Farewell to Gleb

After breakfast Val and I managed a short walk in the Botanical Gardens.  There's a great collection of magnolias there, in full bloom, just now beginning to shed their petals gracefully.
Later, Richard and I went to the funeral of a friend: for R, Gleb was a past mature undergraduate student in Sociology; for me, the partner of an old friend.
Gleb died a few weeks ago, alone in his flat, at the age of 50. Exactly a year after the death of his partner Brigitte from cancer.  I think that after her death, Gleb just lost heart completely.  There's no indication that he committed suicide; it's more that he stopped being able to take care of himself, or to connect with other people very much.
His devastated parents are Ukrainian refugees from the Donbas, brought to Sheffield by Gleb, soon after Russia's latest invasion of Ukraine.  His brother has been on the front line there, wounded badly twice and now in a military training role rather than a combat role. So for his parents, the last few years have been indescribably awful. Gleb's sister-in-law and nephew/niece live in Sweden now, and perhaps the elderly parents will be able to join them there.
There was a good gathering of people at the funeral and then at the wake in a friendly cafe in town.  We were able to share thoughts, to some extent - both happy memories, and very sad reflections on the past few months.  Many of us there had kept in touch with Gleb to some extent, after Brigitte's death; perhaps none of us could have done enough, but perhaps also we could have done more, between us.