We appear to have lost the time

Woven from true and often darkly humorous experiences, this is the story of what happened to a family when both the parents succumbed to dementia within days of each other. It tells of George and Joan Ellis whose baffled admission: “We appear to have lost the time” set off a series of events that led to irrevocable change in more than just the dynamics of the immediate family. Told by their daughter Julie, who found that ‘humour of the blackest sort’ would be her ‘best tool or weapon’ to combat the worst effects of this experience, the story records the bizarre situations and events that occurred as dementia took over her parents’ lives. Challenged by the practicalities of taking care of her parents’ needs, she begins to look for causes of their sudden decline and to consider the importance of memory as the fundamental element that makes us who we are. As her parents’ lives begin to unravel, the present and the past intertwine when a long hidden secret is revealed; one that will prove to have an intense impact on the whole family. With scraps of reminiscence, internal monologues, letters and reconstructed scenes, a patchwork of George and Joan’s past lives is created. These memory fragments serve to recapture time; to provide a personal history of two people who lived through the deprivation of the 30’s and, having survived the Second World War, endeavoured to provide their children with all that they themselves had been denied. The colourful fabric of their lives is held together by the optimistic thread of Julie’s commentary. Through her account, delivered with a heady mix of guilt and humour, a path is woven between despair and hope.