Dear Cyndy,

Thank you for your caring inquiry. Whether or not I'm alright
is a matter of definition, whether or not Hamlet was alright
after he saw the ghost. Shakespeare shall be my mentor.

No longer mourn for me when I am dead
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world with vilest worms to dwell; 
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it; for I love you so, 
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot, 
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O, if (I say) you look upon this verse, 
When I (perhaps) compounded am with clay,
Do not so much as my poor name rehearse,
But let your love even with my life decay,
Lest the wise world should look into your moan, 
And mock you with me after I am gone.

The formal mockery is scheduled for 1 p.m. on December 6,
when there will be a memorial service instigated and plotted
by family members barren of love. The probability that I shall
attend is 90%. I shall try, in the words of my father-in-law,
to be "hellishly pleasant"; in my father's family, the expression
was "gute Miene zum bösen Spiel machen", to put on a good face 
for an evil game, - but that's a poor formula, - because they're 
too insensitive to be evil, and Margaret, as whose ambassador I 
shall appear, was angelic and incapable of malice.

My own state of mind reminds me of my mother's habitual
citing of the Duke of Wellington's words at Waterloo
in an (incorrect) translation:
„Ich wollte, es wäre Nacht oder die Preußen kämen“
(I wish it were night or the Prussians would arrive.)
while Wellington is claimed actually to have declared:
“Either night or the Prussians will come.” or
“I want night or Blucher!” 
You, as an historian, might be interested in these "facts",
which are also, so far as I am concerned, that I wish it were night,
while my watch says 11:20 a.m., and I haven't even started the
oatmeal for breakfast.

My best wishes to you and Ned.

Jochen