My Mother and the RNLI

This story is entirely true and took place towards the end of November 2011. Your comments and reflections on the events described would be of interest. My mother died at the end of November. My wife and I planned the funeral following my mother’s wishes, but she did not indicate whether she wanted flowers. We felt that it would be more appropriate to hold a collection for charity but as my mother did not show any particular allegiance to a charity we decided before the funeral was planned to have a collection for the RNLI. We have particular interests in that charity and as my mother lived in Lytham St Annes, there was a local interest particularly as the media were reminding us of a great loss of life when the St. Annes lifeboat tragedy occurred. This was the decided and I went to LSA to make the arrangements. When I arrived at my mother’s flat I opened the mailbox and found that the top letter was from the RNLI requesting personally, from my mother, a donation. I subsequently went to see my mother’s solicitor with papers requested by him and found that the waiting room was full of leaflets and posters from the RNLI asking that they be remembered when drafting a will. So, 2 coincidences so far. Next, it was necessary to select an undertaker and, given the age profile of the population of LSA there are many to choose from! I was curious and attracted by the name of Whitehead and Daughter, so after leaving the solicitor’s office I made my way to their premises. I was stunned when I arrived to find that they occupied The Old Lifeboat House in St. Annes. By now this was getting ‘spooky’! Finally, when I was clearing up at the flat, I reached in to a drawer to get a tea towel, and was astonished to find the top one in the pile was an RNLI tea towel. Maybe these were ‘messages’, maybe coincidences, maybe I was just noticing things that I would have normally ignored. Who knows, but perhaps my story is of interest to you and may be used as appropriate to your needs.