He Tore A Hamstring Dot Mee Dot UK

Urban Legend: Death by Forgetfulness

Popular culture would have it as one of contemporary society’s greatest sins, a constant theme in romantic comedy, soap opera and film. So quite how often do we forget anniversaries, not to mention birthdays and the like? And is it confined solely to the male gender, or is it a shared domain? Urban myth, as always, gives us much to consider!

Now, I can only vouch personally, but I have been surrounded by strong women – perfectly reasonable but strong nonetheless – throughout my life, the main protagonists being my ubiquitous mum, and my lovely fiancée Dani.

I have some strange tendencies in life, and amongst those are a penchant for a trouble free and uncomplicated existence, as well as a clean bill of health. If you can see where I am leading with this, it would simply never have been worth my while to even consider forgetting a significant date in the family diary!

I did, on one occasion, go down the Basil Fawlty route, and it is not necessarily a path that I will be looking to tread again! On that occasion, my best pal actually had to tell Dani that I had a night out planned for her, as her ire had provoked her to head to Liverpool Lime Street to board a train to go and see her family in London instead.

I know of friends who have forgotten, and I know also of a dad who may also have encountered an annual appointment with amnesia, albeit not unfailingly. I have still, however, always found it close to impossible to forget the special dates in my personal calendar.

Yesterday happened to be a very meaningful day for a close friend of mine who was due to get married. He was never far from my thoughts, despite correctly, in my opinion, choosing to escape for some solitary time. Hindsight will eventually dictate that they were fortunate to come to the decision before their day with destiny.

It was not lost on me either, that the same day would have been exactly a year away from my own wedding. As I stated, I have a photographic memory for important dates, but could not help feeling a touch bemused at contemplating an ‘anniversary’ that never happened.

From my perspective, August 28 is a considerably meaningful day for me. Admittedly, next year’s may be the most difficult that I meet, but even now, it was always going to be a day of reflection. Grief is said to pass with time and I am sure that it will get easier for all of us as time progresses.

What we would have been doing yesterday, who knows! The most likely scenario is probably some form of family meal where we all breathed deeply and realised how much work we still had to do! And of course a private moment of reflection for me when I counted my blessings, as I did every day and still do, for Dani’s presence in my life.

Whilst men up and down the country manage to forget key dates, I somehow find myself unable to forget one that never happened. I knew that attention to detail would get me into trouble one day!

For those that do have trouble with their memories, I am reliably informed that Forgot.Com is an essential tool! For me, I am going to try and remember exactly what I have planned for tomorrow morning, probably failing spectacularly.