Eulogy for My Father
He was born in Bolton, England, in 1935. Left school at fifteen. That was normal then. He wasn’t stupid, just unschooled. No one in his world asked much more of him than to work, so that’s what he did.
In the 1960s, he left the north of England for a different kind of frontier. Australia. He came with my mother, with hope and hard edges, and built a new life on unfamiliar soil.
He drove trucks for most of his working life. Long-haul. Long days. Long silences. He liked the road, I think. It didn’t ask much of him, except to keep going.
He played golf. Religiously. He loved it. The order, the quiet, the rules that made sense in a world that didn’t. Sometimes I wonder if he loved the game more than anything else.
We played together, him and me. Father and son. Fairway and friction.
I beat him once. In a tournament. Men watched, men who barely tolerated him, men who smiled when I won. Not because I was brilliant, but because it meant he lost. I remember that moment. I remember the satisfaction. And I remember the ache too.
He wasn’t an easy man to love. Even his friends were more like tolerances. People at the golf club who showed up because that’s what Saturdays demanded.
He didn’t say much. Didn’t believe in softness. Didn’t show affection, not with words, not with hands. He was there, but not always present. A provider, yes, but never a refuge.
And yet.
When they arrived in Australia, there was a family who met them — Michael and Marion, and their children. Mary-Ellen. Martin. Mark. They became our people. Like cousins. Closer, maybe. They were there for the birthdays, the holidays, the meals where something felt easy.
Martin, if I’m honest, was my first real crush. I don’t think anyone knew back then. Maybe they did. Maybe it was just one more thing we never talked about.
But that chosen family, they mattered. They softened the edges that my parents carried. They held space for something warmer, when our own walls were too thick.
My father lived long. Longer than he expected, maybe. But in those later years, after my mother died, the house got quiet. Too quiet.
No visitors. No company. Just the echo of his own making.
He never learned how to change. Never asked to. Never thought he needed to.
He gave what he had, and what he had was limited.
And that’s the truth. He wasn’t a great man. He wasn’t a terrible one either. He was a man who stopped growing, who did what was expected, who feared the kind of love that asked him to look inward.
He leaves behind two sons. One who stayed. One who left. Both of us still learning how to live with the father we got. Still carrying the quiet.
He taught me, unintentionally, what I did not want to become. And maybe that is a kind of gift. Maybe that’s enough.
Rest now, Dad. The game’s over. The course is played. May you find a fairway where the silence doesn't hurt so much.