Hyde Bay Logo Herbert Pickett's Family History
Emily Pickett Alone

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Herbert Pickett, Jr. writing:

      I can't find any archives to clarify dates or organize events. Housing: She continued to make her base Craig Lynn. She kept the sleeping porch and cabin at camp. Betty took over her work in camp management and health care, and had done so for some time. For some years, she closed Craig Lynn for the winter and took an apartment in Fred and Biddeth McGown's house in Cooperstown. Then she heard of Meadow Lakes, a continuing care retirement community, owned by the Synod of New Jersey of the Presbyterian Church, located in Hightstown, New Jersey. She applied, was accepted, made the necessary down payment. Then she put Craig Lynn on the market, sold the surplus furniture, and moved there. She traded Dad's Plymouth for an Oldsmobile, which she continued to drive for some time. Mac rode with her from Syracuse to Cooperstown once, and said it was an experience he didn't want to do again.

      Larry reminded me of at typical event. One day in Hightstown, she breezed through two stop signs. A couple of motorists got their cars in front and back of her, stopped and made a "citizen's arrest." She went to court, explained to the judge that the signs were obscured by shrubbery, and he let her off.

      After Dad's estate was settled, perhaps after Craig Lynn was sold, she put some of the money in a savings account in the Bethel Savings Bank, of which Uncle Kim was head. She used this to travel. She took two cruises or trips a year. She found congenial ladies to go with her. Mary Ferguson, Polly's Mother, was one. She did the "Delta Queen" on the Mississippi River twice. She took a Mediterranean cruise on the "France", went ashore in Egypt for a day trip, and a storm made the ship head out to sea for three days. The cruise line put them up in a poorly heated second-rate hotel and they had to buy things they needed for the stay. Mother took a blanket, wrapped it around her and played bridge until the "France" returned for them. At another time, she was on a Matson Line voyage to Australia. On New Year's Eve, the ship got hung up on the reef at Bora Bora. They brought tankers from Tahiti, pumped out fuel and water to lighten the boat, and on a high tide a tug pulled them free. Thinking of James Michener's description of the native population's erotic proclivities, I said to Mother, "Think of it. A lady of eighty shipwrecked on Bora Bora on New Year's Eve. What a waste." She answered fiercely, "I'm an extinct volcano! I'm an extinct volcano!"

      Her last trip was on a rather small ship, the Lindblad Explorer. It sailed from Norway, touched Spitzbergen and other islands, and spent two days in Iceland, where she visited her friend, Oscar, as has been mentioned. They were supposed to go ashore in Greenland, but didn't, for some reason, to her regret. They headed north until stopped by ice, somewhere above 860 north latitude, which Mr. Lindblad said was a record for commercial ships.

      When she was 85 or more, (Larry may give me the exact year,) she was returning to Hightstown on the New Jersey Turnpike, didn't see construction barriers, went off the highway and totaled the Olds. I don't recollect that she was seriously hurt but was shaken up. Larry went down and sold the car for junk, and we all breathed a sigh of relief that she was off the road. The stress of the accident caused serious heart problems that required treatment, and was with her for the rest of her life. Then it was discovered that she had a lump in her breast and a biopsy showed it to be cancerous. The doctors in the Princeton Hospital said it had to come off, but she could not have general anesthesia because of the heart problem. She had the mastectomy under local anesthetic, which did not work to well. She said it was terribly painful. Her care in the rehab unit of the hospital was messed up, so she came back to Meadow Lakes in bad shape. But she was able to return to her apartment in due course. Then she had a fall and a broken hip. Back to the Princeton Hospital to have it pinned. She recuperated in the health unit of Meadow Lakes, and got so she could walk pretty well, so she moved back to the apartment. The second day there, she got tangled in some wires at the TV, fell and broke the other hip. After that was fixed, she spent the rest of her life in the health unit. There were further health problems and on July 20th, 1983, while Larry was visiting, she died, eight or nine weeks before her 90th birthday.

      On August sixth next, the three of us sons managed to get together to commit her ashes to Maple Grove, Worcester. I conducted a brief service. The sexton of the cemetery called me aside and said, "We have a problem. When I dug a hole for your mother's urn in front of her name I hit your Father's casket." "How did that happen?" I asked. His response: " Whoever designed that marker didn't realize that wives are always buried on the left hand of husbands, as they were at their marriage." After a couple of hundred funerals, that was news to me. Dad has no interest in cemeteries, and never had stones put at the head of his parents' graves. After Dad's death, Mother had double marble headstones made for the grandparents and her and Dad's graves, leaving the final date off her name. She assumed that Dad was interred next to Grandpa, so his name was next on the new double stone, then hers. None of us knew about this right and left thing. So each parent is buried under the wrong name.

      So ends the story of Herbert and Emily.
      Edited as of June 16, 2000

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