And so it ends
rest in peace, Kevin
And so it ends. Kevin lost his fight on Wednesday night after two weeks on a ventilator. He leaves two young adult girls who lost their mother to cancer ten or so years ago. It’s all pretty rubbish.
Born four years apart Kev and I were never particularly close. We chose different paths and it’s honest to say that blood is what kept us together. We spoke on the phone monthly and caught up with each other annually – the last time I saw him face-to-face was at Dad’s funeral last April. His illness, however, suddenly threw us together. We spoke daily – hourly in the last few days before he went to hospital for the second time. We had a WhatsApp video call on the Sunday afternoon before he was finally admitted on the Tuesday. He was fully dressed and sitting up. He looked rubbish, but not close to death. And, heartbreakingly, the last time I spoke to him was just before he was intubated. He phoned me, struggling to speak through his overpressure oxygen mask.
‘I’m going under. I’m going under.’ And that was it.
Georgina and Grace, his two girls, had a video link with him on Wednesday night after they took him off the ventilator. Georgina told me she wasn’t sure if her Dad had heard them … but I have to believe that he did. He died, with his hand in that of a nurse, ten minutes later.
What a waste. He was 62. The life and soul of the party. A man who would fill a room – drink in one hand, non-PC joke at the ready to shock and amuse. He ran a pub quiz at Rebecca’s, our eldest’s, wedding a couple of years ago. I knew he would do it intelligently. I knew he would run a quiz people would remember. He would work the room. Make them laugh. Entertain. I was also worried he might, by the time he started, have had one too many. And in a Four Weddings and a Funeral moment say something he shouldn’t; or trip over a chair and end up on his backside.
I needn’t have worried. He hit the mark. Took it to the edge and no further. And people loved it.
That was him. He was a hard working, personable man who laughed and smiled more in a week than I do in a month (removes tear from keyboard). In his early days he was a playboy in my eyes. Earning bags of cash and burning it on fine wine, fast cars and attractive women. Later he was a family man; a runner and a swimmer. A great dad. A local man, with his pub, his local park run and a big TV to show the six nations with accompanying rugby top, flags and bunting. His life wasn’t perfect, but he lived what there was of it to the full. In that regard he’s a beacon. A light to follow.
I miss him. I feel for his now parentless girls – C and I will do what we can. And I feel for his, my mum. Telling her was the worst thing I have ever had to do. Over the telephone. Distant. Hugless.
What a shit disease this is.
You don’t want it. You don’t want anyone who you love, or have any feelings for, to get it. It is a nasty, vicious, unpredictable disease. And we have no idea what the long term effects are for those who suffer with it. Avoid it. Wear a mask in public places, no matter what the government say or how stupid you feel you look.
Keep your distance, but stay close to those you love. Life is tenuous at the moment. Treat it with reverence; guard it like a newborn child. And hug. And talk.
And love.
RIP Kevin.
