MY WEEK BY FRANCIS GAY

John has a grown-up son who goes by the name Jonathan. The other day, John received a message from one of Jonathan’s co-workers.

The man said he had just become a father. He wanted to get in touch because Jonathan often talked about him and every time he did, it impressed this young man more and more. It was his dream that his son would grow up as proud of his dad as Jonathan so obviously was of his. “It was a kind thing

Ken loves his work. It fills up all the time not devoted to his family. And he’s involved in as many different aspects of it as he can be.

Unfortunately, it also contributes to an unhealthy and damaging lifestyle.

Recently, he’s been making changes; working on getting healthier. He now does half as much work, talks to half as many people, takes fewer than half as many trips.

I instinctively associated the change with his recent heart attack. He said, there was a connection – but it wasn’t the one I thought.

“I probably love my work more than I love myself. But I love my wife more than both of those together. She had to watch me almost die. I recovered and promised I would never do that to her again.”

Ken is going to live. Not for his work, not for himself, but for his real love. to do,” John told me, visibly touched by the experience. “But, you know, I’ve never heard Jonathan saying anything about me being a decent, never mind good, father.”

“Perhaps, he thinks it’s too obvious for words,” I suggested.

But the words are important. We really should tell each other these things, while we have the chance.

In this instance, the message got through – but why leave it to chance? If we see it, we should say it.

I was talking to Stacey through a high open window, trying hard not to stand on her flowers.

She has tested positive for Covid and was quarantining herself. Just then a car pulled into the drive and her mum lifted out two big bags of shopping.

“I asked you for bread and milk,” Stacey shouted. “Not all of this stuff!”

Mum put the bags on the doorstep, gave them a wipe-down, then addressed her daughter in a tone that brooked no contradiction and did not encourage an ongoing debate.

“You never asked me to change your nappies either. You never asked me to burp you when your tummy was full of wind. If I only ever did what you asked for, what sort of mother would I be?”

Stacey looked at me, eyebrows raised. And I gave her a sympathetic smile. No words were exchanged, because the words haven’t been invented that can contradict a mother’s love.

Alan and Val are usually the last two to leave their living room and the first back in it each morning.

And, still, Val straightens the cushion on the couch every evening.

“I teased her about it,” Alan told me. “Then she explained.”

In Val’s mother’s last few weeks, she was in a hospital bed in their living room. Perhaps she took a little more care for the tidiness of the house with her mum there. On the evening before her mum died, she was straightening the cushions when her mother said, “I’m so proud of you, Val. And I love you.”

“If she remembers me at all,” Val told Allan, “she’ll remember me like that.

“And I’ll remember her.”

“I’ll never tease about that again,” Alan said. “In fact, sometimes, just before bedtime, I will mess up the cushion – just so she can straighten them again.”

In the garden I espied, After a shower of rain, A sight that really made me smile, Again and yet again, From a little thorny bush, Growing in sweet repose, Was a perfect little flower, A single wild pink rose.