Family Affairs and other matters

As it’s Father’s Day in the UK, my children are spending the day with their father. We went out yesterday and bought all the usual old crap that children seem to want to buy for their father’s – Simpsons Y-fronts, “Fab Dad” mug and “Fab Dad” socks.

So. In the meantime, whilst they’re not around, I thought I’d write a few words about my own father in order to avoid unpacking another box:-

He was brought up in Southern Rhodesia and went to school in Kimberly. He was the oldest of three boys and tragically at the age of 10 his father killed himself. I can’t imagine what affect this must have had on him. His father had taken his extremely young wife and three children out to Africa to take a job flying a plane. When he got there, he found his employer had just been killed in a car crash. So. No job. He did a number of other things, including working for various politicians. They certainly lived the Great “White Mischief” existence for a while. The circumstances of his death were very strange – I “prefer” to think that he was murdered by the opposing party.

My father came to the UK when he was 16, met my mother when he was 19 and married her when he was 21. When I was three and my brother was 1 we moved to Malawi, where we stayed for 3 years. We did another brief stint in the UK and then moved to Hong Kong where my parents stayed for over 20 years.

It was our years in Hong Kong that formed my strongest memories of my father. He was a fairly remote figure when I was growing up. He worked and my mother stayed at home. I mostly recall him in a suit having breakfast and occasionally popping home for lunch. I also remember lots of laughter, drinking, smoking and dancing, but not much of it involving us. Sometimes, when I couldn’t sleep I remember him coming into my room. I don’t ever recall him reading me a story, I remember him waving his cigarette about to make a pattern in the dark and then leaving me to sleep in a smoke-filled room. I think the three of us were more of an irritation for him than anything else, slightly getting in the way of his sailing, his gin and tonics and the attention of his wife.

He has always put my mother before us and maybe that is how it should be. They enjoy each other’s company and have been married for 45 years. I sent him a virtual Father’s Day card today with the following quote attached:

“The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother” Theodore Hesburgh

I didn’t like the fact that he preferred to be with her when I was growing up, but now I can see how important that is as a life message. Obviously children will grow up and leave and it is important to maintain and nurture your relationship with your partner (almost) over and above that of your children and to show them how to live in a loving, respectful relationship. Clearly that message got lost on my ex-husband somewhere along the line.

It wasn’t until my two brother’s and I were old enough to go to the pub with him that his view of us began to change (and possibly vice versa). Once we could hold our alcohol and our own in a conversation, he started to enjoy our company. He retired before the age of 60 and loves it. He has learnt how to fly. He has a huge lust for knowledge. He reads, he sails, he talks, he travels. He also learnt how to slow down and appreciate the smaller things in life, something he was unable to do during his working life.

He is the first person I would turn to for advice regarding the big decisions in my life. When I need clarity, I talk to him. He has always been able to see the bigger picture and to cut through the crap.

About 8 months ago his cancer came back and he was given a fairly grim prognosis. “Oh well, shit happens” was his response to the news. He said that he had done all that he had ever wanted to do in his life and that everything else was a bonus. Not long ago, after 6 months of chemotherapy he has amazingly been given the “all clear”.

Who knows what that exactly means, but for now, I love the fact that he is around and interested in our lives and even secretly quite proud of all of us for different reasons. I think that now, after years of questioning what life was all about, he looks at his life, at his wife and at us and feels that he has achieved enough. If nothing else, I believe it was important for him to give us simply “a father”. Something he didn’t have the luxury of.

Although I’m slightly worried about spending two weeks all together in a villa during the summer holiday, booked in a panic because we thought this might be his last summer, I’m actually really looking forward to just spending time all together. We’re very lucky as a family that we actually all get on really well. Obviously, as usual, this will require us having to go to the pub every 10 minutes in order to get pissed and put the world to rights – and the great thing is that none of us can remember what we said the night before so a) we won’t get cross with each other for saying something rude and b) we can do it all again the next night. Long may it last.