Dad  wasn’t particularly noisy, less so for the last few months, until ultimately he passed a week ago today. I’ve been travelling over to my Mum’s house a lot since last Monday and the phone never stops ringing, letters dropping through the door, Whats app messages popping up from people on the village group I joined at the beginning of this pandemic so as to keep an eye on my folks via friendly neighbours; I  have no clue as to their identity, Mum even less so, and she’s lived in the village for decades, shit 42 years!!

Dad wasn’t someone who would go up to the pub on his own, he wasn’t the type to make a big song and dance of things, trying to be the life and soul of the party. He spoke softly and treated people with respect. A kind man, not a flashy man, although he liked to show off his garden because he had built it up from scratch and he loved that place. He was proud  and protective which is probably why he only let me mow the lawn once I think, after his first stroke 24 years back, I believe his garden was one of the things which got him back on his feet again, that and his forced retirement due to the stroke.

The over whelming response from folk, strangers to me and people I have met before was how kind and gentle Dad was, a good bloke, an awful lot to live up to. And in the coming days I’ve got to somehow write some sort of piece to read at the Crematorium next Monday, which will do him justice, and will probably stay away from the sometimes more dirty colloquial language used in this blog. In these few days since he’s gone I haven’t really had time to think about the hole and the silence which will soon fill up the Dad shaped Hole. January and the darkness will be tough I’m guessing.