have been able to see more clearly in the past two years, Margot had such a gift as a mother in figuring out what each of you needed as an individual.  She knew that sometimes that is very different that what one of your siblings may need.

When Margot learned about her pancreatic cancer, she really didn’t need to change her priorities.  Margot was a woman of faith who knew what was important, and her family always came first.  Because of my oncology nursing background, Margot and I had many discussions about the battle she was facing.  I was privileged to be included with your family in many of the consults with the physicians, including a trip to Mayo for her surgery.  We were usually a large group crammed into a small exam room.
The number in the group attending doctors appointments varied based on everyone’s needs—it was important to Margot that everyone had the opportunity to hear the information that they were ready to hear; to not hear the information first hand if they weren’t ready for that; and to miss appointments if they had other things to attend to.
At the end of an appointment, Margot would always look around the room and make sure that everyone had a chance to ask their questions and have their concerns heard before she would let the doctor leave.  Margot handled her disease the same way she handled her life.  She showed her grace, patience and gentle determination.   While I knew a lot about your family through Margot, I am grateful for the opportunity to get to know you as individuals these past two years.  I watched you work together as an incredible unit, especially as we took over the lounge at Mayo during Margot’s surgery.
You laughed, you knitted, you played games and you talked about how you felt.  I know you will be able to continue to do all those things together as Margot’s spirit lives through you.

I would like to finish by sharing something that has been a comfort to me for the last 20 years.  Our cousin, Tom Bergmann, died from leukemia.  Today would have
been his 47^th birthday.  The following is a passage from the sermon by Pastor Koeppen at Tom’s funeral that made everything make sense for me.  I have changed it for the situation we are faced with today.

“Cancer didn’t conquer Margot.  Margot conquered cancer.  Death, the greater end of cancer, was conquered by Christ.  In Christ, Margot has conquered the greater and the lesser.  Thanks be to God.  Margot has cancer no more and cannot ever get it again.”

Thank you for including me in your extended family.
I have learned so much in watching all of you together.

Invitation to a Dessert Reception

Following the prayer service at Bethel and dinner (on your own), Margot’s family invites you to join us for dessert and a continuation of the celebration of her life.

Downtown Madison has a wonderful variety of restaurants for you to sample.  Afterwards, some of Margot’s favorite  desserts will be available at Terry Haller’s residence, 100 Wisconsin Avenue, #801.

We hope this reception will provide a nice opportunity to strengthen and fortify the web of community that Margot wove around us.

Questions?
Call Althea at 239-5453.

Sept. 4: 12 am. I’ve had so many thoughts I’ve been wanting to write about these last few days, but we have been busy, busy, busy getting things ready for the events later this week.  Maretta, Dad, and I have gone through the house and pulled together several boxes of things to display at the visitations on Thursday and Friday.  And I’ve spent hours and hours going through photo albums and boxes of photos to dig out pictures of Mom.  Heather came to stay with us the other day, and with her help, we’ve scanned or acquired almost 700 pictures of Mom from over the years.
100 of my favorites (so far…I hope more keep coming in from people) are in the gallery.

I’ve been so surrounded by things pertaining to Mom and things that embody her spirit these last days, that I know logically that she is gone, but she really doesn’t feel gone.  In fact, she feels very present.  I’ve been trying to pull up feelings of sadness today, but either I’m too focused to be sad today or I’m just feeling to grateful for the rich legacy that she’s left us to find room for mourning.

I found myself walking along today, repeating as my feet hit the ground, “Mom is dead, Mom is dead, Mom is dead.”  And now that I’ve written that down, it looks horrible, but when I was thinking it, I really felt like I was just reminding myself so I didn’t forget again and again.  I think that between the frantic pace of our preparations, the incredible outpouring of love and support I’m getting from friends near and far, and the wonderful feelings of peace that I get from looking through things from the past have given me a respite today.
Who knows how tomorrow will go, but I’ll take a bit of a peaceful day!