A eulogy for a wife

Thank you for coming. I'm Martin, and for forty-one years I was lucky enough to be Helen's husband. She would tell you it was forty-one years of patience on her part, and she would be right.

Helen grew up in Cardiff, the eldest of three sisters, and she never stopped being the eldest. She organised birthdays, holidays and, for a good ten years, most of the local amateur dramatic society.

We met when she was directing a play I had auditioned for as a joke. I was cast as a butler with two lines. I forgot both of them on the first night. She married me anyway, which tells you most of what you need to know about her generosity.

Helen was a district nurse for twenty-eight years. There are people in this room whose parents she cared for, and I have lost count of the number of times this week someone has stopped me to tell me what she did for their family. She never told me about any of them. That was the job, as far as she was concerned, and the job was private.

At home she was the heart of everything. Sunday lunches for whoever was around, a garden she planted for the birds rather than for the neighbours, and a house that was never tidy and always warm. Our daughters, Sian and Beth, grew up knowing they could bring anyone home, and they did.

She had a laugh you could hear from the car park, and she used it often, usually at me. She also had a temper that lasted exactly as long as it took to boil the kettle.

In the last months, when she was the one being cared for, she found it harder than any of us, but she thanked every nurse who came through the door and asked about their shifts. She knew what that job was like.

Helen, I never did learn those two lines. But I learned everything else from you. Thank you for choosing the butler. Goodbye, my darling.