The Beach Hut

The Beach Hut

Wednesday 28 August 2013

Tribute to Dad

My last post was prompted by  my  83-year-old Dad being in Intensive Care, unable to speak or swallow. He passed away later that day.  Just a week earlier my brother and I thought we'd witnessed an improvement in his condition, he'd actually spoken a few words.  I'd even sent a 'sentence of news' to radio 4's iPM programme, which was broadcast on Saturday 17 September. This is my sentence of news:  After four days of being without speech due to viral encephalitis my father clearly said, "I want to have ...." How quickly things changed.

As a tribute to my Dad I decided to post this item that I wrote as recent exercise at my writing group:


Biking to Beachy Head

The winding road to Beachy head and the Sussex Downs seemed steeper every day to Roy as he pedalled his bicycle up the long narrow stretch of tarmac.  He'd used this road many hundreds of times in his long life but never had it been as exhausting as it felt now.  he even thought he might have to give up before reaching the top on this occasion.  It was the snigger on the lips of a dog walker, who's dog ran beside the bike yapping at Roy's heels, that made him determined to keep going.

After a long slow grinding ride up to the top, after he'd sat for a while to enjoy his flask of coffee and slice of crushed cake from his saddlebag, Roy got back on his bike for the return ride down the winding road.  The wind rushed through his thinning hair and it filled his cotton shirt which billowed out behind him. Down, down, down he went, past the dog and its owner still trudging upwards, speeding down to the seafront, on to the pier and home almost without pedalling at all.  This was his reward for the hard-going uphill.  


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