Dear Dad…..(a message from afar).

I wish you were here, I always wish you were still with us as I miss you so much. But having said that, I am glad you are not here to experience what this world is currently having to deal with. I think you are probably better off away from all of this mayhem and madness.

The photograph below, is of Dad looking out into the Atlantic Ocean from Sennen Cove, Cornwall in the UK. This was a holiday we shared in November 2016; Dad’s last holiday and around seven months before cancer took him from us.

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What would you have made of all this COVID-19 stuff I wonder? I suspect the second world war would have been mentioned a few times in the conversations we would have had. As you tended to not go out much, I don’t think the social distancing thing would have been a particular problem for you, and although Mum would love to still have you around, I think you would have been getting on her nerves by now! (I’m joking). Talking of Mum – she is doing so well in these changed and challenging times. In fact, she is getting so much done, including signing up for some distance learning. She is reading, Postcrossing, spending time in the garden (although it’s a bit chilly right now), watching stuff on Nexflix (as she refers to it), and generally looking after herself. You’d be proud of her Dad – she is so cheerful and upbeat.

The thing you might have been concerned about more than anything else would have been your food supply, but I reckon you would have been well planned and stocked way before any lock-down began. I certainly don’t think you would have been hungry – as Mum isn’t now, you’ll be pleased to hear.

We are speaking to Mum daily but it’s a shame we cannot speak to you too. I wish I could send you an email and that you could reply. Having said that, you and technology never did get on. I remember your stubby fingers jabbing away at the keys on your old Nokia. I’m still not sure why you had that mobile – you never took it anywhere with you; it was like the little phone was happy in it’s own company sat on the mantelpiece waiting for you to look at when you got home from not taking it with you. By the way Dad – we’ve still got all your voice messages on the landline answerphone, we’ve not been able to bring ourselves listen to them yet. Although I would love to hear your voice again, and we are definitely not going to delete them; it would feel like we were discarding the last tangible thing of you that we have if we did. That may sound daft to you but they are special messages to us, especially the one where you told us that you had come first in class in the hanging-basket category of the town councils gardening competition. Of course, we have all of our wonderful memories but we will still keep these recordings – these little snippets of you.

As I write this post to you, if you were here, you would love the aromas coming from the kitchen, the succulent smell of roast beef – one of your favourite meals. When preparing our Sunday roasts, we often mention you as we recall the times when you cooked Sunday lunches for us when we visited.

As we move into the beautiful season of Spring, I know that had you been with us now, under lock-down conditions, you would not have been bored. I can imagine you dusting your bits and pieces off in the shed ready to tackle the Springtime gardening tasks. I can see your daily pattern as clear as the March sky is today; toast and marmalade (plus clotted cream if there was any in the fridge), gardening, snooze, some Clive Cussler, lunch, TV news. This would be followed by a nap (this is different to a snooze, much more serious and involves snoring), gardening, cup of tea, gardening, TV news, supper, Clive, snooze, Cussler, TV news, bed. Your day would have been packed full of activity which would have obviously required plenty of rest. I can still pull your leg Dad, and you can still raise you eyes to the heavens – although I don’t know what you raise them to when you are already there.

Dad – it has been good to talk to you in this way. Continue to look down on us while we get through this horrid virus thing and rest assured, even though she is doing fine looking after herself, that Mum is being looked after.

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Love you Dad.