Aribasss

 So two years ago today my brother from another mother passed away 

Apparently he had eaten too many egg sandwiches and his heart couldn't take it ...he always seemed pretty healthy to me, all the years that we don't climbing trees and cliff facias and he was always carrying , catching and cajoling his many children around on top of the miles we would often cover 

I had my doubts about diet being the issue ...

The first time I met Sam I don't even have a solid memory of it , apparently though , as we drive into the road into the estate there is this kid sat there on some steep concrete steps , wearing only a pair of shorts and holding a big stick , as we drive by mum smiled  at him and he stuck his tongue out 

Lord of the flies , ....we ended up more like ' the Goonies ' and ' stand by me ' ( two olden day films : ask your mum ) 

The estate was overlooking  a beautiful ancient woodland and estuary , the back garden to the new place backed right onto this vast set of wooded valleys ....this was our land , our lair ...sited right there on the coast and surrounded by smugglers cottages and tunnels , mine buildings , old industrial buildings , boats ,guns, explosives and wilderness , low tides , high tides ...and an island just offshore that was just close enough that you could walk to it once a year on an especially low neep tide . The island itself featured in Arthurian legend,and a documented history of chapels , smugglers and shipwrecks ....

This is where me and your dad forged our childhood and teens , a tow of rag tagged children from the neighbourhood or one of you as you each were growing up 

Christmas was always a big deal for Sam , dad would always go all out at Christmas and Sam would always be keen to help decorate anything with tinsel and always enjoyed the rapport he had with my own dad and Sam was really a big part of our family ...so much so that one year my,  nan , asked my mum 'when did you have the other one that's always in all the family photos '

Movie theatre trips , local theme parks , beaches , dog walks or just kicking around our habitat  ... The sprawling jungle that lay before us at the bottom of the garden , and in the summer ...it was a jungle , unkempt , ivy strewn and interesting , deep jungly valleys and huge rocky outcrops overlooking the ever changing blues and greys of the sea 

I recall one particular day , me and your dad were making our way back along the coast and we were taking our time smoking en route , and we got cut off by the incoming tide , as was sometimes the case ...we got to a place where there were two particularly large outcrops that went out deeper into the sea than we were wanting to wade on that particular day , the first outcrop hides the second from view from ground level and in-between there is a small pebble beach cove with a path up to a couple of houses which sit just stop the cliff " no public access " 

So anyway , me and your dad start to climb over the first outcrop so that we can get over into the cove and have another joint out of the wind , and see if the tide continues to drop or not in which case we scale the second outcrop on the way back down the coast so we get to the top of the first outcrop and look down into the little sheltered bay below , ...., on the fare side of the cove there are a couple of guys all done up in all the climbing gear , ropes and pulleys and all that stuff , climbing the second outcrop 

So me and Sam make our way down into the cove and stop in the beach , it's tiny this cove ...maybe only 20 to 25 metres across 

We look up at the guys climbing up the next outcrop , and making damn heavy work of it I'd say ...

" best not spark it here, eh ? " 

So over we go , start climbing and , you should have seen the look on these two guys faces as me and your dad overtook them , bidded them good afternoon, as we casually pottered off  over the crest of  the second outcrop and away a little further to find somewhere else to smoke on the way back to town , 

Town was a ancient and quant little fishing village , brimming with character and characters...still full of fishermen with traditional little fishing boats and farmers that still rode only horses and tractors to get about ...but the spiders legs of adventures that could be had off and away from the town were epic 

When we were about 9 or 10 or so , we took it upon ourselves , well your dad mostly , took it upon himself to dismantle by hand an old factory that was locally refereed to as the crab factory , as it had previously been used in more industrially prosperous time to process the crab catches from the boats that would land in the harbour , there were a few old dilapidated buildings in that little enclave of hardstanding amid the woods , just off one of the main estuary contributories ...and if you cut behind the buildings , just  up the hill and through a bit of the woods you would get to 'the circle  bank ' a span of open but steep ground that would get you to ' the circle ' ,a section of road in a stepped estate in the hill , basically the social centre of our little neighbourhood , it was basically a car turning circle section of an otherwise one way , single lane road ...

But it was where the neighbourhood kids would play football and ride their bikes ...it had a lamppost, perfect for for the childhood game we used to call '  123 in ' a low wall that ran the whole way around one half of the drop side of the turning circle where mums would keep an eye on the younger ones out learning to ride bikes and all that stuff ... It was also a battle ground , fueds of great length and severity could and would take place , not just amongst the kids , but most certainly the adults too 

Thankfully we were young ,when,  one of he times me and your dad were having a falling out , as we often were over marbles or girls..but it never lasted long , your dad was one of the few people I could tolerate for any length of time , anyway ,we were passing one day in the circle and amid a feud I think your dad said something to me , or I said something to him and we've gone for each other ,he's got an ice-cream in one hand and a big stick , like a staff ,...a tree branch really ,in the other hand ..again we often were armed with something - when we were young it was big sticks and catapults , as we got older is was bows and rifles ...

So, I think to myself , alright he's one handed at least , so I've barged into him and he's dropped his ice cream ...but he's still got the stick ....

Bastard cracked me right in top off the head with the stick didn't he ...

Many miles, by land and sea ...and many a maiden, by the same means ... when we got a little older and started drinking and looking for girls as young lads do , we had 10 holiday parks but a few miles down the road in every direction , a summers tourist season on the beach ....This was our world , all of it and they are memories I cherish Fondly 

Amid this landscape , before mobile phones , when we used to memorize the numbers for the phone box nearest to the places our mates would hang out....archaic stuff 

After school , and later on as a drunken mission through heavy terrain for , a Christmas tree ...or an old boat wreck , abandoned car or , an interesting thing or an unusual something or just for the hell of it ...a holla , a great bellowing yell ...right down the valley of inquiry 

Stand at the edge of the woods , at the river level ...take a deep breath , .....and holla 

"Awwwwwwrrribbbbaaaaaaassssssss "

Give it a second as the call echoes off down the valley ...then a response !

"Awwwwwrrribbbbaaaaaaasssss" 

It was a consistent means of communication , for years ! Locate your pal and which ever interesting thing has been found , using acoustic orienteering !

And I can't not mention, the premise of a knife having a " Sammy guarantee " or being, or not being " Sammy Proof " if you buy a new knife , a blade of any kind actually , you would let your Dad use it, if it's still in one piece after ten minutes , it'll last you years ....

Many years later after we'd been away off to various places in and out of various cities and relationships , we met back up in the seaside town we grew up in 

And I think Sam was working in a production and refinement plant position down in Cornwall , I think I had just come back from somewhere or other on some phantom contract that got me in a corner I had to get out of ...we were sat like a pair of old men at 25 or so 

 "Being out there man , talking to people .... other people, other people didn't do stuff like we did stuff did they ?? " 

Everywhere I go on my own little missions , even to this day , I still have the image in my mind's eye  from way back when ,we were  children in our own Robinson Crusoe adventure, ...climbing an endless hill in the Cornish countryside, in the roasting heat of the day , or the driving rain in the middle of the night to reach the top and figure out where the bloody hell we are ..

It may seem like a fickle thing right now , and I know your dad , didn't have his own dad around when he was growing up and it would pain him dearly to know of each of you wanting him around and him not being able to be there, he was your father , my brother ,and make no mistake you are your father's children , and as he always made me proud , with his honour , his integrity and his sense of humour his rebelliousness and his recklessness I know that each of you will make him proud even if he can't be around to help you along as he would have wanted to do , but you've got his strength , his wilfulness , his stubborn Ness too ...so watch out for that ! And you have a wonderful Mum who needs you too , You got this ! not only because of the stuff you are made of , but also because of who YOU are !