The last link with the past

or that is what it feels like.

My godfather died yesterday. He was 100 year and 5 months old. Yes, old. His death was not unexpected.

For all the past week I have been helping to set up the Handicrafts display at the Showground but my godfather was on my mind. I had planned to go and see him tomorrow - and now it is too late. He was the last direct link with the Senior Cat, one of his closest friends.

L... was a "returned" serviceman. He served in the navy during WWII and considered himself one of the "fortunate" men who came home even though he did so with a hearing loss and a permanent back injury.

When he signed up he went to the recruiting centre with the Senior Cat. They both intended to sign up at the same time. The recruiting officer looked at the Senior Cat and, without even sending him to the medical officer, failed him on the grounds of his eyesight and his very flat feet. L..., very tall and skinny, was accepted.

L... and the Senior Cat remained friends. Together, with a close knit group of friends, they had been through girlfriends and the early years of "the Marriage Bureau" as they called the church youth group. Later they went to the weddings and christenings and funerals. The Senior Cat moved around the state as a teacher but L... and others were always there in the background.

When they both retired L... would visit regularly. P, his wife, would play bridge with a group of friends on Tuesdays. L... would occasionally drop her off at the venue and then come on to us. As he and the Senior Cat grew older they spent more and more time sitting at the kitchen table over a pot of tea. L... liked the tea my mother first made and then I made. We had rainwater, a distinct improvement on this city's tap water. He would often go home with a bottle of rainwater for another pot during the week.

I did not see much of him as a child. We were out in the country and it cannot be said he took his duties as a godfather very seriously. When my mother died his visits became more frequent. Then P... died and L... came every Tuesday until he could no longer drive his lovingly tended car. I would send him home several hours later with at least one meal to just heat up. Yes, he could cook quite well but "it's not as much fun for just one".  His own two children saw to it that he also had help from the Meals on Wheels service or, at weekends, ate with them. Yes, we all wanted to see he was "alright" because he was such a polite and grateful man. 

Unlike many very old people he did not want for help and it was only a "stroke" which eventually put him into a nursing home. He admitted quietly to me, "I'm not complaining Cat but this place is not where I wanted to end up." No, "community singing" was not what a partially hearing man wants to "enjoy" when he would rather be reading a book or doing a difficult jigsaw puzzle. He pretended to join and pretended to enjoy it all. He was polite to the end. 

Throughout his life he advocated for other returned servicemen. He had help from the government department which attends to their affairs but he gave back as much as he received.

Middle Cat and I went to visit, not as often as I would have liked  but at least we managed to do it - except for this last one time. I wish I had followed my feeling and gone last weekend. I wish I had seen him that last one time. Perhaps I would have felt that way whenever I had last visited him.  He was that link with the Senior Cat and I will miss him for that and for himself.