I spoke to my dad the day he died. When I say ‘spoke,’ I mean on the telephone. 

A hundred miles stretched between us but, as for so many, those conversations sustained us over the painful months of separation during the pandemic. 

We buoyed each other up in a desperate attempt to top up the glass that we always tried to keep half full, even though it felt like it had sprung a leak. ‘We’ve got this far,’ we kept saying to each other like a mantra – a reward for our exemplary behaviour in following the rules. 

Rules, that it seems, were not followed by the man who imposed them on us. Rumours of Downing Street Christmas parties have come to light this week – weeks after it was found that Carrie’s mate spent Christmas with the Johnsons as part of their ‘childcare bubble’. 

It’s safe to say that this news makes my heart break and my blood boil. 

Eerily, as I look back on that last phone call with my dad, death and loss took up a chunk of our chat as we discussed the breaking news of the death of Prince Philip that day. April 9, two days after my son’s birthday, forever carved in my memory.

‘In the summer, when things have settled down, your mum and I are going to come down and stay with you and spend time with those grandchildren.’ 

We said that we loved and missed each other, as we always did. I cling on to that conversation, replaying it over and over in my head, scrabbling for crumbs of comfort, forever grateful that I called that day. It was that night after I’d watched the news coverage of Prince Phillip’s death, that I received another call from home.

It was my distraught mum telling me that my dad had died suddenly of a heart attack. I didn’t recognise the howl that came out of me on the news of this death, just as I hadn’t recognised the strange howls that accompany giving birth. I didn’t expect the physical sensation of pain ripping through me. My brain couldn’t wrap itself around the idea that I had only seen him for 20 minutes in 15 months and that I would never see him again.

That 20-minute meeting took place last December, probably just prior to the time Downing Street was entering its alleged party zone. Despite my insistence that Christmas presents could wait, Dad was adamant that the grandchildren would not be without their gifts; their disrupted school year had been bad enough. 

Stubborn to the core, he ignored my protests. He and Mum would drive down from the West Midlands, we would exchange gifts outside, and they would drive back. The thought of them, in their seventies doing that seemed above and beyond; to them, it was a necessity. Now, I am grateful they did. 

I find it hard to express the current of emotion that ran through those 20 minutes. We stood outside in the rain, socially distanced. Our bodies wanted to drift together in the warm embrace of family, but our heads kept us in check. We were following the guidelines. We feared tempting fate with a minor slip up. 

Like so many others, we believed our caution and sacrifices would then be rewarded with a much-anticipated reunion in due course. If you had to find a zeitgeisty word for my parents’ generation, it’s ‘the deferentials’ – respecters of authority. I’ve inherited a diluted version. 

That day in December we held it together as we said goodbye in the knowledge that, if we started to cry, we might never stop. Little did I know that I would be waving their car off for the last time and that this Christmas would be met by a feeling of numbness, trying to anaesthetise the hurt. 

Therefore, reading about the alleged parties that took place in Downing Street last December sickens me. These parties, the existence of which have not been denied by the prime minister, apparently followed all guidance. 

The guidelines must have been grossly misinterpreted by the general public, as we were adhering to those that prohibited mixing indoors with anyone outside our household or support bubble. 

Surely, if Downing Street were following the same guidelines, the parties would have been made up of a handful of people, all closely related (a disturbing thought), standing one metre apart with all the windows cracked open. Credible? I think not. 

While the ‘following the guidelines’ parties were supposedly happening, hundreds of people were dying not just of Covid, but also of loneliness and mental health issues exacerbated by the pandemic. Grandparents were unable to meet the new arrivals in their families. People missed out on their own office parties. Is it any wonder there’s a white-hot rage at yet another example of a government that unashamedly flouts its own rules, kicking the dirt over its own mess like a dog?

I missed out on Christmas with my dad last year because I followed the guidelines. 

This year, I face a crater-like absence that still holds the power to shock me. 

How I wish I had hugged my dad, got him inside the house for a cup of tea, taken heed of the Government’s attitude and ignored the rules. However, the difference is I care. 

Emmanuel Macron may have called the prime minister a clown in charge of a circus, but I think it’s more sinister than that: he’s The Joker.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing [email protected]. 

Share your views in the comments below.

Source: Read Full Article