A glimpse of a finished keepsake

I was born in the spring of 1948, in a terraced house at the end of Beckett Street, with my grandmother in the room next door. My father worked at the mill and my mother could make a Sunday roast stretch further than anyone I have ever known. We didn't have much, but I never once felt that we were without.

I was a quiet boy with a bicycle and a library card, and I count both among the great loves of my early life. I would ride to the hills on a Saturday and read by lamplight most evenings. My mother said I had an old head on young shoulders. I think I just liked the quiet.

I left school at fifteen and started as an apprentice joiner, sweeping shavings long before I was allowed near the good wood. I served my time, earned my tools and stayed with the firm for forty-one years. I made doors, cabinets and — in later years — a cradle for every new grandchild. There is furniture in half the houses on our street that my hands made, and that is a thought that still pleases me.

I met Margaret at a whist drive in 1969, though she will tell you she won the game and I only won her attention. We married two years later in the little church at the top of the hill, and we made a home together that was always full — of noise, of dogs, of Sunday visitors who came for lunch and stayed until dark.

We had three children, and now the grandchildren arrive with wellies and appetite in equal measure. If you had told the boy on the bicycle that this was where the road would lead, I think he would have pedalled a little faster.

If I have learned anything, it is that a good life is made of small things, done with love, over a long time. I was never a rich man and I never wanted to be. I worked hard, I loved my family, and I was happy in my own house with my own garden. That is more than enough for any man, and I would not change a day of it.