In reflecting on the life of his late mother, Jean Evelyn Padmore- George, during a Funeral Mass last Thursday morning at All Saints Anglican Church, Brian George referred to a Shakespearan quotation.
"All the world's a stage and all of the men and women merely players, they each have the exits and entrances and one man in his time plays many parts." His mother had played many parts complete with charm, grace and an easy laughter - daughter, mother, grandmother/matriarch, sister/aunt/uniter, friend, diplomat, Empress and patient.
The fourth of five children born to Overand Padmore (Sr) and Gwendolyn Carter Padmore, Jean entered this world on July 16, 1934. "Mummy was from day one a princess having inherited the confidence and regal disposition from her mother...It is this confidence and view of herself that would underpin the several characters, which she played during her life" said Brian.
"That is why whether she was at the United Nations with Madeline Albright, the former US Secretary of State, at Buckingham Palace meeting the Queen, meeting heads of state in Geneva or elsewhere, and being Chief of Protocol, Mummy always felt that she was doing these people a favour by allowing them into her company."
In 1961, Jean portrayed Empress Josephine as the Queen of Carnival in her cousin Rudy Piggott's band "The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era." Says Rudy fondly "Jean George is the only one in the history of Carnival throughout the earth who played mas as queen of carnival, never having played before or since. A feat which is likely to last as long as mankind is on this planet."
By 1963, recognising that she was a single mother with two young sons, Brian and Michael, Jean went to the United States to further her education. And studied at Pace University at night while working at the United Nations Secretariat during the day. A sacrifice which meant losing some of the most critical years of her young sons' lives while she was away from them.
Jean joined the Diplomatic Service in 1970, and saw this not as a way to enhance her social status but as a vehicle to help the many Trinidadians who studied abroad. Defence Force officers attending Sandhurst, doctors and lawyers doing postgraduate studies in the United Kingdom, and secretaries, were encouraged to study by Jean.
In 1971 Jean was posted to the Consulate in New York, and in 1975 to the Consulate Division of the High Commision in London. In 1981 she was reassigned to Trinidad. By 1983 Jean was posted to the Embassy in Geneva. In 1992 she went back to New York as Deputy Head of Mission to the United Nations, from which she retired and returned home in 1996, and went into the consulting business of event planning. During her time as a diplomat, Jean served as Chief of Protocol in Trinidad and will be remembered as the person to have organised one of our first state funerals, for Sir Learie Constantine.
She was a devoted grandmother to Christopher and Matthew, and spent considerable time trying to ensure they knew their family history and understood their role in preserving this legacy.
In 1999, this woman who was so full of life, developed a heart condition and says Brian "what is interesting and sad is that someone with such a large heart would die of heart failure...Mummy never fully accepted or understood her progressive heart condition.....For the few of us who have had an insight into this fragile person juxtaposed against the very strong and dynamic person, this was not entirely a surprise. I know that despite the public Mummy with all of the dynamism, there was a private side of Mummy that needed special support and comforting."
Jean exited the stage on which she played so many parts last Sunday, Mothers' Day, in the same month and at the same age as her mother, and in another co-incidence, on a Sunday like her sister, Marjorie, whom she adored. May She Rest In Peace.