Birthday present

The story of how the dictionary in the picture disappeared over 20 years ago and was anonymously left at my office a few weeks ago is too long winded to go into now, what's more important is the impact that it had.

I've blipped this as Sunday 2 September would have been my father's birthday (both my parents died in 2010). When I unwrapped the parcel I was confused why anyone would send me an old dictionary, and then I saw the birthday message, and then it hit me hard.

The book was given to me in 1979, a year before my parents separated (...they never spoke to one another again), so it was one of the last things that they would have given me. The mess of their divorce can still haunt me at times and unwrapping the dictionary just brought it all back to me.