FRIENDSHIP AND KINDNESS WILL BE MISSED
I WAS sad to learn last week of the death of my old friend and colleague Brendan Boyle after a long illness. Brendan was one of the first people I met when I arrived at the Cape Argus, fresh from the Free State, back in 1975.
I was rather intimidated by the Big City after the relative simplicity of Bloemfontein, and Brendan kindly took me under his wing and showed me around my new strange surroundings.
He was the proud owner of a sturdy wooden Table Bay 25 sailing boat called Lapwing and invited me to come sailing with him.
I was enchanted by a whole new world of oak and canvas and complicated rigging. He invited me to crew for him on a voyage to Langebaan. That first overnight voyage along the West Coast kindled a lifelong love of ocean sailing in me.
One of my most enduring memories of that first voyage is of sitting together in Lapwing’s cockpit at midnight somewhere near Dassen Island and being surrounded by thousands of migrating dolphins churning the moonlit sea into a brilliant phosphorescent firework display. It was breathtaking.
Later, when his career took him away from Cape Town, I took over the post of official yachting correspondent from him for the Argus. It was one if the happiest times in my journalistic career.
We also shared an interest in motorcycling and Brendan was an awesome trail bike rider. (A skill I never acquired.)
When my son, Richard, was in high school, he saved enough money to go on holiday to England. But only enough for one person. His parents could not afford to travel with him but he was – at the age of 15 – determined to travel alone.
At that time Brendan and Loesje were living in London and when I asked Richard whether he had made any accommodation plans for his ambitious trip, he said with confidence: “Oh, I can stay with Brendan and Loesje.”
He did and was looked after kindly and enjoyed the holiday of a lifetime.
Brendan was a kind man, always polite and well spoken. In the often stressful world of newspaper reporting (particularly in the days of restrictive apartheid press laws), I never heard him resort to crude or obscene language. He respected the English language and used it with great skill.
In today’s rushed electronic world, where the standard of journalism is being allowed to slip, Brendan’s journalistic skill and integrity will be sorely missed.
In my world, his friendship and kindness will also be sorely missed. My thoughts go out to Loesje, Jordan and Jed. Last Laugh
The golf club grouch always found something to complain about.
The fairway was not properly mowed, the food was tasteless, the caddies were lazy, the weather was too hot, the wind was too strong.
One day he teed off and his ball sailed onto the green and dropped into the hole.
One of the other players turned to a friend and whispered: “Let’s see if he finds fault with that.”
The grouch shook his head sadly and muttered: “Damn! Just when I needed to practise my putting.”