I have mostly maintained a positive attitude about my life and worked through the hard times. This is almost singularly down to the mighty love and nurturing of my Grandparents. My Nan and Grandad have been, and always will be, a huge force of goodness and love for me. My Grandad never lost touch with himself or humanity in general, having fought through the Second World War with the Royal Artillery, alongside the 8th Army in North Africa and up through Naples and into Germany towards the end of the war. When my Dad and I went round to their flat to tell them that my Sister was in a coma, seriously brain damaged and unlikely to survive, my Grandad cried. A (still) big, strong 81 year old man having come through all those horrors, and through past society in general, not keeping a stiff upper lip and letting his feelings happen. He was years ahead of his time. My Nan…. my Nan never failed to see the bright side of things, and if there didn’t seem to be one, she would simply keep going, finding little things to smile and laugh about to keep everyone cheery. She never gave up, she always had hope, and whilst I’ve struggled with life a fair bit, their love, influence and example have guided me through much.

When I was going out with the woman that was to become wife number one (I only capitalise the word ‘wife’ for Jenny, my present and last Wife!) we got matching tattoos with each other’s names in. (Schoolboy mistake. Never get a name tattoo.) And there it stayed, for years, quietly festering, malevolently, on my shoulder. Wife number two said right from the very start that she wasn’t bothered and didn’t care and I couldn’t afford to get it lasered off, so there it stayed. I don’t know why, but at that point, it didn’t cross my mind to cover it up with another tattoo. Then marriage number two broke up and one day I found myself driving down a huge hill into Plymouth, where I have family. I suddenly knew it was ‘the time’ and decided there and then to get that tattoo covered up – after all, if I couldn’t find a decent artist in a city full of matlows (sailors), where the hell else would I find one?!

I found a great, award winning artist who freehanded in biro what I asked for: a beautiful rose with lots of swirly stems with buds on. I wanted to signify something beautiful, growing out of something that had caused me immense pain, after holding the promise of love, hope, and a long and happy life.

It was an afterthought really – but it struck me afterwards that you pile shit on soil to grow beautiful roses. That rose now always reminds me of a period of great relief, a new start in life, where I started to grow again – and in some ways for the very first time. And that’s really the point of today’s words – it’s brown, it’s smelly, it’s horrible, both in reality and figuratively, but it’s full of nutrients that would otherwise go to waste. Clever Mother Nature, naturally recycling her, and our, waste. And out come nice things.

Sometimes, we don’t see the shit coming down the hill, it just hits us. Sometimes, if we’re lucky, we see it coming and have half a chance of directing it to the place where it will be able to fertilise what we are trying to grow. Either way – take the shit you are given, hold your breath, put it where you want it, and start to grow your roses.

See, my Grandparents are still there. Horticulture from my Grandad, and Hope from my Nan. Quite possibly the best gifts I could ever share with you.