A Son, A Death and A Dream.

I dream a great deal and have blogged about dreaming in general before. 

I slept very deeply and for a long time last night. Just before I woke I had an extremely strange dream.  I usually forget the contents of even my weirdest dreams just after I have wakened. Today it lingered - all day.

I was in a very large house with my New Zealand family. My two sons were there as well. When Andy (the elder son) appeared he was immensely tall (which he wasn't in real life being just under 6'). However all the members of my father's family including his sister were over 6'6".  The exception was my father who was 'tiny' at 5'10½".  The height of my father's family had been a subject of discussion yesterday so I suppose there may have been a link in my mind there. 

I've been thinking about Andy most of the day today for an entirely different reason. Had he lived, he would have been 48 today. In the past I have never speculated on what he might have achieved. He was just completing a doctorate (in computer science) when he died and already had a very well paid job and a flat and life in London. Today my mind wandered into the realms of 'what if'. Not in a melancholy way just a wistful one.

This evening sitting in the living room listening to a concert and sort of watching it on the big screen and drawing an 'envelope picture' it suddenly struck me: the significance of dreaming about Andy this morning of all mornings.

The mind is a very strange place. Well mine is anyway.

Understanding

How often do we hear the sentence "You don't understand" in relation to something someone is going through? One blogger in my Blogworld recently said that she had been suffering from a bout of clinical depression.

I often think about the experiences in my life and think about how they have made it easier for me to understand what other people are going through or what other people may think.

The latter is easier to understand because my whole professional training from my short period on a medical ward when I was straight out of school to my professional career as a bureaucrat involved being able to see all points of view of a situation. 

I originally read public administration and my post-grad was business administration. 

In the short period when I was reading for a law degree and then for the English Bar it was drummed into one that a lawyer must always be able to see both sides of the case in order to win whichever side he represented.

I came North and never did become a lawyer (English and Scots law are different). However the ability to see all points of view was absolutely invaluable when preparing a case to present to politicians either at local council level or, as was often the case, trying to persuade the Scottish Office to accede to one of the Council's requests. 

When it comes to understanding what people are going through I fall back on my experiences in life from post-operative depression after having part of my lung removed when I was 16/17, the death of our elder son in 2006 and living with cancer since I was operated on in 1998.  

I must stress that in their own way though they were awful experiences - particularly Andy's death - they were also a way of making it possible to understand what other people may be going through. That in itself makes real empathy possible. 

Depression is different though because when you actually are going through it you don't have control. Even then I was sure it would pass and when it did I've been fortunate in that it never returned. However it was a superb experience because it's enable me to understand what it's like and empathise with those who suffer. However I still do not to go for long walks on my own as I did then day after day, mile after mile because 60 years later it still brings the experience (not the depression) back to me.

After all:

Happiness

Did you know that today is The International Day of Happiness? Apparently the day is celebrated worldwide every March 20, and was conceptualized and founded by philanthropist, activist, statesman, and prominent United Nations special advisor Jayme Illien to inspire, mobilize, and advance the global happiness movement.

I'll be quite honest. I had not heard of the movement until Happiness Day was mentioned on the radio this morning.

I saw the television lunchtime news and there was no mention and not a single piece of happiness there.

Today is also the Vernol Equinox and therefore, in the Northern Hemisphere, Spring officially begins. Unfortunately these days few people worship Zephryus who is (or perhaps was) the god of the gentle west wind and the herald of spring. Consequently he is sulking. Zeus The King of the Gods and the ruler of the heavens was the god of clouds, rain, thunder and lightning and he still seems to be in charge here at the moment.

Anyway ignoring the abysmal weather, let us return to the subject of happiness. How does one determine whether the day has been a happiness success? Internationally the news is, as usual, not dominated by stories of happy events. At home as I type this a newsflash has just arrived on my phone saying that a short extension to Brexit is possible if MPs approve the Prime Minister's Brexit Deal next week. The effect of that would be that the deal will be approved or Britain will crash out of the EU without a deal. Unless, that is, something very spectacular happens. In any case the Royal Mint has issued a 50p coin to reflect the current mood of the nation. None of that indicates happiness so far as I can tell.

So I think we have to look to ourselves for happiness. I woke up this morning. So far as I am concerned that is always a good start to the day. I've been doing it for the last 27,317 days and I don't want to stop just yet. The weather was clement so I enjoyed my morning walk in the woods without getting my usual soaking. When I'd finished my walk and gone into The Woodlands for coffee, the young lady behind the counter greeted me with the diary I had misplaced the previous day. (I use my phone for almost everything except my diary so was lost without it). I'd been in animated conversation with a friend when I'd left and forgotten to pick it up. Silly me. This afternoon I met a lady who had at one time been the best buddy to our son Andy who died. We have almost no adult photos of Andy and whilst we were blethering it transpired that she has. I hadn't met her for years despite Stornoway being such a small place so that really was a wonderfully happy re-union.

Yes. All in all today has been a Good Day.

Dolce far niente

Literally 'sweet doing nothing'.  For Italians - and I suspect they are the only people who have perfected this art and it, as much as the Mediterranean diet, may have a lot to do with their longevity.  

Today is a day - or rather today is a date - that will always be etched in my mind. A day I decided that I was going to indulge in dolce far niente.  Andrew (Andy), our elder child, died on this day 11 years ago. A very dear friend's father died on this day 10 years ago. Gaz, deciding to try and ameliorate the bad connotations of the day, got engaged on this day 4 years ago. And today we are, yet again, listening to the horrendous effects of terrorism at home. 

Today is also the anniversary of my birth: the 73rd to be precise.

I shall be out to dinner at friends'.  

This coming week I am determined to return to Blogland. I'll see you there.

[Written yesterday, 4 June but posted today]

"Do not stand at my grave and weep"

As I mentioned in my last post yesterday was a Good Day. Today the sun is shining out of a solid blue sky and there's hardly a puff of wind: just enough to be pleasant. So I spent three hours gardening. I have never regarded that as work. For me it was, and is, a way of relaxing and allows me to think about the meaning of life in a way that I can't if I'm doing anything else.

Today I reflected on the life, and death, of our older son, Andrew, who died ten years ago yesterday. Who knows what might have been. To be honest I never think of that. 

One of the things that has struck me more as I get older and as the two World Wars get further away (I was born 2 days before D-Day) is how many parents (on both sides) lost their children without them even getting out of their teens or early 20s and how many had children who went away as 'normal' children and came back mentally or physically scarred and changed: often beyond recognition? 

No parent expects a child to die before they do. It goes against the natural order of things.

Andy, as he preferred to be known, had cancer. He had the very best of treatment at the Royal Marsden in London one of the finest specialist cancer hospitals in the country. It was a horrible cancer and it was a horrible way to die. That was as bad a period of life as a parent as it could be.

There was no funeral. Andy had arranged for a Humanist celebration of his life with his friends and family. We celebrated that life.

I think of Andy most days. I think of the good times. I think of the positive things he did. I don't think about the pain and the suffering. I do not grieve. Grief is a negative emotion. We grieve for ourselves and those who are left behind. Grief doesn't help the person who has died. 

So today I thought even more about the happiness that he brought to the family and to his friends during his 33 years on this earth. And I was thankful.

I posted pictures of Andy last year here but here are a few more:

Andrew's first catch?

Andrew seemed to spend a lot of time in small boats which was strange because on the ferry he was always sick before we left port.

In Uig

Early signs of a career as a computer programmer?

A birthday with friends at Coll (some of you may recognise yourself!).

Another Birthday

Today is the anniversary of my birth. I've always thought the term birthday rather odd because one only has one: the day of one's birth. Anyway by common usage today is my Birthday. I rarely celebrate my birthday. In fact I've never given birthdays the importance that many people obviously feel they are due. Somehow, though, I had a feeling a few weeks ago that this birthday was going to be a bit different: it was going to be a Good Day.

It has been. It started yesterday with a meal out at Digby Chick with my son Gaz, his wife and her parents. It was a very special evening.

Today the sun has shone and despite the wind still being from the North it was not so cold that I haven't been able to spend three hours in the garden during the day. My knee isn't complaining either.

I've had visits and phone calls and messages and cards and presents and I don't know whether I've just been more sensitive to it but I actually feel I'm having a birthday in a way that I haven't for as long as I can remember: well my 60th actually when very dear friends organised a huge party.

So I'm writing this whilst waiting for a lift to Pat and Dave's for dinner where I know that I will have a lovely, relaxing evening with good company, good food and good wine. What more could a man want?

My birthday is also the anniversary of the death of our son Andrew. This year is the tenth anniversary. It is also the anniversary of the death of a very dear friend's father.  

Our son Gaz proposed to his, now, wife Carol on this day too.

So today is a day of special memories and reflections and of mixed emotions and despite that it is still a Good Day.

I will do a more reflective post tomorrow but for now I shall sit in the sun-drenched conservatory and pour myself a G and T (Thank you Gaz and Carol) :

Isle of Harris Gin

4 June: A Reflection

I woke to a text from Gaz wishing me a happy birthday - a wish which was followed by a surprising - and very warming - number of others and a wish which was to prove very effective in coming true.

The day was cool but sunny so I decided that my first call would be to Kelvingrove Park next to Glasgow’s main University buildings. It is a magnificent park in the true tradition of British cities and their Victorian era Councils and benefactors. (Kelvingrove Park was established by the City Council in the mid 1850s.)

The reason for the call was to visit the tree planted in memory of our son Andrew - who preferred to be called Andy - who died on this day in 2006. The tree is doing really well. The setting is really fitting overlooked as it is by the splendid main building of the University - in the background of the first photo below.

The tree in the foreground was planted to commemorate the life of Andy 

I was taking the photos at the same time in the morning that Andy died so it was an opportunity for some quiet reflection.

After that I went to the Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery to meet Friend Who Knows Too Much and her daughter who had, a few hours previously, had confirmation of her BA degree. So the lunch to which I was treated was a most enjoyable occasion. FWKTM and I then spent the afternoon at the Art Gallery and Park chatting and catching up.

Back to Anna’s we had a quiet evening with dinner and a DVD of a modern take on Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. 

Thank you one and all. It really was a wonderfully happy, if sometimes reflective, birthday.

“It’s a funny old life, Dad!”

Andy died 4 years ago today at the age of 33.   No day ever goes past without something that he did or something that he said passing through my mind.  I am sure that the same can be said for his Mum and his brother, Gaz.  When any young person dies it is sad.  I don’t dwell in his absence but in the joy that he brought when he was alive.  Last night I was looking through some of the photos that I took when he was a child – we have few of him in later years – that I have scanned into the digital age.  I decided that I would share some of them.  The thing that struck me most was that Andy and Gaz seemed to be joined at the hip.  They are together in the majority of the photos.  There was only 14 months between them (Andy was the elder) so I suppose that was a significant factor.

  First trout

Proud Mum and paternal grandparents

I shall return with more captions later.

A Question of Light and Time

I wake.  I wonder what time it is.  No point lying here.  The time doesn't present itself as a thought.  I open an eye slowly.  As I do so I am blinded by a bright orange light.  I close my eye hurriedly.

This is not what I expected.  I haven't woken from a nightmare or even a dream.  So why the flash of light?  Where am I?  It is silent.  It is warm and cosy.  I'm not in France - the window would be open and I'd hear the noises of the night.  The air's different too.  I remember.  I'm in Glasgow at a friend's.

So why the bright orange light?  I open my right eye very carefully.  It's still there making other visual contact impossible.  This is becoming a game.  I've had lots of very weird and horrible dreams and nightmares recently and often the worst nightmares have occurred when I've 'known' that I was awake.  I know I'm awake now.  But this isn't a dream.  It isn't even a nightmare.  So am I awake?

I open my eye again.  Again the light enters.  The question of time remains unanswered.

I try to re-group my senses.  My watch, I remember, is on the bedside table.  The bedside table is on the other side of the bed to the one I'm facing.  I turn over and gingerly open an eye for a third or fourth time.  I don't want to be temporarily blinded again.  This time the light's gone.  No.  I realise that's not true.  The light is not bright but a soft orange glow.

And now the realisation.  There is a tiny crack between the curtains where I didn't draw them properly  Outside there is a bright orange street light.  Something that could not be further from the reality of anywhere I usually stay.

I lay there wondering how long all this has lasted and why my brain failed to analyse the issue more speedily.  Then I wonder why I'm wondering that.  So I decide to get up and make a cup of tea.

"It's a funny old world, Dad."  as Andy would have said.