Digested week: The world spins on as I cope with Mum’s loss | John Crace

Monday

Grief is an unnerving companion. Continually nudging me off centre. Even though the world appears much as it did before my mum, Rosemary, died, everything feels slightly out of kilter. Not quite right. Not as I remembered it. Sometimes, I even have to double-check the chair is where I thought it was. The physical merges into the metaphysical. Most of the time I feel OK. Tell myself that it was the right time for her time to die and that no one can feel cheated at 101. That it is a blessing she is no longer subject to the terrors of her dementia. That she is at peace. I just get on with my work and spend time with family and friends.

At other times, I feel overwhelmed with sadness. Struggling to come to terms with the finality. Unable to quite believe that the only time I will see my mum again is in my dreams. Consumed with regrets for the things I was never able to say, before and after the Alzheimer’s took hold. In the meantime, we get on with the death admin, of which there is surprisingly little. My sisters have registered her death and organised the small cremation service but there is no house to pack up and sell. We did all that years ago when she moved into the care home.

Everything my mum owned was tucked away in the single room of the home where she lived. Just a few chairs and a small bookcase, some clothes and old photo albums. I felt in something of a daze as we went through my mum’s belongings. Now I regret some of the decisions I made. I found a small folder of random letters I had sent her, mostly ones I had written to her as a child. I found them too painful to re-read so I chose to throw them away. I wish I had hung on to them. As a mark of respect, both to her and to my younger self.

Tuesday

There have been an increasing number of articles written warning Britons not to visit the US. I don’t feel as if I have a choice in this. My daughter lives in Minneapolis and I want to be able to visit her over the next four years. Or longer, if Donald Trump somehow manages to tear up the constitution and award himself a third term. As things stand, I have no idea if I have any reason to be worried. I’m certainly not about to stop making fun of the Sun-Bed King or commenting on his influence on global politics. I can imagine border security have more important things to do than prevent a Guardian journalist going on holiday to visit his family.

But maybe I’m being naive. After all, even the UK government is going out of its way not to rock the boat. Keir Starmer has been desperate not to do anything to upset The Donald, even when the US administration was about to impose tariffs. He doesn’t even fight back when JD Vance and Marco Rubio suggests the UK is stifling free speech. The irony. Rachel Reeves has gone further still. In her spring statement last week, she couldn’t even bring herself to mention Trump by name. In her section on “global headwinds”, she was happy to call out Vladimir Putin. But the section on tariffs was rather garbled, with no references to Trump in person; nor are any other members of the cabinet prepared to do so. Trump is He Who Must Not Be Named. For the time being, then, I will just carry on as normal. I’m due to renew my ESTA in a few months’ time so we’ll see how that goes. One step at a time.

Wednesday

I have a feeling the four Beatles biopics that director Sam Mendes announced in Los Angeles this week may not be for me. One, maybe, out of curiosity. But four, each devoted to one member of the band, seems like overkill. It’s not as if the music is going to change much from film to film, though I guess Mendes will have prepared separate soundtracks, and the bottom line is I can’t see myself sitting through a film dedicated to Ringo.

I’m just not a Beatles obsessive. I was well drilled by my eldest sister, Veronica. Back in 1964, when I was eight years old, she told me there was a choice to make. You were either a Beatles fan or a Rolling Stones fan and there was no crossing the divide. Veronica was a Stones girl through and through. She bought all their LPs and singles and was allowed out to see the band play at Longleat. My dad was a curate in nearby Westbury and the gig was a short drive away. I pleaded with my mum to be allowed to go as well, but was firmly put in my place.

My first ever gig would have to wait a month or so. The Hollies were scheduled to also play Longleat and by now my mum had been ground down. I was in. Sadly, I had to make do with Heinz and the Wild Boys because the Hollies cancelled. But, from the age of eight I, too, was a Stones fan. The Beatles were the safe choice. The Stones had an air of danger. I lived out a parallel life to my middle-class childhood through Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. It never occurred to me they would be still going 60 years later and that the Stones and the Beatles would both become about as establishment as you can get.

Thursday

One of the less-reported knock-on effects of Labour’s landslide victory last July has been on select committees. In theory, these are where ministers and officials are held to account. Far more so than in parliament, where questions are so easily left unanswered. When I first started political sketch writing, there were three standout committees. There was the home affairs committee, where Theresa May was time and again put under scrutiny as home secretary, and the public accounts committee. Heaven forbid anyone tried to pull the wool over the eyes of its chair, Margaret Hodge. But best of all was the Treasury committee under the forensic Andrew Tyrie, aided and abetted by his attack dogs, Rachel Reeves and Wes Streeting. It was always box office, no more so than when Dominic Cummings was completely exposed as a fraud. Chancellors used to be genuinely anxious before an appearance, unsure if their budgets were about to unravel in real time.

This is no longer the case. Because Labour have such a massive majority, they get to take the lion’s share of the places on every committee. And, inevitably, many of the committee members are also new MPs. Men and women who don’t quite know yet how the system works; who are reluctant to properly interrogate senior ministers from their own party.

A case in point was the chancellor’s appearance before the Treasury committee to answer questions on her spring statement this week. The last person Reeves would have wanted to face was her former self, because then she would have been forced to defend her benefits cuts and say what she would do if her fiscal headroom again went awol. But Reeves had no such worries. All the Labour MPs asked tame question – “Have you thought about this?” “Yes, I have” – and the two Tories were more spaniel than rottweiler. Rachel went into the hearing with a smile on her face. She came out laughing. You couldn’t blame her.

Friday

Next Tuesday is my mum’s cremation. It will be a small affair with just my sisters and me, partners, and Anna and Robbie. For the music, we have chosen two piano pieces that my mum used to play: a Schubert Impromptu and Chopin’s Raindrop prelude. As her wicker basket leaves the chapel, Richard Strauss’s Morgen! will be playing: a beautiful song she loved and passed on to us. There will be tears.

We are planning a bigger service to inter her ashes next to my dad some time in May, though we’re not sure how many people to expect. Mum outlived almost all her family and friends, though maybe a few of the younger generation will come. It’s a tough time, made worse by the illness of my dog, Herbert Hound. We had hoped to have him around for the summer at least, but he is fading fast and I fear his life is measured in weeks at best.

He spends most of his time asleep, hardly eats and has trouble weeing. The only upside is that he doesn’t appear to be in any pain. It feels as if Herbie is looking at us in a different way. Distant, yet strangely intimate. As if he knows his time is short. One of the few consolations in all this loss has been you, the readers. Over the past two weeks, I have received so many kind emails from strangers. Too many to reply to them all, but greatly appreciated, nonetheless. I thank you all. It has also been wonderful to meet so many of you at events I have been doing round the country. I have three more upcoming. At the Marine Theatre in Lyme Regis on Good Friday, the Bloomsbury Theatre in London on 24 April and at the Norwich Arts Centre on 1 May. Please do come. I would love the chance to talk to you and thank you in person.