James Whitaker

He kept tools in order and promises the same way. If he said he would come, he came. A quiet man, and a steady one. That was the whole of it, and it was plenty.

We used to walk and not talk much. A road, a bit of weather, the same route home. That was enough. I would take another of those walks now.

Dad never missed a school play. He sat in the back and clapped the loudest, then found you afterwards as if that had been the only thing on his day. It probably wasn't. He made it seem so.

I still expect to see him in the garden in the late afternoon, the way he stood with his hands in his pockets as if he had all the time in the world. The grandchildren thought he did. He made it feel that way.