1"I'll write a will for you but on one condition:"

Matilda was my first law client.

A palliative care nurse, Slight, invisible, and very sweet,

In her late sixties, she had just recently lost her partner, a practicing doctor,

who had recently died and had left Matilda a lot of money.

In today's money, over $1 million dollars.

You would never have known it from looking at the apartment the women had shared.

It was tread bare. So sad.

Matilda came to me to settle the estate and then asked me to write her will.

"I will on one condition: that when you have died, you will have spent all the money you inherited."

Amazingly, Matilda agreed!

For the first time since we had met, I saw a twinkle in her eye.

We left my office, and went on a shopping spree.

First La Coupe, for a glamorous hair styling, and a transformational makeup job.

Then off to Lilli - then the grand couturier to Montreal's rich,

And there Matilda indulged over the next weeks like a kid in a candy shop:

Designer dresses and suits, colorful accessories, costume jewellery....

and "sexy" shoes!

An amazing transformation. She looked stunning!

I wrote her will, and Matilda left, a beautiful, elegant, woman,

glowing with happiness!

Something in her that had been deeply buried, had been released into the open.

A happening!

I never saw her again.

A year later, I learnt she had died.

Had her life been transformed?

Or had she retreated back to her old ways?

Does it matter?

For a moment in time, Matilda had experienced real joy.

And a wonderful sense of self.

How much was that worth?