Wings

There is a number on my phone that doesn't really belong there anymore.  Every so often, I will scroll through the list of contacts looking for someone and I will stumble upon it and think to myself, "I should delete that".

But I can't.

The number belongs to Angela.  Or I should say 'belonged'.  There is a chance that if I called the number, someone might answer, but it won't be Angela.  Maybe it would be someone who knew her or maybe the giants of the telecomms companies would have efficiently reassigned her number to a new customer - perhaps a teenager who would never want to hear the likes of me and how I just wish I could hear Angela's voice one more time.

Angela died a few months ago.  It shouldn't have surprised me.  She had been fighting cancer for quite some time and there was always a chance that she would become too sick to keep fighting.   But I never wanted think that way.   The last time I saw her she was standing in my kitchen, drinking a cup of tea with me and talking about how we must go out for lunch when she was feeling a bit stronger.  I just assumed I would soon get a text message from her telling me to meet her at her favourite pub. 

Instead I got an email from a mutual friend telling me that she had passed away.  Our lunch date was


Like so many others, I feel cheated.  Where my father-in-law has been expecting to die and doing almost nothing with his life for the last twenty years, Angela refused to believe that her time was up.  She loved too many people and still had so much that she wanted to do.  Now was not the time. At least not in her mind.


As is the case with everyone else that I write about in my blog, I change the names a little.  My parents didn't name me 'Cate' or 'Catherine', and I don't know anyone named 'Damien' in real life.  I have never met anyone named 'Titus' although I like the name so I might look to find a real Titus someday.

'Angela' was not my friend's name either.

But she was an Angel in my mind.  Not the kind with wings that fly around singing. It's a lovely thought but I think I might get annoyed if I ever had such a creature following me around.  To me, Angels are the people we meet along the way who inspire us, give us strength and keep us smiling.

Angela was far from angelic.  She smoked like a chimney and I don't think she ever considered a meal to be complete without a side of chips.  But she befriended everyone, made us all laugh and if you ever needed anything, she would be the first person to give you a helping hand.  Tales of her misspent youth in post-war London could keep us entranced for hours - she'd done things that I could only dream about and spoke as though it was just a bit of silliness, nothing more than that.  The good times were peppered with low points along the way, but she always kept a sense of humour about life and never let it get her down.  The challenges were what made her strong.


On her 60th birthday I asked her what was the best year of her life.  I was thinking back to when she was in her 20's and hoped I'd get another story about life in 60's London.  But she said 40 and I looked at her in amazement.  Times weren't particularly good back then and she was struggling to make ends meet.  I couldn't hide my confusion and she laughed and said that 40 is when she understood the things that are most important in life - children, friends and the confidence that you can handle anything that life throws at you. She was the embodiment of that.



It's been months since Angela stood in my kitchen, smiling at me and telling me how well I was doing.  I often have my doubts that I ever do anything right at all, but Angela never doubted me or the possibilities of what is to come.  She always had a kind word to say and a story to make you laugh.

What I wouldn't give to share another cup of tea with her.


Cate xxx