[my father] a most significant birthday

Beckfoot bridge, where my father would toss pebbles

My father’s birthday has just passed. I didn’t want to write anything during it but shall put down a few words now.

If ever there was a complicated relationship, this was it and it reminds me of Springsteen’s Independence Day but without the rancour. Looking back now, I see that his distance from us was partly his war experiences catching him up, partly his age and partly his being transplanted into the new world downunder so long ago.

He never lost his Yorkshire accent [he was a West Riding man] and neither did the sizeable shipload of pilgrims from the Bradford area who eventually settled in Geelong, fifty miles south west of Melbourne shortly before the war, clearly escaping the Great Depression or at least hoping to, the other half of the family electing to remain in England.

He was still youngish when he travelled to join the army upon declaration of war, serving in the Middle-East and Palestine with some distinction – his medals bars went right across his chest – but he was of the kind who never recounted war experiences and so there are only the three small, leather bound albums of box brownie type snaps to go by.

In a rare moment of togetherness, he once told me, “Look at that photo, James. The Germans were two mile up the road there.” It was the El Alamein Road, for want of a better description of the dirt track and a sign had been stuck in the roadside sand, proclaiming, “Advance at your own peril; Jerry’s awaiting you.”

My memories are from decades later, as a nipper down at the beach in summer in a 12 by 18 tent with a 24 by 24 canopy stretched taut above it, all the other campers stretched up and down the foreshore and not a care in that sun-drenched world. He hardly ever went for walks, electing instead to sit on the camp stool and gaze out over the sea, whilst I was out skiffle-boarding or sailing on a surfboard with a raised beach towel or whatever.

The rain would pour down quite often and he’d be out there, with my help, digging trenches around the tent, water running off down the slope and he’d tell me not to touch the calico tent walls, as the rain would come in at that point. All food was in the icebox and we had a porta-gas stove and lamp.

His skills were as a painter for what is now Telecom and he’d been a carpenter before that, having built our house and just about everything in it, as well as other people’s edifices. Despite my humble origins, I had a public school education, which both my parents scrimped and saved for and so I write now in this most unhumble manner and can do nothing about that. I remember my roots though.

There were various stays back in England - my aunty had a lovely house near Ilkley Moor and that was my centre of operations until I made my own way in life – followed by stays back in Australia. Eventually I came back here for good but that is another story.

Another memory I have is of him sitting in the large brown chair, which nobody else sat in, drumming his fingers on the armrests and drinking tea. This had to be a rare moment, as he was always in the garage or shed building something or other and his tools were in immaculate condition, each in its place on the garage lattice wall and jars of nails, screws, bolts and so on along the bench.

I remember his metal comb for his full head of hair he kept till the end, which is more than I can say for myself and I should have been more vigilant after he died as my mother was one of the “clearers out” of the world and practically all memorabilia was thrown out at the time.

He was a dour man and my mother's vivacity was a nice counterpoint to that. About the only joke he ever told was that old chestnut about the garage doors needing painting badly but he certainly appreciated comedy programmes like Alf Garnett, On the Buses, Fawlty, Yes Minister and so on. I got the impression he didn’t like Australians, as most Brits don’t and yet he chose to spend his remaining days there. He’d cheer for the English cricket team but then would support the Aussies in rugby.

I’ve obviously inherited this and more and in the world cup a few years back, watching it at a Russian gym, one of the Russkies asked me whom I was supporting. I can remember being in a real quandary over that one and decided to just enjoy the match, which was a rip-snorter as you’d recall, with Johnno putting on the final points.

Not to put too fine a point on it – my father was a very sick man, physically. Emphysema, hepatititis and a number of other complications eventually brought him down and when he did succumb, it turned out he’d been suffering for the past three decades, in great pain, it seemed.

My mother was nearly a decade younger than my father and both had had me very late in life – I don’t know what they’d been doing during all those years after the war. Many people would be surprised that this particular birthday was or would have been his centenary.

G-d rest his soul.