Whisky before breakfast

ED died. My brother rang me mid morning. She was his mother, my stepmother, but whoever she was to whoever it was, she was a remarkable woman.

One Christmas, forty years or so ago, we got up at silly o’clock so my younger brothers could open their presents, and we opened a bottle of whisky. We’d finished the whole bottle by the time she got up to cook breakfast. And we take breakfast pretty darn early in South London, boy.

Another time she got annoyed with my big brother and I having drunken ego contests and said "this is just about who’s got the bigger dick. Come on, drop those trousers and let’s settle this once and for all." That shut us up of course. Tough, clever, practical, principled, funny. Strider said she had a deeply mischievous laugh and he was right. The Girl Racer rang me in tears from Canada; she loves all her great women role models and knows about love and loss.

Every life is a particle in a huge quantum universe. We’re part of a wave but unique in our own way. I’d planned to go down to Bristol and see her this Christmas knowing it would probably be the last time, but it didn’t work out that way. Pants.

I bought a bottle of whisky on the way home from work and had some help getting halfway down it. The Dizzle knows what to do on days like this. He helped me talk it out. Memories flooded in and connected with other memories. Particles became waves. Waves became consolation.

I don’t understand much and I certainly don’t claim to understand death. But a life well lived is worth raising a glass to.

Merry Christmas ED. And thanks for the memories ...