John Hughes 1936 - 1992

Today is the twentieth anniversary of my father's death. I miss him. I am sad that he is not here with us. I am sad that we have not had the benefit of his presence these past twenty years. I am sad for him that he has missed the past twenty years: time with his family would have meant a lot to him; time listening to music, watching plays and movies, reading and writing; time out walking on the moors; time counselling his clients; time managing his house and garden; time he never had. He should now be a mere 76 years old, maybe getting a little frail, but still with the energy and spark to engage, to contend, to contest, to affirm, to support, to love. Much of his life was sad in one way or another: raised fatherless in wartime London; injured in Cyprus during compulsory military service; married far too young having got his teenage girlfriend pregnant; periods of unemployment; more mouths to feed and a wife who knew little financial discipline; long working hours in a hell-hole industrial town; redundancy; divorce; isolation. His health declined, made worse by tobacco and alcohol: he suffered a bout of hepatitis. He had the first of several heart attacks in the mid-1980s, the final heart attack being fatal. I am hugely thankful that he was able to find love with Anne, to remarry and move to Cornwall. Would that much more of his life had been of that ilk.

I write this, not to claim special knowledge, special understanding or a special relationship with him. Each of my siblings (full, half and step) have their own experiences of him. I think that he impacted positivley on the lives of many people with whom he came into contact, especially in Cornwall and Devon. Each will have their own memories of him. I write this as a kind of wayside shrine, twenty years along the road. Not being one for cut flowers, I would perhaps plant a flowering rose in his memory, and maybe a peppermint bush as well.

...

For a while you were, about which I feel grateful. You died, and are now no more: I feel an aching loss. Who you were touched the lives of many, and shaped the lives of some, of whom I am one. Who you were will not be forgotten.