He wasn't a person I would choose as a friend; his moods were unpredictable, he was often difficult to be with, and there was something uneasily cautionary about him: if you don't clean up your act, that's how you'll end up. Yet he reached out to each of us, in his way; the daily question of "what are you making for tea tonight?" was his way of establishing contact and fellowship.
I'm glad that he got to spend his last years somewhere that offered him some kind of peace and a sense of place; because in a community as small as Rum the passing of each soul is keenly felt. I'm glad of all the small kindnesses I showed him; the small things you do, even the simple remembering of a birthday, have an effect far greater than the energy you expend in doing them. I regret that I didn't respond more fully each time he attempted to make a connection; perhaps this will be the gift from him that I carry to the other Normans I meet in my life.
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