Frank Turney

'How long have you been driving roughly?' How many times I heard that in my life, I've long since lost count. Certain biological and cultural qualities establish the concept of a father. You need to have fathered or raised a child. You need to repeat your stock standard jokes at every conceivable opportunity. Finally, long suffering family members express annoyance every time you do it (which only encourages you further). My childhood Labrador, Amigo, loved chasing tennis balls (I'll bet most of us remember him with up to five or six inside his enormous mouth), which made playing cricket in the backyard almost impossible unless he was asleep in the garage. If Frank was outside too and we wanted him to control the dog so we could play we'd call out; 'Can you call the dog, dad?', and his immediate response was 'dad! dad!'. At every mention of the insult 'p*ss off', his immediate response was 'I'll have a whiskey, then'. And if...

Now I look back I don't know why we didn't do it more often, but one year we had Dad over at our place in Cronulla for Christmas. Wendy and Emily loved him and he loved them, and even though we found an easier life in Perth than we would have had in Sydney at the time it was a shame they didn't get to see him more than a few more times. But if we'd stayed in Sydney longer we probably would have done it regularly. He got to drink as much a he wanted (a lot) and not worry about driving, he got to have Christmas morning with a little kid again, and apart from Jim's grandkids when he lived over in Randwick I don't think he'd had one of those since David and I grew up. I don't remember many of the specifics apart from how happy he was to be there, but I remember two. We were playing music while we did something with decorations or the Christmas Tree or something and The Macarena came on, so we were all dancing around the lounge room doing it, Frank included....

It was easy to forget in the later years how much Frank loved having a lot of people around. He rattled around in that flat in Kirrawee and was too lazy to get out of his own way, complaining that he never saw anybody and nobody ever came to see him. I used to have the same argument with him every time – he used to have a standing invitation to David and Tracey's place every Sunday night for dinner, and his freezer was so full of meat tray wins from the Tradies he could have provided the dinner half the time. He was also still able to drive and could have got in the car and gone to see whoever he wanted. Like a lot of people when they reach a certain age, he never appreciated how important it was to still have mobility and independence. But some of my fondest memories of him are when he was surrounded by extended family. One that struck me through the week was a New Year's Eve at Miranda RSL in what must have been about 1994 or 1995. It was a big crowd and I don't remember ...

Anyone who knew Frank knows what a generally agreeable bloke he was. He always went with the flow, gave everyone the benefit of the doubt and his first instinct was to accept people who meant something to you. During my childhood and teens I never remember him taking against any of the friends I bought home or had for sleepovers, even if they acted entitled or ungrateful (and some did – you never really know some people's standards until they're guests in your house). Till the end of his days he loved Joanna, he loved Wendy and he loved Emily – I call her first born daughter princess sometimes partly I think because that's what he called Emily. Because when I look back on him there's something I remember about him (and I might have a slightly skewed perspective others might correct me on) but I remember him always being really good with kids. Whether it was one of the barbecues or new year's eve parties in the backyard in Gabo Place or school friends we sometimes ha...

This short story about Frank isn't to mark an anniversary or anything – you all know his birthday was in November and he died in very early January. Something's just had me thinking about it a bit lately. Maybe because my own birthday's coming up I'm thinking about how time passes and how our relationships to those around us and those we've said goodbye to change as we age. But while it might seem like the story of how he died, it's actually the story of his last trip. He'd been in Canterbury hospital for most of the preceding November and celebrated his 79th birthday there. David had told me he was pretty sick and I should go over the Sydney in case the worst happened. I came for a week and a half or so but couldn't stay much longer, I had work and my own family to look after at home, and against all the odds the chest infection he'd been put in with had started to clear up. He hadn't come completely good though and never would again. Somehow am...

With his birthday coming up (and thus nearly time for one of my two cans of XXXX every year), I'm thinking about Frank a bit lately. And although I hadn't thought about it in decades, I suddenly remembered how he used to play squash. I don't know if he ever enjoyed it as much as rugby league, I think he played that as a young man and it made him a devotee and watcher of the game, whereas squash was more to do with having fun and getting a bit of exercise, probably about getting out of the house and hanging around with other men. He played at a couple of different courts that I remember. One used to be at the top of a rise where President Avenue goes up and down over the bush-covered hills at the southern end of Caringbah, where it backs onto Lilli Pilli. Another was in Beverly Hills near the corner of King Georges Road and Stoney Creek Road, not far from where the M5 crosses King Georges Road nowadays. I only ever remember him playing with two people – Uncle Bob and a famil...