Eulogy

LCDR William Bentley Irwin     

MMM CD (Ret)

 Charlotte asked me to say a few words about my father and I knew immediately that I would not easily get through the words here today.  I knew I would cry.  I also knew that if I didn’t have the courage to stand up here and speak in memoriam to him then I had learned nothing from him. 

 Accepting this as my only way to honour his memory I realized I had only a few minutes to tell you about the most influential person in my life.  How could I do that, how could I possibly tell you who he was or what he was or what he did for his family, and for so many other people.

 And then I started to cry. And I cried for fifteen minutes as I sat and thought about how impossible it would be for me to come close to sharing this man’s life and accomplishments in a few minutes.

 And then he was standing beside me, and I cried harder.

 “Mark,” he whispered, “you’re just a university graduate – Keep it simple, make a list.”

 And then I laughed while I cried because those would have been his words exactly.

 So I made a list, and on that list appeared the words:

Courage, Honour, Honesty, Love, Perseverance, Loyalty, Commitment, Humour, Anger, Forgiveness, Strength, Tenacity, Kindness, Generosity, Compassion, Friendship, Errors, Apologies, Charm, God, Country, Wisdom, Officer, Gentleman, Comrades,..

 “There are more Mark.”  He whispered again into my ear.

 “Dad,” I replied,  “lets not push our luck here.”

 I wish I had all his qualities.  I think I am working on some, but on others I am a bit of a slow learner.  I confessed my shortcomings to him in private some time ago.  He got that twinkle in his eye, and said: “Listen Jerko, although I am perfect now, there were times when I too was a bit of a slow learner.”

 I did mention he had a sense of humour?

 LCDR WB Irwin paid his way and paid his dues.  He never shirked from the job at hand.  He found humour and a positive in everything that confronted him, although not necessarily at the moment of confrontation.

 In my youth I personally frustrated him to great length and in many ways, but he always loved me, always forgave me, always let me back into his heart, and always gave me a new opportunity to grow. To him I owe a debt I shall never be able to repay.  If I can live my life with the courage and dignity he displayed as commonplace I shall be satisfied.

 He worked his whole life to make my life and the lives of those around him better.  He left everything he touched better than when he found it.  He never expected anyone to do anything that he would not do himself.

 Make no mistake, my father was not a perfect person

He was as human as you and I.  He knew that, and I believe that is what makes a man great.

 LCDR WB Irwin was an officer and a gentleman.

 And may God bless him and keep him until I see him again.

George and the Cat Woman

 

This is one of two stories I wrote based on tales told to me by a schizophenric at a Psychiatric hospital in Toronto Ontario Canada

I have done my best to relay the story as he told it – but I have not done his delusion or his pain justice, I’m sorry, I am only a writer

 

George and the Cat Woman

by

Mark Irwin 

George lies sweating, focusing his eyes within the light shuttered room. He remembers the dream; the woman, his cat. It is another omen. He shivers in his sweat. He is sure of it. It is why he has slept so little, always the dreams, different and the same. Always admonishing him in some way for some thing.  He only discerns them all as the reality of his insanities, the falling curtains of his imbroglioed life, the introduction to his end – for he has been ill anyway and growing more ill every day.

The Asylum

 

This is one of two stories I wrote based on tales told to me by a schizophenric at a Psychiatric hospital in Toronto Ontario Canada

I have done my best to relay the story as he told it – but I have not done his delusion or his pain justice, I’m sorry, I am only a writer

 

A Short Story

By

Mark Irwin

With the preface not yet read I should mention that, in the interest of reader comprehension/comfort, it is recommended the preface be read after the story or, better yet, not at all.

Preface (as in an Eucharist prayer)

Written by the character Sergius Gilmore, as a clarification of the garbled mess the author has made of this important spike in Mankind’s evolution.

There must be thirty-two million or so ways to differentiate correct from incorrect. It was my old friend Pliny V who so very often spent great quantities of time on the numerical accumulation of this minimal factor.

Whenever I ventured to his environment, always, there he would be, talking to this acquaintance, that stranger – anyone he could grasp (and just as often to some he could not).

But I Sergius Gilmore, yours truly, was most certainly the most fre­quent. Hour upon hour, passing vast quantities of time amongst the many and varied dissertations (and digressions) of the most profound considerations – correct and incorrect.