Should originally been a blink in someones eye. Grandma, after the trauma of giving birth to my mother, got herself "fixed" but you know there are times that "fixed" doesn't always work. So along came Uncle Tommy. He and my mother fought like Tom and Jerry if they are to be believed, and yet they loved each other throughout their lives. Early in his life Uncle Tom learned that he had the knack of keeping customers happy. I believe (and my memory is a little fuzzy here) that it had something to do with Hoover Vacuumn cleaners (which would explain his strange habit of collecting them in his later years). He married and it didn't work out but a newly single Uncle Tommy met one Millicent Warburton of Heysham and one of the greatest love stories ever in the history of human love stories began. From there he and Millie had a hotel in Morecambe, which was wildly popular among the aged and to be honest probably infirm residents that inhabited it. Always wanting to help out his "big sis" Tom gave Mum and me and my sis a job at the hotel once it was up and running. I can't even remember what it was that I did, other than at one point I believe I was responsible for eyeing the potatoes However the memories I have of those days rattling about in the kitchen of The Sovereign were days of pure joy. One Sunday morning everyone was in the kitchen getting everything ready for Sunday lunch, which of course is a major meal in the UK. Milly was making her famous sherry trifle, and at the time had added the sherry to the sponge cakes in the bottom of the large bowls. At some point my Mum wandered past the bowls and added the sherry to the sponge cakes, at which point Tom wandered past the bowls and well you get the idea. By the time the trifle was served to the residents that afternoon it was about 100% proof. While Tom and Mil were at the Sovereign their first born Katie arrived into the world. I remember being at the Christening, lord I was still a child at the time, but I remember that christening party in the "basement" (the rooms where they lived while the "hotel" part was above). The years that followed Tom and Mil bought various properties not least of which was "The Lindale Inn" a small village pub in the even smaller village of Lindale near Grange over Sands. My mum got remarried when I was 14 or so and when she and Harry went off on their honeymoon I went to live with Tom and Mil in the Lindale Inn. I learned lots of things at Lindale, not least of which was how to climb the huge oak tree in the car park and that Katie, when she wanted to be was wicked with a hose. After the honeymoon Mum and I would travel up to Lindale at the weekends, Mum would cook and I would wait tables at the pub and we would sleep in the apartments at the back. We took Danny our beloved brindle boxer with us at the time, until he died one weekend, there in Lindale, and there he was buried. Tommy was the consumate landlord, he could talk to any customer about any subject, for hours on end. As the years went by me and mum could not longer work there and he employed various other people. As time wore on he bought the Kingfisher Restaurant in Sandside and turned a tiny little single-wide trailer type of diner into a restaurant where people would make reservations one year in advance. While they had the Kingfisher, and some apartments in Morecambe, and probably some other properties, Tommy bought a pub in the middle of nowhere. I asked him why he would do such a thing, you know considering that they already had so much on their plate, he told me "Millie didn't have anything to worry about while she was sleeping so I had to give her something". Of course when he bought said pub he was already up to his neck to the bank for the other properties he owned when he went to them for a loan for the new pub, when the bank manager got a little difficult with him Uncle Tommy said to him "listen pal you do what I want you to do or I will take my overdrafts elsewhere". This story is probably rhetorical, but I can just imagine Tom saying just that to the bank manager and in the end getting just what he wanted.

He called me Tilly, I have no idea why, from being the tiniest of babies he called me Tilly, and he was the only one who was allowed to call me Tilly to be honest. Noone else could get away with it. My Aunt Dot always called me "Dawn Louise" and noone else could get away with that and he called me Tilly. He was the most wonderful of persons, of that there is no doubt. I remember one moment, a silly little moment really when you think about it. Katie had broken a toy, and she wanted it fixed, she took it to here Dad and said something childish about wanting it "fixed" Tom said "would you like Daddy to repair it for you?" "it's broken" Katie said "would you like Daddy to repair it for you" he repeated, "Yes" said Katie. I was always fascinated by that, by how he would use the correct word other than the regular childish word "fix". Tommy was like that though, as much as he loved children he would treat them like adults and would expect them to behave like adults (within reason of course). I do not ever remember him speaking down to me as a child, he always spoke to me with respect, he always treated me as an equal when obviously I was not.

I know it is probably the wrong thing to say but the best most wonderful memories I have of my Uncle Tommy is of the entire family getting happily, screamingly drunk together. Especially at the Lindale Inn, staff night, Saturday night, after we had closed, mum would cook up a huge pan of stew or hot pot or something and we would all sit around a massive table and eat and drink and get blisteringly drunk. I know that is really not PC right now, but you had to be there, you had to have lived my life with my family, and more's the point you had to have known Tommy. Personally I shall be eternally grateful that I knew him.