She is 91 now and she has served her country as a Wren Officer during World War 2. If you are reading this in the U.S. that means she was a female Royal Naval Officer.
At one point she was operating only 22 miles from Rommel's approaching army.
She was one of the generation who brought our National Health Service into being and, of course, funded it through her taxes and, as well as helping to bring up a family of three in a secure, happy and stable environment (of a sort that a lot of kids now can only dream of) she held down a series of important and worthwhile jobs.
When we got home from school we used to have our evening meal together during which she'd always talk to us like the intelligent human beings she knew us to be and tell us in great detail about the book she was currently reading. I KNOW that this was where I got my love of language and literature.
If I am spared I intend producing a fuller biography of this fine lady at a later date - also one of my father.
John Robertson Nicoll
Broughty Ferry,
Dundee
FOR MY MOTHER
The pebble on the beach
and the wave
are good metaphors,
I think.
For the wave alone
gives the pebble its form,
returning time and again
to spend everything on the stone
which, owing to its nature,
can never adequately give thanks
for each gift -
each act of forgivenness.
