my neighbour died today. his name was bob and he was 82. I think I’ve written about him a couple of times.
he had a bad fall around christmas and never fully recovered. He’s been bed bound and in and out of hospital. His wife Maureen is also housebound after illness so we’ve been doing shopping for them and my partner has been visiting Bob in hospital and chasing up what ward he’s in.
In the ‘80s Bob worked at a homeless shelter in the crypt in Liverpool cathedral and got tear-gassed during the riots so he’s always hated the cops. He met Maureen when they were both doing an adult learning course and he worked in caring for alcoholics.
He would come out for a smoke or wait for a taxi and if I was outside he’d always talk about the weather, the snooker, or how Scotland were doing in the football. When Scotland played during the World Cup I felt sad that he didn’t get to watch it because he had no tv in hospital. No matter what the weather he wore a woolly hat, a thick fleece, cords and his slippers, and he’d wear exactly the same to go to Sainsbury’s to get his cigarettes
I wanted to tell you all about him because apart from his wife, he had no family. I’d like to think me and my partner were his friends. He’d always gave my partner a thumbs up when he wore his more blacks, more dogs, more Irish T-shirt. He was generally irascible and disliked everyone on our housing scheme. When my partner visited him on Sunday, he told Bob one of the residents asked about him and even though he was in and out of consciousness, he summoned up the energy to roll his eyes at the mention of her name for one last time.
So RIP Bob. You were the best neighbour I’ve ever had and you’d roll your eyes at me saying that
