My Brother Mike
I don't remember you being born, but there were already four of us, five if you include our step brother Ray, he was not living with us at this time. I remember our father's nickname for you was always Winkle.
You were there in the background as another brother, I now had three, we all played together went to the river swimming and the beach which was not too far away. In those days we could safely roam wherever we liked without fear of harm coming to us, there was always someone around who knew who we were, those Elms kids.
My first real remembering was when you were a Teenager. You worked for Jim Harris at weekends after School; you were also very much interested in Girls. Den looked upon you as a younger brother, his were so much older and you were someone he could get into mischief with. I remember him coming home to our house with a very large Salmon Trout, which you had poached from the river; you even had the audacity to offer to sell it to the farmer whose river you had poached it from. This has been an abiding memory for us. And another time you caught a very large Skate when you went sea fishing, we have the photo to prove it was not the one that got away LOL
I was married to Den, and was having babies; you were godfather to our daughter JJ
Then you came to live in our house for a time. You wanted to join the merchant Navy, and were duly employed as a waiter aboard the Reina Del Mar
You brought me gifts from abroad, a teaspoon from New York. A koala bear from Australia and tea towels from other places which I can't remember. You also brought JJ a very large Spanish Doll which she loved and Tim a Boomerang from oz. We went to test it out in the field behind our house, it did not come back to us and we never saw it again. But Tim never forgot that Boomerang.
I remember one year receiving a telegram on my birthday from you, I was so excited to receive such a thing, it had never happened before in our family. I still have the telegram as a memento all these years later.
You bought a little Red Mini, which stayed at our house while you were away at sea, you gave Den permission to teach me to drive it, and my first outing was a disaster so the driving was put of till much later
Then on your voyages to Australia you met Sue, she came to stay at our house also. Then the question was should you marry this girl I remember you taking some time to make up your mind. Then when you decided that this was the girl you wanted to marry you decided to settle in Australia. This is when we went our separate ways, we took you to the airport for your flight to Oz, this was one of the worst experiences of my life, I hated seeing that plane go with you on it..I cried for days afterwards. And the Peter Paul & Mary song leaving on a jet Plane forever etched in my mind as a memory of you leaving for Australia, I could never hear that song without thinking of you.
I only saw you in the flesh twice after that. Both times you returned to the UK we were never in a position to afford fares to Os to visit you. We saw photos of you sue and the children that were to sent to Mum, and there were telephone calls and while you were enduring your illness and I was tested as a positive stem cell donor should you need it ,the phone calls keeping me updated of your progress were more frequent.
Then it was decided that you could use your own cells, mine weren't needed the calls were less frequent.
The last time I spoke with you were on your birthday 9th July, not knowing this would be the last time we would speak. We had the best conversation, we set the world to rights, spoke of our families and had a really good brother /Sister chin wag.
Then came the awful news that you had gone forever, I was inconsolable, but now for you there is no more pain or suffering
Goodbye my lovely brother, love you forever xxxxx