How my father’s final hour barefoot in the sun taught me what it really means to remember.
Dad passed away on the 4th of August, some years ago now. This year, the date slipped by quietly, and I didn’t remember. For all my talk of “Lest We Forget,” for all the importance I place on remembering what matters, somehow, I missed the anniversary of my own father’s passing.
When I told Mum, she’s 93 now, she said something that has stayed with me: “It’s not your fault. We don’t have time to think of ourselves anymore. The world is too terrible.”
And maybe she’s right.
We’re bombarded by the weight of everything - news, crises, endless noise. We chase the big picture and forget to think about the real things. The things that matter.
We say Lest We Forget like a sacred promise. We engrave it in stone, wear it on pins, teach it to schoolchildren. And yet here I was, a part of a family who loved and love him fiercely .... forgetting.
But perhaps that’s the thing.
Dad never made a fuss. He didn’t expect memorials or morning services. I remember him saying
" all I want is peace, love and harmony. "
He believed in getting on with it - in fixing the fence,cooking magnificent stews and helping Mum hang the washing. His life was in the doing. And most of what he did was for us.
He didn’t spend his time making sure we’d remember him. He spent it making sure we were okay.
Maybe forgetting the date means he did his job well. He made himself part of my fabric ... not an event, but a presence. Not a statue, but a shadow on the back step, a voice in my head when I need advice, a quiet nudge when I am being silly.
And when Mum says she still feels him sometimes, it’s not sentiment. It’s sense.
I forgot the date. But I remember the man ... in a thousand ways, every single day.
That must count for something. Surely?
But how did I remember? It was comments on the blog about grass on the feet.
In the last days of his life, stuck in a hospital bed and weighed down by illness, he surprised us with a single request:
“I just want to feel the grass under my feet one more time.”
So we plotted.
We didn’t ask permission. We wheeled him through a fire exit like a bunch of Ratty Dusty Gulch members of the the CWA. . my brother, Mum, and I giggling like kids. It felt reckless and right.
And when we got him onto that patch of grass, something happened.
His toes dug in.
His face lit up. Colour returned. His voice came back strong. He laughed. He talked .. to us, to strangers, to the world. We wheeled him through the sun and he waved and laughed. For a brief, beautiful hour, he wasn’t a patient. He was a man. A spark. My Dad.
We even got in trouble from the hospital staff. I think he loved that part the most.
Three days later, he died.
We didn’t expect it. We truly thought he’d be discharged. But now I wonder - maybe he knew. Maybe that moment, barefoot in the grass, was his final recharge. A last surge of freedom before letting go. After all, he was an electrician. He always knew how to complete a circuit.
Too many people don’t get that.They’re shut off, not signed off. Mowed down by the system before they get one last chance to be themselves. To finish as valid humans...not “in-valids.”
All these years later, I like to think he’s still up and there...toes in the grass, the sun on his face, laughing at the rules he never followed. Maybe even planning another great escape.
And maybe, just maybe, he got out at the right time.
Before COVID. Before the world became so strange and suspicious. Before we all became prisoners to fear and noise and fractured tribes.
That day in the sun wasn’t just his farewell: it was ours. A last tribal laugh. A moment of wholeness, before the world began to fade into something colder.
Now? It feels like we're the ones in the hospital, trapped in rooms we didn’t choose. Longing for the fire exit. Longing to dig our toes into something real. Longing to feel again.
Because we’re tired of waiting for permission to be human.
Maybe that’s what Dad taught us in the end: There’s always a fire exit. You just have to dare to take it.
So maybe we didn't forget. Maybe Dad is sick of reminding us? Or, maybe he is just too damn busy trying to sort out the mess and we are as well.
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