Father's Day.
Me and Dad.
So...today happens to be Father's Day here in Australia. Earlier this year I missed sending my Dad a card on Father's Day because of the different date in the UK which crept up unannounced here and so I was going to send him one for the Australian Father's Day....as it turns out I don't need to now but it doesn't mean I am not thinking about him. In fact I have done pretty much nothing else since receiving the news earlier in the week.As a child the thought of losing your parents is horrifying and you avoid those thoughts but as you grow up you accept the inevitability of it. You know that day will come I just wasn't expecting it this week.I have not been able to mention any of what had been going on with him before because Dad would read this, but before our earlier trip 'Up Over' in February I learned that he was beginning to get a bit confused and was struggling to find the right words in conversations. While we were there visiting him there was a definite change in him, he no longer was able to do the crosswords he loved doing and he had stopped reading because he found it hard to remember what he had read. When my brother rang him one day Dad told him "Will and...er.....the other one are here."However while we were there he improved greatly which was encouraging and I was able to return 'Down Under' thinking that it was perhaps a 'blip' and that he would recover. He had been for a brain scan towards the end of our visit and it took at least a month for the results to come back and when they did he was diagnosed with a 'mixed form' ( whatever that means) of Alzheimer's. It was not good news and the thought of what the future might hold for him was distressing.At his first memory test he got 17 marks out of 30 and could not even remember his sister's name but after starting on medication there was a big improvement and in the last test he took he got a score of 27.I decided pretty much as soon as I got back 'Down Under' that I would visit my parents again before the end of the year and booked my flights in July.In my last phone call home I did not speak to my Dad but the phone was on speaker and he could hear me. There was a noise in the background and I asked Mum if it was Dad hoovering."No, it's just the washing machine" she said. "He only hoovers on Mondays and Saturdays now.""Blimey!" I said "that's a big improvement because he used to hoover every night didn't he?"The last time thing I heard him say in that phone call and, as it turned out, the last thing I will ever hear him say was,"Tell him not to come on Mondays or Saturdays."It was very funny and typical of my Dad and I came off the phone happy that despite what he was going through he still sounded the same old Dad to me.In the end it was his heart, we suspect. He was having difficulty breathing and felt a tightening of his chest and was taken to hospital by ambulance where a couple of hours later, despite efforts to save him, he slipped away.At least he has been spared the descent into dementia.He was still our 'Dad', the same one we knew and loved when he left us and very fit for an 81 year old. Just a few days before his death he had gone for a 5 mile walk through Gelt Woods.My Emirates flight was booked for Friday 8th September. I tried to get earlier flights with the airline but to no avail. In the end they have promised a full refund of my ticket price under the circumstances and I have rebooked my flights with Etihad. I leave Brisbane tomorrow, Monday and will arrive in Manchester on Tuesday.Dad's funeral is on Friday.