The view from ward J

My mother didn’t die on Mother’s Day. It was expected, given her sudden deterioration that she would. Instead she hovered between worlds, hardly with us, but not yet gone, day after day after day. And as she lingered, so our universe shrunk to the confines of the ward where we focused on her breathing, on her life and how we would cope with the void that would inevitably follow her passing.

Outside the hospital the world and indeed the country continued to seethe. Terrorists blew up children in Europe, and at home South African politicians continued their own suicide mission, ensuring that the next generations would suffer the consequences of their greed and arrogance. Emails were hacked, corruption exposed and the president laughed.