Author: Moobs

The dogs have stopped quarrelling and lain down. Some are in front of the fire, others have their heads tucked into the laps of dozing members of P’s family. There is chatter in the kitchen and Christmas lunch to come.

Outside the Sun has begun to shine and the ice is thawing. My phone is in my hands and on the screen is a text from my sister, H, to say that the doctors consider there is nothing more to be done for my father. Their aim now is to make him comfortable and wait for the inevitable. I wonder how someone so proud, so fierce, can die.

Aberdeen is a grey place; the Granite City. It is stolid and, on Christmas morning, silent. Silence has a double nature. It can be an angry refusal to communicate, lips pressed shut. Or it can be quietness, stillness and peace. Kneeling in Church this morning, I find, quite to my surprise, that it is the latter that I wish you Dad.

There is a tremendous storm closing in tonight. The wind is roaring and I was hurrying home ahead of the rain. As I passed the small row of shops around the corner from my house, I saw a face flicker in the doorway of the accountancy firm as a cigarette was dragged on. He caught my gaze, a man slumped in the doorway, a can of lager in his hand and a knitted woollen had pulled down below his eyebrows. I hurried on.

Once home, my conscience began to nag at me. This was no night to be sleeping rough. Equally, I didn’t feel inclined to spend breakfast explaining to P why there was a tramp at the kitchen table.

I grabbed a torch and headed to the garage in search of compromise. I was convinced that there was an old sleeping bag to be had. There wasn’t. But there was an old blanket and a plastic groundsheet. I gathered them up and headed back out.

I approached the man warily. Disconcertingly, he looked even more wary. As I committed to walk up and speak to him our mutual wariness raced neck and neck towards panic.

“Hello” I opened “Are you locked out or are you sleeping out here tonight? If you are, I have a blanket and a groundsheet that you would be welcome to.”

“That’s very kind of you” he said. “I am staying the flat upstairs but they would rather I didn’t drink or smoke there so I have popped out to have a cigarette before bed”.

Absurdly, we then shook hands and I pottered off again weak from the amount of blood that had rushed to my cheeks.

For the most part I avoid blogging about work but some of you will know that I am a barrister specialising in Employment Law. One thing barristers learn quickly is the power wielded by the ushers. The essence of an usher’s job is to call the parties into court and settle them down so that when the judge makes his or her grand entrance everyone is silent and rapt. Where there is more than one case to be heard, being on the right side of the usher can result in your matter being promoted up the list and ensuring you are done by lunchtime rather than sat disconsolately in a waiting room for 5 hours with a fidgety client.

My favourite usher was Len. He worked in the President’s Court in the Employment Appeal Tribunal. Len was somehow always pleased to see you. His welcome was extended just as warmly to first-timers as to old-timers and he was as respectful to those representing themselves as to the most self-important of Silks. He had a calm and an easiness about him that allowed you momentarily to forget the stressfulness of the situation. He made sure that you got an early warning if the Judge was fractious and, if there was time, would pause to tease you about your football allegiance.

You will have guessed from the tense that Len has died. Today, at 10:30 in the President’s Court, we gathered to pay our respects. On the dais, below the Royal Seal, sat the judges. In the well of the court were his colleagues and large group of barristers all of whom had had reason at some point to be thankful to Len. There was, as you might expect, much eloquence deployed in praise of him. Every elegiac compliment was deserved. There were grand people present; people who have consciously developed their careers and reputations and have craved such glory as the Law allows. Len did a job for over 10 years that involved no glory, but by being constant in his kindness and spendthrift in his consideration for others he filled a room with people who will miss him terribly and whose affection and respect he will have as long as memory persists.