Learning to love my late father

I think the American forces were very quick to whip away any serviceman who got a girl in Europe 'into trouble'. My brother served with the British Army in BAOR (Germany) for his national service and said the British Army did the same.

Joining the army or navy used to be a traditional way for young men to avoid having to shoulder responsibility for an inconvenient pregnancy.

I learnt to not love my father after his death. He walked out on a wife and 3 small children when I was 4 (I was the middle child and there is barely 18 months between my older sister and I, and 13 months between my younger brother and I).

We had no real contact with him when we were growing up, and my body language in the few photos that we do have with him in the early days, is very interesting. Then as a teenager I self-righteously decided that he had been misjudged by my mother's family (who referred to him as The Rotter) (she never spoke ill of him by the way, she very seldom spoke about him) and I worked hard at establishing a loving relationship with him as an adult, until he died. It was only after he died that I could reflect on how much of the relationship we had at that time was down to my superhuman efforts to make myself believe that he was good and kind and unselfish; and suffice to say - as is often the case - certain truths about him came out after he died and a whole lot of stuff made sense to me. I have no bitterness, or regrets, am just sorry I never had the chance to say to my mom, 'You know what, we were better off without him'.

Like greatnan, I was lucky to have one the best mothers in the world.

What a lovely surprise - thank you so much! I am looking forward to reading this book given my experience as a child whose Father was away in the Army until I was 10. He only came home periodically, on leave, and always felt like a stranger to me. We are lucky with our Fairy Godmother GN giving us treats!

How lovely nice surprise! Wil look forward to book!

Thanks, you!

What a beautifully written book, each word carefully chosen, some wonderful words I had to refresh my memory on on what they meant, or look them up for the first time. I absolutely loved it. Many thanks Rupert and GN.