A person seems to become larger than life at his service but in Jack’s case, I don’t feel they need to recount more than the sum of his life.

He was a printer and manufacturer of watercolour paints and was regarded by all and sundry as a ‘good bloke’. This was the key to the success of his business. Against that, unfortunately, he was generous to a fault and this sometimes worked against him. He had his prejudices, his moments; he’d dig his heels in but who doesn’t?

It appears my mother was much on his mind in the last days and the hardest part to bear is that I’m over here blogging and the family is over there doing whatever is necessary. It’s the small details which always stick and when I heard today that he kept a map with my exact position in Eastern Europe pinned for all and sundry to see, it became difficult.

When I’d phone, he’d always ask when I was going to fly out there and I’d always say soon. He never pressed the matter. Needless to say, no one understands what on earth I’m doing over here but that’s all right because neither do I. None of which helps, of course. Nor does the fact that he had, they both had, enormous family support at that end.

He was one of the troops on the Kokoda trail who saw live action and he had a connection with Singapore’s Changi prison. That’s the era we’re talking about. Again, I never heard very much about those experiences because he was more into the present and he had a busy round of engagements visiting and assisting Legacy war widows, playing bowls, fishing from his orange runabout, ‘Jaws’ or barbecuing later at Canadian Bay Club. He’d enjoy a beer or two and it was always two and that was enough.

Now it’s time to take stock and the inevitable question arises of how to treat someone who has lost someone. We were discussing this the other day actually and I posited that it was unnecessary to treat the bereaved with kid gloves because it makes it worse. Best really just to get on with business as usual and reflect from time to time.

It may appear insensitive for me to keep the light-hearted phonetic dictionary and salacious Kate Moss photo on the other page but as Jack always had an ear for humour and an eye for the pretty ladies, it’s right that it should stay and I’ll even exacerbate matters further by posting the third instalment later.

In the end, Jack decided it was time to move on to the next thing and I’ll now do the same.