Tribute 

I didn’t expect to be standing here but on the one occasion Patrick and I discussed his funeral his instructions were clear. Less a discussion, more some barked orders. Our Ladies. Tick. Fr Tony. Tick. Good party. Soon to be delivered. And then. Got to be you. No one else. No silly anecdotes. No trite remarks. No cliches  

 

So here I go. What do you say about the man with whom you shared almost half   your life, with whom you built a life, a home, and a family, and with whom you raised two such wonderful daughters. The still centre of my life for nearly 35 years, the man I loved above all others. The man who made it possible for me to thrive and our lovely girls to flourish  

 

But looking around this crowded church today - there’s only one thing to say. Patrick was a man who belonged, comfortable in his own skin, he was tribal in his passions, and in his loyalties, steadfast in his involvement.  

 

Unwavering in the love he gave.  

 

A man who belonged.  

 

Today we’re gathered in a church, a Catholic Church. I suspect, indeed I know,  some of you will be surprised to find yourself here. Some will have left all this behind. Some will have other faiths or none at all. Some will have been badly hurt by the church of their birth. But the Catholic Church was a church with which Patrick resolutely identified, as do I.   I remember one of or early conversations when I said rather querulously (probably after one or other seemingly mad pronouncement from a representative of the church )  ‘but you don’t actually believe in it all?’ To which he said, it doesn’t matter what I believe this is my church, my faith. This is where belong’.  

 

Throughout his life this was a crucial part of who he was. And in his last four years the support and comfort given to him by both Father Tony and the sisters at the Bar Convent made it very clear that this was indeed his tribe, his home. And so fittingly, always the only possible place for his funeral.  

 

Another tribe well represented here is the Labour Party which Patrick loved with his whole soul, in only the way a truly tribal man can. A loyalty I could never share personally, or even begin to understand, but would always admire.  Loyal from the moment he arrived in England, active and engaged till the very last months of his life, seen knocking up in May for the local elections, I only realised quite how ill he was when he was entirely uninterested in recent by-election triumphs. A committed member whatever the troubled waters. An argument around our always argumentative dinner table had him thumping the table – ‘it’s my party whoever the leader is. ‘ 

 

And then the friends. Those he knew from school, from university, from first job, second job, Barcelona, Southwark, York, Limerick. The enormous cast of friends who loved him and who he loved - and for whom too often in the last awful months I must have seen like some malign form of air traffic control, managing access, passing on dreadful news. But I was never in any doubt about the importance of Patrick’s friends who he loved and kept in touch with, and which provided him with so much consolation when occasionally needed, but so very  much fun and joy all the time.  

 

Friends who talked about books, about writing, friends he walked with, art, theatre, music, travel, football. Terrible TV. Sometimes terrible music. Architecture and of course politics. Food, beer and wine. And pubs. So many pubs. Some friends were passionate about nearly as many things as him. We called them the bromances.  An unruly tribe to be sure. One with surprising and sometimes uneasy parts, but Patrick loved and knew and treasured his tribe. He tended to his tribe, and time and time again in the last few weeks we heard people say, he kept in touch. He worked for his vast network of friends. And in turn they loved and knew and treasured him. 

 

And then the family. The family into which he was born. The loving strong warm family created by Kathleen and Laurence and their six lovely, and loving children.  As soon as I met Patrick i knew how important his family was to him and how much he loved Chris and Mary, Michael, Gerard and Karen. In that - as in all his tribes- he never wavered. I haven’t got time to mention every partner, every niece, every nephew, every aunt, uncle, and cousin. But Patrick’s love for the tribe of his birth was strong and unchanging. It supported him and defined him easily as strongly as his other tribes. 

 

And of course, it was part of his mixed but never shifting love of Northern Ireland. Like so much that we love it was contradictory and confused but his attachment to the place of his birth was real and unchanging.   He used to say that he’d lived in Belfast for 18 years, compared to 50 in perfidious Albion (his occasional nickname for me). But he was for all of his life a man from Northern Ireland. Indeed, it provided him with a bucketful of information and background for his lovely, successful, and hugely well-regarded novel. Copies available at the wake. Never miss an opportunity for a sale, as he would say.  

 

And then, there was the tribe he formed. The tribe that was first me and him. Soon joined by Annie (our brown berry girl) and Rachel (our peaches and cream baby). And now with his much-loved sons in law, Paul and Ollie, and soon the grandchild he will never meet but was so happy to hear about. We were Patricks tribe, and we knew that he held us all together.  

 

The hospitality, the generosity, the warmth and welcome that he created was the touchstone of our little tribe. We’ll do our very best to keep it going.   

 

Our favourite poem by Raymond Carver (and I recognise I run the risk of him accusing me of cliche)  

 

- did you get what you wanted in this life even so?  

 

I did.  

 

And what did you want ?  

 

To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth.  

 

Patrick was beloved, and felt beloved - he loved well. I think we all know what it was to be part of Patrick s fierce, sustaining and committed love.  

  

Being at the centre of that has been both the privilege and joy of my life - and I’ll love and miss him forever. This passionate, principled, persuasive man lived and loved so well.  

 

May he rest in peace .