The actual existence of my dad, Ivan, ended on Tuesday 22nd December, 2015, at the Marie Curie Hospice in Belfast.

In the weeks after, I gathered some faded photos and dusty trinkets from his long buried collection, and the terse and factual obituary he’d written for himself (is it a curse or a blessing to know you will have to write yours?) and wrote the following about the ripples he left behind.

The Early Days

Ivan Bradford Johnston, was born on the 25th of March, 1946, at home in Brookmount Street, Belfast to John Henry (or Jack, as everybody called him) and Vera Johnston.

He was the youngest of 3 children, Norma his older sister, and Kenneth his older brother. They moved frequently around Belfast during his youth, from his grandparents’ crowded house off the Shankill Road, to Sunnyside Street off the Ormeau Road, and finally to Sydenham in East Belfast.

He attended Strand Primary, where apparently he met some fellow young entrepreneurs:

“At the age of 7 my business enterprises began, with my good friends Victor Wilson and David McKinstry — we took advantage of David’s large buggy and in the winter time we would head down to the shipyard, and to a local wood importer, where we would pile all the scrap wood into the buggy, and head back to Victor’s back garden. [There] we would cut and pack short sticks, to make into kindle bundles, ready to sell around the doors on Saturday afternoon, after we came back from The ABC Minors.

“In the summertime we swapped the wood for flowers which we would get from Mr Smith’s garden (sale or return), and on Sundays we would sit at the graveyard gate and sell any we had been left over from the previous day.”

Later the Johnstons moved on from Sydenham, to a then-brand-new development, Clarawood, off the Knock Road, where he attended Ashfield Boys’ High School during the late 1950s and early 60s.

After high school, and after a couple of part time jobs, he got a mechanic’s apprenticeship on the Springfield Road at James Mackie & Sons, at that time one of the largest employers in Belfast. This was to be the beginning of a long career spent in the engineering industry, that would continue right up until his passing.

The Sailor

After the end of his five year apprenticeship, in his own words,

“I was drawn to the excitement of travel”,

and he signed up for the British Merchant Navy, where he would serve as a junior engineering officer.

About his maiden voyage, he wrote:

“I remember my first trip on the MV Testbank, a tramper managed by Andrew Weir & Co. I signed on a 2 year contract joining the vessel at the East India Docks in London. I had no time to be home sick as when I joined the vessel we set sail for the South Pacific — first port of call Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Then we spent another few months discharging around the Pacific Islands ending up in Fiji, where we spent over 7 weeks loading sugar by hand.”

I’d always known my father was well traveled, and he often reminisced about his merchant navy career, but when I came across some of his old memories from this time, kept faithfully and tidily in an old biscuit tin, it served as a reminder of how he lived a whole other life before becoming “dad”.

Expired passports heavy with the weight of countless immigration stamps, immaculately preserved discharge forms, and Seaman’s record books that listed countless countries visited, and years served, along with photos that capture those moments.

“We headed across the Pacific, through the Panama Canal to discharge in New Orleans — this was the start of a few trips across the Pacific from Australasia to the USA. Then we at last got a homeward bound cargo, jute, from Calcutta to Dundee — however just as we headed to the Suez Canal with only 4 weeks to home, the Six Day War started, and we were re-routed via the Cape, which added about a further 3 weeks to our trip. Then we ran out of fresh water, as the evaporator had broken down, so it was a matter of looking for rain showers and putting out canvas catchers so we could at least have a wash. By the time we got to Dundee, there were a lot of smelly and unhappy sailors.”

He sailed with lots of different shipping companies, like Shell Tankers and United Arab Shipping, for 12 years. Below are some of the fascinating photos and things collected during that time.

As is standard for fathers the world over, my dad loved to bring a camera (even in the pre-digital era) on every single family trip. As is standard for kids the world over we groaned and rolled our eyes every single time we had to pose for yet another parental snap.

Looking back at these photos, it became so clear to me that he loved to do this not to torture us, but because he understood the power of freezing and preserving memory in photo. Every Polaroid or glossy card contains a story you might otherwise let slip from your mind.

I don’t know whether it is the analog quality of these photos, or my connection to him through them, but they feel alive.

The Husband

12 years after embarking on that first voyage, he came back to dry land for good, getting a service engineer’s job with GW Monson & Sons, located in Newtownards, County Down, where he settled for the next few years.

He never stopped travelling, connecting with family in California and elsewhere.

Then as he said, with characteristic simplicity,

“It was at this time in my life I met and fell in love with my beautiful wife Carolyn”

They were married in April 1983, surrounded and cheered on by their expansive group of family and friends in Bangor.

However they felt about this, my parents mostly seemed to me to be a fantastically well-suited pair, matching dry wits, caring support, and a warm and positive nature (mostly).

Regardless of the accuracy of that, they were always a strong team, and they continued to explore the world together right up until the last weeks. They were always been great role models to me for the value of positivity and exploration, and remained so together until the end.

The Father

Not too long (suspiciously soon, let’s be honest) after meeting, and marrying, I was born a few months in 1983.

We lived and grew up together in 51 Eastmount, Newtownards, where I remember my first moment of true anxiety — trying to clamp my eyes shut so Santa wouldn’t think I was awake and take away my presents — and my first moments of exploration and wonder – walking down the country roads to a big hill towering over Strangford Lough so we could watch the Ards Air Show with its roaring and acrobatic jet planes.

The family photos following contain a wealth of my fondest childhood memories with my parents.

Trips to France (where dad taught me to swim) with uncle Harry and aunt Roberta and their soft-top car; St Andrews in Scotland with our beloved relative Bill Campbell where I held my first golf club (and I haven’t gotten any better since); and the forests of Castlewellan – we went here more frequently than any other place, and I’m sure it’s the reason I feel like cosy and safe in shadowy and spooky forests.

In 1987, my little sister Debbie was born, and we spent a few months living down in Bill Campbell’s house at Butterlump Rock while our first family home, at Erindee in Donaghadee, was built.

Two children might have kept some other families house-bound, but not ours:

“We were a close family and spent most summers in our touring caravan heading away each Friday after work to Castlewellan and other parks throughout Ireland, and during summer breaks we headed off south to Limerick, Cork and Kerry where we made some great memories.

As the kids grew, [the caravan] was no longer on the agenda, instead it was Spain, France, and of course USA – California in particular.”

For me there’s no more important meaning to life than creating great memories, and my dad made sure we have countless amounts of them to treasure – whether in a rain-soaked caravan in County Clare, or locked out of our campsite and stuck on a beach in Italy.

The Adventurer

One common thread running throughout his life was my dad’s sense of ambition, whether that be with travel, with family, or with work.

After 12 great years at GW Monson, in 1992 I decided to broaden my outlook and took the plunge into starting my own business. Thermpak [now TPS], which at one time employed 7 people. and is still going strong to the present time.

Running Thermpak gave him the opportunity to visit, or indeed revisit, countless cities, keeping up a spirit of adventure that he never lost.

And even with all of that, I think he still really loved to adventure close to home, around Ireland.

He even took on the challenge of coaching rugby kids, including a very reluctant me, at Donaghadee RFC.

I’ll always remember Donaghadee RFC’s biennial Boxing Day matches with Wigtownshire RFC, in Stranraer, Scotland. Every other year, they’d come to visit and compete against us, and in the other years, we’d travel across on the ferry, and play against them.

But I barely remember the sport itself (I think I played in a couple of minis matches, but hardly a glittering playing career), what sticks in the mind were the drunken and uproarious sing-songs on the ferry back, or being surrounded by familiar and jolly faces in the clubhouses.

Dad didn’t let illness stop him either:

“In 2005 I unfortunately suffered liver failure and became very sick, but after a two year wait in 2007 I was given the gift of liver, and was flown [in an] air ambulance to King’s College Hospital in London, where I was given a new liver”

After his transplant, he was deeply involved with ensuring that people in his situation would be better off, through the RVH Liver Support Group, and by encouraging people to join their countries organ donor register, if available.

As he said, still with customary dry wit:

The transplant was a success and up until now was performing well — I had a very important extension to my life.

In fact it was important to all of us who knew him.

The Cancer

So this is it, there’s no avoiding talking about it. Suddenly, in mid-2015, he was diagnosed with small cell lung cancer.

Cancer is a horrible dichotomy of a disease . It takes people away slowly, but ends fast. It spreads your grief out over weeks and months, but doesn’t let you have that last punch of loss that you might need to move on. It makes you feel guilty, because you feel relieved for an end to their suffering, instead of devastated at their departure.

The rest of this part of the story is something private and personal that I won’t share, but there were good things to hold onto.

For one, my dad maintained that adventurousness, fitting in as many trips around Ireland as he could, getting the best steak of his life, and battling the disease with dignity and courage.

I was able to show him an early ultrasound photo of his future grandchild, and I hope that provided him with some comfort, even if it was made bittersweet knowing he wouldn’t be there to meet them.

Another bright spot was the kindness and gentle compassion shown by the staff of the Marie Curie Hospice. Dad spent the last few days of his life here, cared for by people who must have to deal with such tremendous heartbreak on a constant basis. Please support them, or your local hospice, if you can.

And it was there where he passed away, less than a mile from 25 Knockwood Crescent, where his journey through life began all those years ago.

At dad’s funeral, I was surprised by the vast numbers of people who turned up to say goodbye. I shouldn’t have been, because nobody who creates this many ripples in life could have had otherwise.

This is what gives me comfort and delight - I know I won’t meet him again, in the religious sense anyway, but I, and many others, are still left with tremendous memories of him, or created by him. This living obituary is merely a drop in the ocean.

Now go and make some ripples of your own.