EVERY STORY MATTERS

Last week was a big week.  Nick had a big birthday.

Nick was born on 11 November and as a child his birthdays were dominated by the fact that it was Remembrance Day.  His dad was a vicar so Nick spent his early birthdays in church and parades at war memorials, in his little Cubs uniform then his Scouts uniform, along with his sisters in their Brownies and Guides outfits.  This was the 1950's and the war was still very fresh in people's minds.  Remembering the fallen and the two minute silence was what everyone did.

My dad's birthday was on 10th November and after my mum died in 2002 we all made a fuss of him, especially on the big birthdays, seventy five, eighty and ninety.  With it being the day before Nick's birthday there were often joint birthday teas and although Nick and I always celebrated his birthday separately there was still the sense of it being secondary to something else.  My dad died in 2022, an old man who didn't expect to lose his wife so young and then outlive her by twenty years.

So, with it being Nick's Big Birthday we made a big job of it, lasting several days, before and after.  There were lunches out with friends, a special lunch with just the two of us the day before and an apéros party on the day itself.  A whole bunch of friends came round.  There was a birthday cake, presents, cards, music, the joyful murmur of friends in conversation, the tinkling of glasses and a big smile on his face all day.  Everyone had a lovely time, especially Nick.  He didn’t have to say it but it made up for having more memories of shivering in the rain at a war memorial than of birthday cake.

It was a beautiful day for Nick's birthday.  We were busy, cooking, tidying the garden, rearranging furniture, all so much easier when the sun shines to lift your spirits.  The next day it was back to normal, grey skies and rain, but the birthday continued for one more day as we took a break from the washing up and went out for a burger at lunchtime.  We barely noticed that it was pouring with rain outside!

Of course, it’s been a big week for other reasons and as most of the people we know reflect on the outcome and what the future might hold, we stare in horror at the news and hunker down.  We steel ourselves for the forthcoming winter and for the fallout from the election of a man whose morals make him patently unfit to hold such power. 

A few days later my sister in law sent me a link for this.  For people in the UK it’s a chance to have your say about how the pandemic affected you, your friends and family.  I contributed my thoughts and it makes pretty damning reading as mostly I wrote about how badly it affected my dad and how the agencies that should have been there to care for him and give us support let us all down.  Not only because of Covid but also because the system is geared to fail old people in our country.  Our story is probably similar to hundreds of thousands of others but as long as someone is reading it and lessons are learned it was worth the effort of writing it.  Fourteen years of austerity and bad government had brought us to a state where Covid highlighted the shortfalls in organisations that couldn't cope and that those in charge didn't seem to care either.

It’s definitely almost winter here now.  It was only 1°C as we drove home from an evening with friends at the end of Nick's Big Birthday Week and it’s only four weeks until we go home to the UK for Christmas.  I'm sure it will go in a flash!