It’s time to say goodbye to my lovely friend and do my job for her

AN OLD friend died last January and I am her Executor. The whole process of sorting through her house falls to me.

She left several bequests and the house is to be sold to honour all of these. I know probate takes quite some time but I have been putting everything off for months now. I am not usually one who procrastinates, but it didn’t feel right and I just kept postponing the inevitable.

Last weekend my baby brother offered to help me. He knew this lady too and he knew how difficult this was for me. My conscience was pricked when I saw the amount of people queuing to purchase houses last week while her lovely home was lying idle. It was time.

It felt unreal to be in the house where my friend had lived since she was 10 years old, for over 80 years of her life. She was very proud, had impeccable taste and kept it like a dolls’ house. Everything had a place and everything was in its place.

She loved her style and had several wardrobes full of clothes, some of which still had their labels attached. She lost so much weight before she died that new clothes had to be bought for her to be laid out before her cremation.

What I found totally unnerving, was that long before she died she had been burgled. Most of her treasured jewellery had been stolen, but there were two pieces — one a bracelet she had been gifted when she was 21 years old by her parents — that she had hidden so very well they escaped detection, and she told me where they were. She had me check they were still in their hiding place, even when she was in hospital.

When Nora died I left the pyjamas, dressing gowns and so on that were clean with the hospital as spares for other patients. The nursing staff always admired her night attire, just as we all admired her sense of style when she was in full health.

Even as an old lady in hospital for all those months before she passed, she had her hair done every week and her French polish shellac replenished on her fingernails every fortnight. She always wore a little lipstick, too.

My big problem was going through this very proud lady’s possessions that she had acquired throughout her long life. She was in her 92nd year. I felt as if I was intruding, so having my brother there with me as the voice of reason certainly helped.

It took me three years to even start to go through our son’s room and there is still so much of his stuff there that I am loath to part with.

I am seriously thinking of doing a big clear out of my own stuff again. I, like so many others, have so much that I do not use, and if the truth be told, do not want either.

I never realised precisely how choosy charity shops can be. I can understand they do not want trash and I would put clothes in the recycle bin if I thought they were not fit to be sold on.

When we got to the shop, they looked at the bags and told my brother that they had no room for any more stock. But when one lady asked to look into a couple of bags first and discovered the quality of the contents, they accepted everything.

I had cleared out wardrobes and presses myself when we were snowed in, and this same shop, which gives its proceeds to Cancer Research, was delighted to accept everything, so it was our first port of call.

Either way, I was very sad to think that this lovely lady who was very good to me, and loved my children as she never had any of her own, left so much of herself behind.

As her solicitor said, she entrusted this job to me and it is my final duty to do right by her, and carry out her final wishes.

May she rest in peace.