20 January - Dad's birthday

It has to be said that my father was outwardly not one for birthdays. After my mother died his default present was a cheque or cash (for varying amounts). Indeed, as he got older this amount tended to decrease for all of us (me, grandchildren and others) as his memory skipped the recent present and recalled an earlier time when five pounds was a lot of money. Chris, my mother, had always bought the presents that they would give together, a task she delighted in, and he was more than happy to go along with it.

"You mustn't get me anything" was his usual plea when it came to his own birthday; or "you shouldn't have" when he saw the present. Books, videos (latterly DVDs) and CDs were common, indulging his tastes for autobiographies, choral music and period dramas. His granddaughter Abigail recounts seeing 'Pride and Prejudice' on countless afternoons after he had picked her up from school; and also to being fed slices of apple dipped in sugar (about which her health concious parents would have been horrified!).

Of course, being the social animal that he was he hugely enjoyed being the centre of attention and sooner or later the storytelling would begin. This is the first time in 52 years that I won't be calling him or coming over to his house to celebrate with him; I will miss those moments as he would graciously accept the plaudits for passing yet another milestone.

Happy birthday Dad.

Love Lawrence x

Chronology and Category

Whilst my father's stories were told on an apparently random basis, triggered by circumstance, conversation topic or some other internal or external prompt, they do group into an obvious chronology and can also be categorised into themes.


He was born in Hirwaun in South Wales and lived there until he went to University in Birmingham. This represents a distinct 'era' in which his family, in particular his grandparents and his parents, feature large. There are local characters and places, exploits with friends, school and sport. It also encompasses the Depression, coal mining and farming. Rugby remained a constant theme, spanning all the years of his life, as did many of the interests he developed in those early years.


University in Birmingham and then his first job in Coventry are the second era. He was the first of his family to go to university where he read economics. He met my mother in Coventry and married her when he returned at the end of the Second world War. He didn't join up immediately because his job was considered important as a contribution to the war effort and he wasn't allowed to leave. Instead he became an ARP and endured the Blitz.


It is fair to say that he had a 'big' war. From the point that he joined up, his training, the war in Europe and his passage to Japan via India, Singapore and Hong Kong he endured (and in many cases enjoyed) a string of exploits and life shaping experiences. After Japan, where he saw Hiroshima first hand, he was offered a commission in the Royal Welch Fusiliers as a professional soldier.


He turned it down but it wasn't so long before he and my mother left for Africa to follow a career in the Colonial Service. Another era when he was again actively participating in a time when our modern history was being made. A time of political change and paradigm shift. This is where he defined his 'Welshness'; because one of the things that happens to a Welshman like my father, who has left his country never to live there again, is that they become passionate and self-appointed 'ambassadors' for everything Welsh. Such feelings were, in his case, driven on the one side by 'hwyl' (intense pride and passion) and on the other 'hiraeth' (longing - in this case for home). They left after the colonial sun had already dipped below the horizon. Rather than take another role abroad, which he had been offered, they decided to return to England and to start all over again.


The next phase, as I grew up and he and my mother grew old in the home counties, was when I listened to his stories and made the voyage around my father's previous life. In this part the stories are mine; stories about him and us, reflections on the man himself. 


And then there is the 'time before dad'. As I joked with my children: Before Dad (BD) and Anno Pater (AP); or for my children Before Grandad (BG) and Anno Pater Grandis (APG). Stories he told about his near and distant ancestors; the Celts and their history (an enduring interest); and the history of the Welsh Valleys.


I am not sure how I will recount his life and times. Maybe a level of randomness is required - to be ordered (and no doubt reordered) in due course as the pages grow.


Lawrence J-W