In My Father’s Words
Brian Matier
03/07/1938 – 18/10/2018
A Father’s Journey Towards The Son
On the 18th October 2018 my Father Brian Matier died. He had been struck down by an aggressive liver and bowel cancer that killed him in a matter of months from the first diagnosis he received in June of that year. I suspect that he had been ill before that but had ignored much of the early warning signs as was his way of believing that he would live to 100. He had turned 80 in July of that year.
May 2018
I had seen him in May and he looked very ill and had lost a lot of weight but he dismissed that as something else, notably a knee problem – again – true to style that he Brian Matier was perfect and could not be ill. Within weeks of my seeing him with a ‘knee injury’ he told his family he had been diagnosed with cancer and he was going to die.
It seems wrong that the very last photo of my Father and l together should be so very telling – me acting the fool, and Dad, well Dad not looking quite well at all. The photo was taken with a view to cheering him up, but he closed his eyes at the wrong moment. But this is the very last image of Father and Son together, which is sad.
Making life harder for everyone, Dad wasn’t a great patient, he was fiercely independent and didn’t wish to be in a hospital during his end days and started lying to all sorts of people and then forgetting who he had told what do, which hindered the health care packages my Sister l tried to administer to him.
His own family wanted him with them in North Wales and Dad, didn’t want for that – his wish was to die at home, surrounded by the things he loved the most and not die in a hospital ward. As his children, my Sister and l worked diligently to ensure that wish became a reality.
It did, my Father died at home surrounded by his memories at 3.05pm 18th October 2018.
R.I.P
***
Whilst my Sister and l had lost a Father, in essence we had lost two very different people – the relationship we shared with our Father was not the same for the other – it was differently unique. I knew my Father, but my Sister knew her Dad. I never really knew the Dad side to my Father in the later years of his life. It wasn’t that l didn’t call him Dad, for l did, but it was simpler and yet more conflictive than that – my Sister saw more of her Father than l did. She has Children, and this made him a Grandfather, l do not.
But also Dad and l didn’t always see eye to eye, we were in many respects like chalk and cheese and misunderstanding and misinterpretation – we were different and indifferent to each other. We loved each other as Father and Son do and can, but we were not buddies, or closest friends and many a time not even allies singing from the same hymn sheet.
He thought me weird, strange and often, more often than many ever knew not a sound mind…. strangely enough l thought the same things of him too.
I can confirm and had known it for many years, that he was on the autism spectrum somewhere, like me. I was a diagnosed Aspergian, yet he refused to acknowledge any of that, as that would in his eyes mean he was faulty, and he couldn’t be seen as faulty or flawed. He was content knowing that his Son was the only faulty one, next to his ex-wife.
The truth had he ever allowed himself to view it was this … that we were more closely connected than he ever knew … which is even sadder in many respects, because perhaps and maybe, a chasm of indifference – two gaping sides could have been brought together towards the end.
***
I started this series dedicated to my Father in 2018, not long after his death. I discovered all of his ‘words’ in the style of short stories, fictionalised autobiographies, letters, diaries and an unfinished actual autobiography as l attended to the administrations of the estate itself.
My Sister accused me of not experiencing any grief with my Father’s death – that’s not entirely true. Whilst my grief was not visible, it wasn’t that l didn’t or have not grieved his loss, l have – l cannot deny that l didn’t break down and sob at the news of his death, my instant reaction was one of relief – an end to an era. However during the course of this series, l have experienced more of a dry grieving process mostly down to a sense of loss of a Father that although l knew, there were aspects to him that l did not, mostly his love for writing.
My greatest grief has been to the fact that there could have been a more solid friendship and relationship between Father and Son than there was. I grieved the relationship that never was but could have been. He favoured to spend more time with my Sister than myself.
If anything my Father was a prolific writer, pretty much like his Son, it’s perhaps sadly only one of the main things we had in common. We knew that we both wrote, that we enjoyed writing. He knew l was fond of rhyming poetry, and stories of factuality concerning my life, and all l knew was that he attended writing class for almost ten years so that he could write and have published the ultimate love story so that he could dedicate that to his long lost love.
She walked out of his life in 1998 and they never got back together and for the remaining 20 years of his life he spent missing her, continuing to love her and writing about his love for her in his novels. The latter were never picked up by any publishing houses as it was not a genre they were willing to host, but also, his novel writing specifically wasn’t of the calibre they were looking to pursue.
However, still my Father wrote, short fiction, historical pieces and memoir styled stories which documented moments in his life. He never chose to once share any of these with his Son despite knowing that he would have found a very receptive audience with me.
He only ever sent a copies of his self published novels to a handful of people, myself included, but from what l can gather now, of the ten copies he had printed, perhaps 50% loyally read but many were tiring of seeing the same plot over and over again, and many a time, the books were discarded and binned.
I think the saddest part of all is that he DID have a gift for penmanship, just never decided to change course with his subject matter for publishing houses. I believe if he had of done, then he may well have become a published author and finally realised his forever dream of recognition.
I knew my Father, not perhaps the depth of his imagination to which he pledged into his fiction, but l knew him as a very different man growing up till indeed the time of his death. A dark and violent man who cared not for family as he would explain to others and have them believe, but a man who lived with demons all his life caused by a complete and utter lack of understanding into who he truly was and never allowing himself to be who he wanted to be.
He was a mask wearer like his Son – but unlike his Son who stopped wearing and tried to change, he never did not publicly and the only time the masks came off were during his final days.
Since my Father’s death this series has changed name twice: “The Father I Never Knew” and “My Father In Reflection”,the name of the series now is more in line with how it should reflect the content. “In My Father’s Words”, l have during this journey finally come to understand the hidden side of my Father – that whilst l suspected, could never confirm. I had many questions about my Father at the start of this series and of those questions, l have found the answers to perhaps 90%. Of course the series has not yet ended, but it has been a journey of discovery and of healing.
This series has helped me to understand more of myself, and in turn will help me pen later on this year 5 Shipsa Docking.
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Memoir Story |
Memoir Story |
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Memoir Story |
Memoir Story |
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Memoir Story |
Memoir Story |
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My Unfinished Father A Life Lived To The Full |
Page No: |
Date |
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001 – 011 |
29 Jan 2019 |
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012 – 023 |
04 Feb 2019 |
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023 – 035 |
14 Feb 2019 |
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036 – 046 |
19 Feb 2019 |
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| My Unfinished Father – A Life Lived to the Full – Part 5 |
047 – 053 |
26 Feb 2019 |
| My Unfinished Father – A Life Lived to the Full – Part 6 |
054 – 062 |
06 Mar 2019 |
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063 – 072 |
15 Mar 2019 |
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My Unfinished Father A Life Lived To The Full |
Page No: |
Date |
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072 – 080 |
15 Mar 2019 |
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| My Unfinished Father – A Life Lived to the Full – Part 9 |
081 – 088 |
21 Mar 2019 |
| My Unfinished Father – A Life Lived to the Full – Part 10 | 089 – 104 |
31 Mar 2019 |
| My Unfinished Father – A Life Lived to the Full – Part 11 | 105 – 111 | 10 Apr 2019 |
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Post title – Short Fiction Tales |
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Post title – Short Fiction Tales |
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Post title – Historical |
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Post title – Historical |
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The Killing of Alex Millar |
