To Liz, with love

Gavin Kerr lost his wife of 61 years following a battle with Alzheimers. He talks to Paula Hulburt about his beloved Elizabeth and the poetry books he has written to raise money for the charity which supported the pair through their darkest days.

In the sometimes silence of the evening, Gavin’s gaze is drawn to a blue chair, positioned just so. He sees his wife Liz sitting comfortably, gaze captured by the garden she planted. He sees her smile, her heart gladdened, a respite from the confusion.

In her smile he sees his beautiful bride in her scalloped, lace-trimmed veil. He sees the attractive student who caught his eye, pencil poised, taking notes in a lecture room at Otago University. He sees the proud mother of three and grandmother of four smiling in delight, and finally, he sees her, at last, at peace.

Blinking back the memories from his mind’s eye, Gavin is again in the lounge of the Blenheim home the two once shared. His memories are a comfort as he sits and pens a poem to “his lost love” – a poem included in his third book. All money raised from the sale of his work goes towards a cause close to his heart, Alzheimers Marlborough.

Titled There’s A Fish In My Garden, a poem of the same name graces its pages. A soliloquy about a pottery fish sculpted by a friend and gifted to Liz one birthday. During her final days at home, she enjoyed watching it from the comfort of her favourite blue chair. Memories of his wife are many, and while he mourns her loss, he is comforted by the thoughts, thoughts that see the two of them together again in his recollections.

It was 1953 at Otago University. Sitting back in his chair as the English lecturer talked on, Gavin’s gaze drifted idly around the room, pencil tapping against loose fingers. His attention was captured by a pretty, blonde student nearby. Sitting up straighter, Gavin tried not to stare, instead casting covert glances to the beat of a joyful heart.

Gavin was studying English and History, while Liz studied languages – French, Latin and English. It was a meeting of minds, of a shared love of language and, he smiles, instant attraction.

“We met in an English class across a not-so-crowded room. It seemed that there was a bit of instant chemistry at work, Gavin says. “From my point of view, I was a friend, a friend with a motive,” he chuckles, raising an ironic eyebrow. “It was a slow-burning relationship.”

Their marriage in Roxburgh three years later followed a courtship conducted in part in the rhododendron dell of Dunedin’s Botanical Gardens. The pairs’ dating life was “awash with decorum,” Gavin laughs. It was in Liz’s flat after one such visit the pair became engaged. “From memory, it wasn’t a one-way proposal, it was a similar discussion we had together,” Gavin explains.

A lifetime of discussions and adventures followed. From the mundane to the life changing, the pair communicated well, sharing ideas, possibilities, and different cultures.

They travelled extensively and lived in Fiji, where Gavin, now a retired schoolteacher and principal, rose to become principal of Queen Victoria School. After long service back in New Zealand, upon retirement, the pair moved to Karachi and Balochistan in Pakistan, where he took on the mantle of principal and education consultant.

“She had a great facility for and retention of grammar and vocabulary usage. My ear for spoken languages was probably better than hers, but my capacity for grammar and vocabulary wasn’t,” Gavin laughs.

Watching the woman he loved struggling to express herself was heartbreaking. Alzheimer’s slowly shrunk their world, finally limiting Liz’s horizons to a quiet, sunny room in a comfortable Blenheim rest home.

She forgot so much, Gavin says, but not once did she fail to recognise him.

“One of the more distressing parts of her progression was that she used to sit on her blue chair, and I noted that they [her beloved cryptic crosswords] weren’t being finished, and then, not even started,” Gavin says.

It was a gradual six-year demise, Gavin explains. Returning home to the Omaka Valley from a trip to Europe in 2016, the changes were small to start with.

“It began in the most mundane way imaginable. It was a case of, ‘I told you that – no you didn’t,’ but it became too frequent, and then there were signs of forgetting how to do some of the more mentally demanding tasks.”

Standing in the kitchen, Liz once stretched out her hand, slowly and tentatively, to prod a couple of buttons on the microwave and, as it beeped its dismay, Gavin watched with a sense of growing unease as he watched his academically gifted wife falter over the simplest of tasks.

“She wasn’t aware of it straight away; it took time for her to come to terms with the fact that things weren’t going as they should be. Eventually, we talked about it and went to see her GP, who referred her to a geriatrician at Wairau Hospital.”

“But he was very cautious about making a formal diagnosis,” Gavin says, sighing as he recalls the struggle they went through. “Looking back now, I didn’t understand the stress I was under. You simply do what you have to do at the time.”

“I was anxious about getting a formal diagnosis. I realised I was going to need help, and I couldn’t get that until we knew what we were dealing with.”

Determined to arm himself with as much information on the disease as possible, Gavin signed up to a free online course through the University of Tasmania. Understanding Dementia is a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), offering university-quality education about the latest in dementia research and care. It was, Gavin says, “incredibly useful.”

Getting a final diagnosis nearly three years after first seeing their GP was a comfort. “It was a relief to finally get it and be able to channel my energies into finding the assistance we needed. Liz had got to the point where even her demeanour changed.”

Gavin pauses briefly to say hello to a well-fed black and white cat that has just jumped through his sunroom window with a thud. She isn’t his, he explains, but belongs to a neighbour. The cat, Bella, acknowledges his words with a meow and jumps up on a chair, settling down for a snooze.

Outside the window, the flowers Liz planted have bloomed, a colourful assortment and a thriving testament to her impressive talents as a gardener.

Surrounded by the shared paraphernalia of their lives together, Gavin is grateful to have shared so much with his much-loved wife.

His poems are both an outlet for his grief, a tribute to the woman he loved so completely, and a way to give back, he explains. The team at Alzheimers Marlborough were there during the bleakest of days and their care and support was invaluable.

What would Liz think about all this? I ask. Gavin smiles, his eyes crinkled in appreciation of his wife. “I like to think she’d be supportive and even proud. I think she’d be happy to be part of it all.”

There’s A Fish In My Garden
By Gavin Kerr
There’s a fish in my garden
Swimming nowhere.
A piece of clay so fashioned
To sit upon a pole.
Grin of mouth and bead of eye
It turns valiantly towards the weather
To let me know just
Which way the wind is blowing,
Bought as a present for my lost love,
A colourful, greeny-blue dead treasure
Among the living in her garden,
It came alive in her last days
In the place to where I moved it
Beyond the window where she sat,
Swung and bobbled to her in the breeze,
Messaging to a wandering mind
Such memories of its maker, a friend, as may remain,
Such encouragement as may be taken
In her adversity.
The wind comes soft and warm from the north
Today after the rain.
The fish tells me this as I occupy her chair,
Viewing it as she did through the same window.
A good sign, I take it,
That she rests well.

To order copies of each of Gavin’s three books, email [email protected]. Copies are also available from Alzheimers Marlborough, 8 Wither Road, Blenheim.