A Rumination on the Death of My Father

This image signifies everything.

In my concluding thoughts for 2018, I promised you all that the new walking season for 2019, my eighth, would start today, February 9th, but that has not come to pass, instead I am here, regretfully telling you that on the morning of Saturday 26th January, My Father, David Wren, died aged 77, after suffering a fall in the night, having endured the onset of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy over the last three years, which had gradually robbed him of his mental and physical capabilities. A shocking and sudden end to his protracted and undignified illness, which we had all anticipated for quite a while but still were not expect to arrive so swiftly, by My Mum's accounts he had been in a normal sort of fettle for much of his last week, but had grown increasing restless and irritable during his last few nights, moving about with a force and freedom that he was quite incapable of in his waking hours, regularly trying to get out of bed when he lacked the strength to do so when alert, and taking his ultimately fatal fall in the small hours of that Saturday morning. I'd been due to travel down to see My Parents on the 2nd February, and thus did not have my chance to see Dad for one last time after Christmas, but absorbing the news proved surprisingly easy, as I'd known that Dad had been in his last days since his first hospitalization in 2015 after suffering an intercranial haematoma, and became fully aware that he had a degenerative condition after his diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease 'Plus' in 2017. Apparently, the medical attendees who had assessed him over the preceding weeks had largely brought less than positive news, the occupation therapist having noted that while his muscle strength was still good, his motor skills were starting to fade badly, diminishing the fine control in his hands and rendering it difficult to negotiate the steps that gave access to the bedroom and out of the house, while the speech therapist noted that his chew and swallow responses were worsening and that he was starting to show signs of aphasia, with his brain starting to lose the ability to form words. All told, Dad's sudden death seems like a merciful release, as his continuing decline was looking like it would soon rob him of his ability to eat normally, communicate even slightly coherently and probably render him bed ridden, and coupled to My Mum being close to the end of her physical and emotional tether, his sudden end spared them both a long, lingering and undignified ordeal.

Self & Dad, early 1975.

That doesn't make his illness and death any easier to absorb though, as Dad didn't deserve an end to his life like that, maybe no one does, but Dad certainly didn't as he was one of the loveliest and most dedicated Fathers that anyone could wish for, a man against whom we held no grudges and no one had a bad word to say, a perpetually funny and warm hearted soul, quite simply put, He was My Dad, who I loved absolutely without reservation. Born during wartime in Birmingham in 1941 to his mother, Eva Green, he never knew his own father, who remained an enigmatic absence for his entire life, subsequently moving to Leicester in 1950 when his mother married Robert Wren who adopted him as his own, and while not excelling at school, he didn't lack for intelligence and application and would probably been diagnosed as dyslexic by contemporary educators. Sadly for Dad, he was born as part of the generation that couldn't always pursue their dreams and didn't get the chance to follow the career on the railways that he desired when he left school at 15, as that would have meant traveling away to Derby, and instead ended up taking a career in light industry, primarily as a press tool setter, that lasted over 40 years, preferring to work the shop floor than taking the opportunities for promotion as he was always happier pointing out the mistakes and foibles of others rather than taking the responsibility that would otherwise be his. His relationship with Abbot's Road URC was the other main centre of his life, where he went through the Junior church and gradually became an active member of the congregation, it was here that he met My Mother in the mid 60s and married in 1967 (with whom he went on to start a family in 1973 with My Sister's birth, with Myself arriving the following year), and throughout the years he dedicated himself to making himself useful to them through the art of DIY and he was never happier than when he was building something, fixing something or trying to find out why something wasn't working. Dad could probably have excelled in any of the allied trades, as he took on carpentry, paint and decorating, plumbing and electrical work with an amount of skill that seemed almost unnatural, and it was only in the art of plastering that I ever saw him come unstuck, and for much of my youth, I was called on to assist him and his partner-in-trades BW as a their third pair of hands, or notional supervisor, as they always liked to put it, it's always been a regret of mine that I never inherited his DIY skill set.

Dad & Self, September 2017

I never realised until later in life that our family basically got by on Dad's wage alone for the bulk of the 1970s, while My Mother took a break from teaching to raise their family, and while Dad was never one to splash the cash around, he took responsibility for household bills and costs for all his working life, and was always supremely generous with his time, doing DIY work and favours for anyone who'd ask it, and always having time for work and fundraising at the church, with the social and drama groups, both of which form some of the abiding memories of my childhood, watching him play it up on stage or act as general dogsbody behind the scenes for many a church social. They were such a feature of my younger days that I took more about catering away from church than I did faith, but Dad's strong moral core was always there to inspire us as he encouraged us to pursue out interests and education through the years, indeed for most of the decade he and I were inseparable as he developed my fascination with engineering, history and the railways as we travelled up and down the country to ride the preserved lines, see the heritage of these isles and to go 'loco-bashing', as we always called the dark art of trainspotting. It's always been a small regret of mine that my late teens and interest in pursuing my own path coincided with his mother dying 1991, and for years afterwards I felt bad for growing away from him when my emotional support would have been useful to him, and the distance between us sadly grew further when I moved away to University, and to start a new life in West Yorkshire in those pre-internet, pre-mobile communication days of the 1990s. We always stayed friends though, and we took interesting each others paths, as he left engineering to take up a second career in stock-taking, and always had another foreign holiday tale to tell, while I forged a path into the working world and fired the interests that sustain me still. We all grew back into a family again when My Sister had her children, and Dad might have loved his grand-daughters as much as he did anyone else, and after his enforced retirement after a hip replacement in 2009, he settled enthusiastically into the role of being Grandpa Wren, while still finding the time to holiday with us, make himself useful with decorating and DIY and to travel the country to see what the railways brought anew, while retaining the good nature and good humour that always sustained him, which he was still doing well into 2015 before his first hospitalisation.

The very last act.

Three years of illness denied Dad the happy and long retirement years that he deserved, and I've really said all I ever want to about the illness that stopped him from doing what he loved most and eventually robbed him of his life, not an end I'd wish for anyone and certainly not something I'd be willing to face myself, and I'm surprised that he endured as long as he did, as many times though the last two years we'd part ways with me wondering if I'd get to see him again, and now I won't, though I'd remined convinced we would until Mum informed me of his passing. That's where we are now then, as My Sister and I rallied straight to My Mum's side immediately after receiving the news, but gathered with a feeling of relief  that Dad's ordeal was finally over and the long decline he may have suffered wasn't going to come, and My Mum seemed so unburdened by it all that it made her seem years younger, by her own admission she felt like she'd lost the man she loved quite some time ago. I didn't really want to go to see Dad in recumbence at the funeral parlour, but felt that I ought to as I'd deliberately avoided seeing either of my Grandmothers when they died, and it was the right thing to do, to see him finally unburdened from his toil, and to make the apology to him that I never made when he was alive to hear it, that I was sorry for never creating a family of my own for him to participate in, and needless to say tears were shed. Yesterday, we went to the Crematorium at Great Glen for his funeral, which we had intended as a quiet affair for the remaining six of us, but enough people from the church wanted to attend, that we had to expand the service, with Rev. PS presiding, we did our best to send him on his way with as much dignity as possible. My Sister I made music selections for the occasion, which will probably ruin the hymn tune 'York', REM's 'The Flowers of Guatemala' and 'Coronation Scot' by Vivian Ellis for us for years to come, and I made the bold decision to read Walt Whitman's poem 'Toward the Unknown Region' during proceedings, and it seemed a good idea right up until I stood up to speak, when the emotion of the moment overcame me. At least, this is the best moment to be emotionally overwhelmed, and my bravery was commended by many of the church folk who I've known for years, all of whom will feel the loss of Dad as much as we will, and that really is where we are now, mostly holding ourselves together and looking forwards now, considering the loss of My beloved Father as being as much a gain, as we don't have to face a drawn out ordeal for him and all our lives are thankfully relieved of a terrible burden.

The next chapter starts here, then, and the loss of Dad will surely start to weigh heavy on me, and all of us, for some time to come as the loss of a parent is always going to be difficult, a reality breaking moment indeed, and it's always going to feel weird that he won't be around anymore, and though I'm not a religious man, I know he'll be coming with us as we continue on though life, for he is four of us, as we carry his DNA in our bodies, and our personalities are all etched by our interactions with him, with his love to be carried onwards. So, Rest Now, and Go Safely, Dad, your journey maybe over, but there are still many more miles to go for us, and you will be with us for every step of the way, wherever they may lead, over hill and down dale, through darkness and light, for all our days. Forever.


Next Up: Whatever the Future Brings?