Putting a Sock in it...

One of the best things I never did was go to Diana's funeral.

Quite extraordinary when you think about it. Imagine, a front row seat (kind of ) at one of the biggest events the world has ever seen..and I said no.

And people look at me with incredulity when I tell them. When I say that, instead, you and I sat at home, watching it on TV, and you took off your sock during the minute's silence and put it in your mouth. As if you knew there was no way you could keep quiet without it.

You were five then - though not five, not really. Still a baby who needed feeding, changing, pushing about in a push chair, prone to temper tantrums...and 5am waking.

I remember us in the front room of our little home, me on the floor, nose pretty much pressed to the TV, you on the couch in the sunshine surrounded by toys (you didn't move about much then - I could vac the whole house and mow the lawn and you'd still be there, an hour later, merrily beating up a playgym).

I remember sitting there and glancing at you as the Westminster Abbey choir reached its agonising, unbearable heart-rending crescendo. And you put one finger in your ear, shouted with what sounded like joy, and glugged from your juice cup. And as the world wept I knew, right then, that this would be one our most precious moments together.

A moment in time printed as if in tableau, as if painted, like a Leonardo fresco, on some deep part of the mind, but never losing colour, never losing light, no cracks appearing over long, interminable years without you.

The world fell silent and you put a sock in it. Worth all the tales I might have been able to tell about rubbing shoulders with the great and good, about being a player on this world stage... 

Why did I decline? Because I had been away from you without you for two weeks, because Diana's death meant I'd spent another weekend in the office, another weekend away from you and I needed you with me. Does that make sense?

Precious hours. 

I think I knew, you see. I think I always knew that we wouldn't have you forever. Don't tell me how I knew? I'm not even sure if I acknowledged it to myself. No doctor ever said your time on earth was limited. You were rarely ill, you were as strong as an ox..... 

But sometimes in the quiet of an early morning, I would lie in bed, waiting, listening.

 This is how it would go: first the thud as you negotiated yourself out of the bed and on to the floor, seconds of silence as you bottom-shuffled your way across the carpet and then the crash-bang-wallop as you started on your toy box. Emptying it all , picking out your favourite, and giving it hell for leather. 

This until you got bored. Then you'd fumble your way round the bedroom door, bottom shuffle along the hallway to the kitchen, dragging along your best toy to the washing machine and bang it around inside.

But sometimes, this didn't happen. You would sleep in and I would lie there thinking...not today Thomas, not today. And it never was. Until it was. 

Do you know how many times that happened? More than I can say. Do you know how many times I played over in my head while sitting at my desk, scenarios of how it might be...and what if I were far away? 

Do all parents carry such dark morbid thoughts with them or was it my subconscious preparing me for something it knew would come? 

I took so many videos of you, as other parents will do...but I took them thinking, I need to make sure I always have you....just in case. 

So when I was asked to cover the funeral, that we had tickets to get into the Abbey, I think they were surprised. I surprised myself to be honest. But I never regretted it, sacrificing the chance of pomp and circumstance, to watch you putting a sock in it..

xxx