A letter to Fergie

First of all, to anyone who stumbled into here looking for a running blog, I apologise. Events have rather overtaken me and I know I'm running away off at a tangent.

Today, I found myself thinking about what I wanted to say to Fergie (assuming he could hear me). I'm still trying to come to terms with his premature demise and putting my thoughts down on paper (or blog at least) seemed to crystalise some of the thoughts running round in my head at the moment. I think it's been a therapeutic exercise for me. If you knew Fergie, maybe it'll help you too.

Fergie,

I don't know if they have the internet where you are, but working on the assumption that you can have whatever you like where you've gone, I'm going to guess that you've got a decent broadband connection. If you've only got dial-up or worse still, AOL, I fear you may have gone to the "other place" (and I don't mean Parkhead) .

You're probably wondering why I'm writing to you when we didn't really know each other that well, what with me living in Ayr, you in Troon and me not being a football fan. Well, after all the messages that have been left for you, I wish I had known you a lot better so this is a kind of "better late than never" letter.

You left us in a bit of a rush, no doubt as big a surprise to you as it was to us. I know you're thinking "But I'm not ready!" but then, neither were we. You gave us a hell of a shock going off like that and we're all struggling to come to terms with the fact that you're not here. When you do it like that it's hard to find any comforting thoughts to cheer ourselves with but having got over the initial shock, I'm beginning to think that there are worse things than leaving us the way you did.

For a start, I don't think old age is all it's cracked up to be (although you have to smile at George Burns's famous riposte "It's better than the alternative"). You'll never have to suffer the indignity of cancer, heart disease or alzheimers. Never have to be helped with the most basic of human functions, never have to worry about losing that fine figure of yours.

Yes, you were certainly short-changed in terms of years but years are a poor measure of a life. It's not the years you put into your life that count, it's the life that you put into your years and I think you put in plenty. I sometimes think that the most important thing we can do between the cradle and the grave is to bring happiness to others and all these messages prove that you did this time after time after time.

So yes, we will grieve for you, we will miss you, but most of all, I hope we'll remember how much happiness you brought to so many.

Wherever you are, take care.

Tim