A year with my Father

I was going to write something about the year gone by and, well see what happened. So far all I can really think about is this year and my Father and my time with him. So maybe if I can put this down I can begin to move on,. Maybe?

The beginning was as always his return in January from Columbia. He and Marina usually missed the worst bits, but this year took longer than most to warm up. He always came back with something or other wrong or needed fixing. This year it was his teeth, he had got some sort of infection before coming home, how long he had been in pain or suffering he would never admit to, half his face had swollen up and he had waited to come home to get it sorted.

Soon after his return he started on a new treatment for his prostate cancer, this he had admitted to 2 years earlier, but apart from news on his PSA levels had not really affected the rest of us since he had told us. He had had problems with his heart for several years and had been taking various concoctions to keep this under control. I knew he was not 100% and was rationally of all the things that could happen. However I gathered them all into a corner of my mind and glanced at them every so often to check that they had not escaped and stayed with my Micawber inspired view of the world.

So at first the Chemo therapy was no great trial. After a few days he was a bit sick, though thinking about it he probably would not have mentioned it to me any way. It was about this time I began to call him more often it was the middle to the end of February. We would talk a couple of times a week and most Sundays we went to the Lyndon House Hotel for a couple of beers and a bap.

The Chemo actually knocked him about a lot each cycle getting progressively harder and harder on him. Every three weeks he had a dose. His hair thinned rapidly and he just looked frailer and frailer. He said he felt “rubbish” and it was “killing him”.

The end of March, the 30^th to be precise was important. His 70^th birthday, he and Marina organised his party bringing together his friends from his extended social circle, His brothers and sisters in law, and his children, even Dan came. I managed to impress him with a present from his children, a bottle of 1941 Armangac. He told me it was good and he was able to impress the French club members who had some. One day I will get a glass.

He still played golf a couple of times a week, and had his bacon sandwiches. He bought a motorised trolley for his golf bag.

He went back to his oncologist in April or maybe May, how looked him over looked at his test results and decided to stop. The Chemo therapy was not working, he needed a plan B. There was a new treatment, but it had not been authorised yet, probably later in the year, October.

Slowly it seemed at the time my father seemed to improve towards his old self, but not quite. yes many of his old symptoms were there. He still had odema in his feet, but that had been there for at least a year, His breathing especially in the mornings was a problem. As the summer progressed his hair grew back, but his shoulders and hips seemed to belong to someone else half the time. He could still swing a club, drive his car and hold a pint.

I went on holiday and he made plans to go away at Christmas as normal and maybe to have his step children over and to take them to Europe for a holiday.

He found mornings worse, being able to get his breath after doing strenuous things like getting out of bed, having a shower. I knew he was in trouble when he asked me to take him to the hospital one Saturday morning. They checked him out and by the time we got to see a Doctor he was much better. It was then that I understood that he was terrible at telling Doctors what was wrong with him. He told them only bits and pieces and what he thought they needed to know. He would tell one thing to one person then something else to another. It made sense as I spoke to his wife, to my sister and brothers. By the time they let you out after chest X Rays and heart monitors and shrugs of shoulders, you walked back to the car, much improved.

Marina kept him going, I kept in touch and spoke to Marina who would tell me things that he never quite got around to. I talked to my siblings, kept them up to date, what did people do before mobile phones?

More unplanned visits to the hospital followed over the next month or so, and by October he was really struggling. Even going to the Pub was beginning to be hard work. I watched and realised as you nursed a pint, I took you home early that night.

After that he was finally admitted to Hospital with a chest infection, double pneumonia to be more exact. Your kidneys decided that they would have a rest and your heart felt the pressure.

After 2 weeks he had had enough of Hospitals, as ever my father had made up your mind and no one was going to change it. We took him home, where after the initial euphoria of escape wore off he declined. After another night in A & E we brought him back home, you had somehow convinced the Doctor not to admit you.

Just under two weeks after he got himself out he was back in. By now he was deteriorating rapidly and he died.

So now my father has gone I realise I have thought about him more in the last weeks than in years gone by. For over half of my life he spent Christmas in Columbia and did not come back until middle or end of January.

So where am I now, apart from sitting here on what was when I started New Year’s Day 2012? I don’t know how I should feel or think. At the moment I feel fine, though increasingly I am getting cross and frustrated. If life was simple and I could work out what was going to happen and well … I would feel a lot less frustrated. But other people are involved and that always complicates things no end.

My father did as he always did, left it to the rest of us to fill in the details and get things sorted whole he moved on to his next adventure.

To My Father, Antony Levesley 1941 - 2011

What follows should explain itself.

To My Father

So where to start about Antony Levesley, my father. I suppose where I first remember him reading me stories tucked up in bed. Telling me of lands far away, how Odysseus outwitted the monsters and came home. We lay and listened and usually interrupted.

As I sat down to write this and reflect on how I knew my father 2 things came to me. My father liked his patterns, his routines, especially if they involved beer wine and family. For as long as I remember he played chess every week with his brother Fran. I understand his bacon sandwich at the golf club was a major weekly landmark also.

On the other hand he could and often would decide to do something. Why, most of us who followed on behind never quite understood. Recently he decided that Sky did not offer the service he wanted so he switched to Virgin.

How many cameras did my Father go through, let alone the ones he misplaced. He did like his gadgets.

One Easter Sunday many years ago, as the children lay sprawled around after Sunday lunch, he decided that we would all go to Beacon Park and play golf. He dragged us complaining all the way to the first tee. I would like to report that he showed us all how good he was and was able to pass on to his children his golfing wisdom and skills. Well once we had all hit a ball once or twice it became apparent that he was as rubbish as we were.

There is a thing about my father, it did not matter how good or bad he was at something, he would have a go and enjoy doing it. He did not care if he got it right. He would do his best and enjoy it whatever it was.

He did many things did my father. His job took him all over the world and when he came back he would tell us of what he had seen and done. My father had many adventures, few to be honest involved life threatening moments or true heroism. They were funny and warm accounts of the places he had been and they almost always involved the almost missed flight, missed boat, missed train.

I came back to Walsall and married and settled down. My father was always there for me, even when I did not need him and occasionally when I did not want him, but he was there. He was involved.

He always had an opinion and usually a story to go with it. He was very proud of all his grandchildren and wanted to be a part of their lives.

My father was to be honest rubbish at some things. He found it very difficult to be wrong, once he had made up his mind, he had decided and that was that.

Secondly, he was rubbish about telling people that he was unwell or hurt. I suppose if you think of the Black Knight in Monty Python, that was my father.

When he told me he had cancer, on top of his heart condition. I was brave and he carried on. He still played golf, he still went to Columbia for Christmas.

He wanted to be normal, to carry on. I saw him more and more of him, well he did offer to buy some of the beer. I became part of his routine.

It was when he said, he could not go out that I was really worried. I went around to his house and we sat and talked.

Two nights later he went into hospital and this time he stayed.

I sat with him on the Tuesday night and we talked and told each other stories. I held his hand while he lay tucked up in bed.

He was asleep when I left.