On Monday we got the 'green form' for disposal, and the death certificate. We got a date for the crematorium - the earliest we could, Thursday, 11th January - and we'll be talking to our parish priest tomorrow about a requiem Mass beforehand, as Mum was a Catholic convert and so am I.
Today, we talked to the bank and found out that my brother, as joint executor of Mum's will, will have to establish his identity in his local bank branch in Lancashire, and do the same with a solicitor, sending the solicitor's certificate to our solicitor. Only when the bank has received proof of my brother's identity and a certificated copy of Mum's will - which can't happen till after Christmas - will Mum's bank agree to pay the expenses of the funeral and wake (we've booked a 'sympathy buffet' at a hotel in our seaside town that Mum loved.)
However, my solicitor tells me not to worry, as he'll be able to get the certificated copy of Mum's will from the solicitor's in Lincolnshire, where she used to live, in time to pay the funeral director.
I am still shocked by the very fact of Mum's death, even though she was so old and though in fact it is better for her that she has passed.
I'm really tired with sorting things out and phoning people, not just banks and priests and funeral directors but also my brothers and sisters, keeping them abreast of things.
So far the pattern has been that I go to sleep fairly quickly at night, but wake at four or five in the morning and then can't get off again - the same thing even if I weaken and take an over-the-counter sedative. That just seems to mean that I can't get back to sleep at dawn, and feel a bit hung over into the bargain when I get up.
Today it is just slightly more believable, though I'm still feeling bereft. It's ridiculous that I feel this way, but it still seems so momentous, that Mum, who's dominated my life in childhood, and more especially for the last twenty-one years with her presence just across the road, and for the last five years with her dementia and helplessness, has actually gone.