Steve's Online Diary
Copyright Comeuppance Ltd. 2002 - 2012 This diary may not be reproduced in whole or part without permission.
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DIARY 10/05/10
Death has preoccupied my mind somewhat of late. My two friends were far too young to have suffered that way and to be taken. And the deeply emotional tasks the relatives face once such important people have gone, this has plagued me. It’s hard for those of us hurt by the loss. You want to help, but you’re not there, you’re not involved. You’re not family. You feel their terrible suffering and want to console them, but you’re not there. They must move in a sort of purgatory, a middle land where reality is blurred. I had a call today from a very good mate, but again one I go a year or more without actually seeing. No lunch. No dinner. No bottles and tales, nor late confessions. But we love each other as close friends do. And I know it, and hope he knows it. His call came soon after he’d read my on-line diary. There are those you should keep in touch with. Stop putting it off. Manana, manana.......today! Do it today, I am telling myself. You drift, but true friends know this happens and do not take it personally. But I don’t want to drift too far from the few really good, important friends I’ve made and kept. I determine to make more effort.
DIARY 30/04/10
Two separate emails received Friday gave news of two separate old friends being diagnosed with lung cancer. Two friends. Lung cancer. I was keen to get a copy of “Stranger Comes To Town” to Paul Evans, maybe the world’s leading collector of Bloomsbury Press (mostly Virginia Woolf) literature. I called the hospice late Friday afternoon; he’d been taken there a couple of days earlier. Asked if he would be able to hear it if it arrived by post Monday. Perhaps better if you brought it tomorrow, the nurse told me. It was heavy news.
DIARY 20/04/10
Home at last. And, really, I had it easy. The tv pictures of the stranded thousands at Frankfurt airport, a few kilometres from my hotel, were heart-breaking. Families with young kiddies; the old and infirm; the once-a-year travellers, desperate to get to a wedding, a celebration, an anniversary. They all told their stories and I listened with a heavy heart. We managed to book pretty much the last seat on a Eurostar for Monday, and I arrived at Ebbsfleet last night, after moving on to Brussels for a night and a couple of days.
DIARY 16/04/10
Had a wonderful time with Werner Reinke on HR1 Radio in Frankfurt last night. When I get more time and better internet access than now I will tell more. Since the evening came to a close, after 4 hours on air, we have done little but fight for a way back to England. The ash cloud sprung into terrible life minutes after my flight landed from City Airport on Thursday morning.
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