This one is for you if you’re a fan of the Mighty Dandies, Aberdeen FC. (Must find out how to make the link text red!)

A quick glance at Google Maps ahead of tonight’s Premier Sports Cup Tie against Annan Athletic suggests it’s a mere (almost) four hour trip.

So, we’ve come up with a way of killing at least half an hour of it.

You’re welcome.

It’s this week’s Pittodrie P.S. where we review the Dons’ previous match and ahead to the next, and this week’s a two-for with Annan this evening followed by Ross County away at the weekend.

Meanwhile, Pittodrie P.S.’ Andrew Shinie is making the journey because it’s another ground to tick off his list, but he’s making a trip of it and taking his missus with him too. He sure knows how to treat a lady!

One other thing I wanted to add. How lovely was it to see the smile on this guy’s face at the weekend. Dream realised.

💬 "I have dreamed about it since I was a little kid. Growing up an Aberdeen fan I have always wanted to play and score for my team."

❤️ 🔴#StandFree | @Ryan_duncan10 pic.twitter.com/w6tQgiXRwQ

— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 28, 2022

#COYR

I don’t know how the year’s unfolding for you, but for me it’s been quite strange.

You know when the things you plan end up being not important in the bigger picture?

Perhaps the plan goes according to plan, or maybe it comes off the rails entirely, but the fact is it doesn’t matter because something larger and wholly unexpected rendered that entire line of thought redundant anyway, such was its significance.

This will be making no sense to you whatsoever without context, so let me give you some.

Despite having no prior knowledge as we approached 2022, so far I’ve ended up writing and reading a eulogy at a funeral (which, I wish for all the world there had been no requirement for me to do), and officiating at a wedding.

That one I did have an inkling of – although it started out as, “Uncle John, would you mind being the MC at our wedding?” then gravitated towards, “Uncle John, will you actually be able to marry us?” when, totally unexpectedly, and I think uniquely, the minister who had been booked to conduct the ceremony had to cancel because his wife had double-booked the date with a holiday!

Let me tell you what those words (Uncle John, will you actually be able to marry us?”) meant to me.

The inability to submit an invoice.

I’m kidding.

Words alone are incapable of doing justice to my feelings regarding that request.

As an only child, I grew up never imagining for an instant I would marry into a situation where I’d become an Uncle to six wonderful nieces, but here I am.

Every single one of them is beautiful and accomplished, engaged with the world and ready to make their dent in it, but my first nieces, the ones I met before the others, had a unique set of circumstances, which, in that moment, meant we spent a lot of time with them in their formative years.

I couldn’t be prouder of them if they were our own.

Often they feel to us like they are.

So to be asked by one of them to marry her and her partner, Ally, was quite overwhelming for me.

I could never say no, but was almost crushed by the desire to deliver exactly what they wanted, having never done anything like it before.

In both cases (the funeral and the wedding), I wanted for nothing more than to not let anybody down.

I hope and think I did OK for both.

What I got from it though was entirely unexpected and a revelation to me.

When I say, I’ve never done anything like this before, that’s not entirely true.

My every day is about writing and delivering scripts with a microphone to an audience, whether in the same room as me or not – the concept is well within my wheelhouse.

And technically speaking, this wasn’t my first rodeo so far as delivering a eulogy was concerned. I’d done this for my Father, some ten years before, and knew I was able to exist within the moment without crumbling.

In many ways, I think the requirement to retain an almost work like zen at the ceremony allowed me to be present in the moment, but within a responsibility framework which demanded I control my emotions to a degree that I was able to deliver the task in hand, and ‘not let anybody down’.

I use that phrase a lot when it comes to these types of event.

I think I was more comfortable with the weight of that responsibility than the feeling of helplessness that can present at a funeral where your eyes dart about the room, witnessing your family wilt and crumple and being entirely unable to do anything about it in the moment.

Like a series of fires spontaneously combusting, you’d attempt to put one out, knowing another would spring up in its place no sooner than you had, and in the end the entire process would prove utterly and traumatically futile.

No, this way was better. To take on the responsibility of attempting to help all my family through this moment gifted me the chance to actually do that.

It also presented the opportunity to fail spectacularly in that role.

Those were the odds I was prepared to take on.

At least if I failed they’d be able to unite in blaming me, and maybe then, they’d forget their sorrow, at least for a moment, to pile in and let me know.

I thought long and hard about all the possible outcomes and ploughed on instinctively feeling this was the right thing to do.

What surprised me most was what I got from it.

When I work on the radio, often people will very kindly take the time to let me know if I’ve made them laugh, or cry or think twice about something or someone and change their mind as a result of something I’ve said.

I get feedback, and I appreciate it.

The gift though of actually being able to see it and hear it in people’s faces and words in the moment is astonishing.

I work in front of crowds on a regular basis too, whether that’s at football matches or gigs.

The thing with those scenarios is that nobody there has turned up to see me. I’m a cog in the wheel of the function of the event in question.

The voice which reads out the team lines and the scores, or introduces the next act to take the stage.

When you stand in front of those crowds you don’t really see the whites of their eyes or their reaction to the words you’re saying.

In my very limited experience, funerals and weddings are the exact opposite of that.

The response is instantaneous, and real, unguarded in the moment.

That’s enormous.

The desire to deliver exactly on the wishes of those you’re serving , matched by a reaction which tells you, broadly speaking, you have, is rewarding in a way I’ve never previously known.

It’s a privilege to be asked to take on the role of helping family and friends mourn a loss or celebrate a union.

And the manner in which this all crept up on me meant my own expectation was less and realisation of it all the more profound.

One of the associative aspects of these events this year is that by virtue of them, my family has been thrown together twice in a short period of time in a small piece of real estate.

OK, our house isn’t exactly small, but it’s no sprawling countryside mansion either.

As a terraced townhouse it’s Tardis like in its delivery of indoor space, but even at that we struggled, happily, to accommodate family members in the moment as all families must.

On the two occasions we were hosting at least 12-15, somehow, but we did, and despite stepping on each other’s toes, at times literally, and given the circumstances and pressures weddings and funerals uniquely present, we revelled in having all our family around us, flying in from various locations around the world.

These moments are fleeting, often overwhelmingly emotional, yet at times beautiful and fulfilling and life affirming.

The celebration of a full and varied life which touched and influenced so many others.

The realisation that, although departed physically from this world, the ripple like connections are there for all to see and hear, in language through the use of catchphrases and family jokes told so often they’re recited more than delivered. In songs penned, or at least sung, if no physical rendering of their existence was ever committed to paper.

In calamity fuelled trips, bumps, bangs and clatters. Broken glasses, spilt drinks, soiled tablecloths, all only deliverable through bloodline or osmosis from being seated at the same dinner table thousands of times over the years.

In talents passed on, traits inherited (whether wanted or not), and in so many other ways the gathering of family presented all these beautiful instances which would have been so much more difficult to witness had we been disparate and geographically apart.

And to a wedding a few short weeks later.

The chance to witness, in my case, ‘ring’-side, the little girl who’d been one of our flower girls blossom into a bride, marrying her sweetheart at the third or fourth time of asking. No-one was really counting at this point, we all just knew the reason had been Covid.

The postponement of so many weddings because of the pandemic, I hope, over time, will result in so many couples appreciating even more how precious the day was when it finally arrived.

In our case, that meant the guy who would undoubtedly have been the loudest in the room, wasn’t there.

So we felt honour bound to unite and make it as though he was.

I’m happy to report we carried off that task with aplomb.

To the week after and a trip to the Borders once again for the family to unite with the addition of a couple of friends, Ashley and his wife Julie.

Ashley had been friends with the kids of the family when he was younger and they’ve all stayed in touch over the years.

He and Julie basically are family, and so we had another weekend of celebrating and rejoicing and revelling in the wonder of what those can offer, often in the most pressured environments.

So the year so far has been at times unexpected and often emotional, but if I didn’t also recognise the joyous gifts that journey has presented us as a direct result of these occasions, I’d be lying.

Something else too.

That feeling of privilege. Of helping a family.

The fulfilment of it.

It stuck with me.

I wonder if it’s something I could replicate, or was I just able to because it was my own family?

In reality I’ve had years to write in my head the elements of a wedding I’d conduct for my niece, or a eulogy I’d deliver for my father in law.

My own lived experiences form a lot of those pages of script.

Could I really do it for someone I’ve never met, entering into an environment of their family’s personal grief?

Surely that’s an entirely different matter altogether?

And the fact I’ve done a couple of eulogies and officiated at one wedding does not make me a qualified authority on either.

It does however make me curious on the issue.

I’ll be honest, I’ve looked before at the idea of becoming a celebrant.

My knowledge and investigation of it previously took me to the door of Humanism.

That didn’t sit well with me because I was born and raised a Christian.

I am a Christian.

So, in order to become a Humanist Celebrant I’d have to renounce my beliefs and I simply couldn’t. I’d be starting on a path with a lie to myself.

Incidentally, just because I have my beliefs does not put me at odds in any way with the idea of Humanism. If that’s how you wish to live your life, then do.

You do you. I’ll do me. And we can all get by quite happily in tandem.

When you investigate further the idea of becoming a celebrant, you realise, actually, it’s the Wild West out there.

It’s not regulated by one definitive body from what I can tell.

In fact, so far as conducting a funeral is concerned, you don’t need any formal qualifications.

The same is true of a wedding, except for the fact one has to be certified to legally marry a couple in the UK.

There are others who’d argue you’d have to be certified to get married in the first place but that’s another argument for another day at a Bernard Manning Convention.

So, as a celebrant, you can’t actually marry a couple unless you also happen to be a registrar, for example.

If you’re not, then the couple in question has to conduct the legal aspect elsewhere beforehand, and then you can perform a ceremony of any kind knowing that legal requirement has been fulfilled.

So, technically, there’s nothing stopping you from just going out there, saying you’re a Celebrant and getting started in the field.

Equally, there’s nothing preventing you from saying you’re a plasterer even though you’ve only sealed a couple of cracks at home.

So, here’s where I am.

I have a desire to explore this world further. I have a limited hope I might be OK at it, going on my limited experience to date.

I’ve wrestled with my own personal beliefs and found a way to reconcile them and still go ahead and look at this some more.

I may be a Christian, but not everybody is. Why shouldn’t those people be able to work with a professional to construct a bespoke service for them as opposed to having to settle for something generated by a body in which they have no belief, and take no comfort from?

I won’t enter into it haphazardly without some kind of professional training.

But I think I want to do it.

What do you reckon?

You never really know as a parent what’s going through the mind of your teenager, do you?

I’ve come to the conclusion, that actually, that’s probably for the best in the long run.

For the most part, I try to figure out what mine might be thinking (because it wasn’t all THAT long ago I was one, right? ) at exactly the same time as I’m wrestling with the fact I’ve just heard one of my own parents’ phrases fall out of MY mouth.

How did THAT happen?!

As much as your teenage son or daughter is grappling with everything being a teenager entails, you’re going through a second age of wonderment, trying to piece together when exactly you became old?!

It must’ve happened in the same blip that took place when I carried my baby boy home from the hospital only for him to wake up the next day and announce he’s sitting his Nat 5 exams next week.

That can’t be. I’m NOT READY.

I don’t know about him!

So far as studying goes, we’re kind of operating a policy of ‘you can take a horse to water but you can’t make it drink’.

Or, in this instance, I could glue his hands to a desk full of past papers but it wouldn’t mean he’d study them, and not specifically because he couldn’t turn the pages.

We couple the ‘you’re responsible’ policy alongside ‘subtle guilt’.

‘Remember son, if it doesn’t go well, it’s not me you’re letting down. I’ll get up the day after and still have a job to go to. My life won’t have changed….. (PAUSE FOR DRAMATIC EFFECT AND BACKGROUND LIGHTING)….but yours will’.

Whether it has the desired effect or not will only become evident in the longer term.

Too harsh?!

Things I’ve learned in this process?

• I’m more nervous for his exams than I was my own
• We really never can tell what’s going through their heads

My Dad did a number on me at exam time. It must have bothered him his entire life, and he was determined it wouldn’t destroy me.

So he’d thought about it, and this was what he came up with.

“Are you nervous about the exams Son?”

“Dunno Dad. I suppose a bit”

“Why?”

“…Huh? Well, just am, you know”

“Don’t be. Don’t worry…..You hear me?”

“….uh…..y-e-a-h……OK….”

“Do you know why?”

“…..n-o…?”

“Because it won’t make any difference. Whether you’re going to pass or fail is all pretty much decided beforehand by how much work you’ve put in. Worrying about it on the day isn’t going to make a difference. Not a positive one anyway. There’s no point. So, go in, do your best, and whatever happens, your Mum and I will be proud of you, but there’s no point in worrying about it, so really TRY not to. OK?”

And I didn’t.

This isn’t a fairytale. I didn’t pass everything. Not second time around anyway. I distinctly remember trying to persuade my parents that the entry ‘NA’ next to my Higher Maths stood for Natural Ability.

In retrospect, I don’t recommend that course of evasive action.

But here’s the thing.

Because that had worked with me, and has all my life, (due to my Dad making it his life’s work to come up with a solution I could action ) – I wanted to pass it on, be THAT useful for my own Son.

And this is what blew me away.

I asked him in a quieter moment in the run-up,

“Are you nervous about the exams, Son?”

“N-o……well, not r-e-a-l-ly…”

“What bothers you about them, then?”

“I’m not nervous about sitting them. I’m nervous about NOT sitting them”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“Well, the last couple of years, the kids in school haven’t been able to sit exams, and if the same thing happens to me and they’re cancelled again, how will anybody know what I can or can’t do?”

And there you have it.

A kid crippled by fear about the upcoming exams a few weeks out.

Not because he hasn’t put the work in.

Not because he has an unhealthy fear of examinations in themselves.

A fear the world won’t be able to judge him on his merits if he’s got no piece of paper to back any of it up.

So, no, you never really know what’s going through the mind of your teenager, but I think, nine times out of ten, a bit of reassurance and support, letting them know, no matter what happens, so long as they give it a bloody good go, you’ll be there for them on the other side to tackle whatever comes next – goes a long way.

Good luck with the exams.

And don’t worry.

Ask my kids and they’ll tell you there are various landscapes they grew up knowing as ‘Dada’s View’.

There’s one where the valley opens up as you come over the Cairnamount and into Deeside. You can see along the Dee for miles towards Ballater and on a sunny day it feels like God got up early to prepare it just for you.

That being said, pretty much any view from any part of the Cairnamount is the sort of thing Undiscovered Scotland was built for.

Equally, approaching that same valley from a slightly different point, as you come down the hill from Torphins to join the main A93, and again see right the way along the length of the Dee, does the same thing for me.

And so too, I rediscovered at the weekend on a flying visit to Inverness, does the view from the A9 as you descend towards the city, and the panorama opens out across the Moray Firth and coastline in all its glory.

I actually felt a little emotional as I realised how long it had been since I’d seen it last.

All these views mean one thing to me – HOME.

They nourish my heart, and I feel myself actually switch off and relax as I see them.

So, as a town or city dweller, when you wonder why someone would commit to staying so far away from work? (Is half an hour drive really so far?)

That’s your answer.

But Toonsers dinna ken, ken?

There are various moments in life, which stand out for all of it.

Getting married. When your kids are born. When people die.

The ‘Hatches, Matches and Dispatches’ of your world.

And you get a feel for when they’re coming. Well, at least I’d hope so. There’s an invitation through the post with at least one of those!

Visual clues are pretty pivotal with another.

The only one that sometimes sneaks up without any warning is the ugliest.

And that’s exactly what happened to our family in late February this year, when we lost my father-in-law.

Because of a variety of issues, none which bear repeating here, we only got to say goodbye at his funeral this past week.

My own Dad died ten years ago this year, and when he did, I wanted to speak at his funeral. The only person I had to convince to let me was my Mum.

I knew I could do it.

When I tell you that I get nervous about most things in life, and uncertainty readily creeps in, that’s not a lie, but the few things I know I can do, I have a rock solid faith in. This was one. I had no reason or right to feel that way, never having done anything similar. I just knew.

And when my father-in-law died, and my wife and sister-in-law asked me to write something on their behalf for him at his funeral, I knew I could do it again.

It was an honour and a privilege to do so, but I’m glad it’s now done.

If you knew Trevor at all, but couldn’t be there, we thought you might appreciate seeing a transcript of what I said.

Hello,

I’m John. I’m one of Trevor’s son-in-laws, and, a few months short of ten years ago I stood at a lectern very similar to this one and read a tribute to my Dad in the wake of his passing.

He didn’t moan about it then, so here I am….. The difference on this occasion, is that I’m not representing myself and my Mum, but Edna… Mark, Ruth, and Lynne, their kids, and…believe it or not….THEIR kids, as well as the wider family.

My hope is to not let you down.

The reason it’s me doing this, and not one of ‘the kids’….is because they’re understandably concerned they might buckle or wilt a bit up here facing you all.

I, on the other hand have made a career out of speaking, followed by people crying.

This is nothing new for me.

So, this is a little sprinkle of what Trevor’s kids, grandkids and great grandkids wanted to say, because that is who Trevor was.

We’ve heard from Holly (one of our Ministers), and Mark, (Trevor’s son) about some of their recollections….and I could tell you about the things he did during his life…the jobs he held, the places he lived.

And he was a very accomplished, intelligent guy….but that gives you a flavour ofwhat he did, and where he went, not who he was….

Trevor was a performer, and the fact he’d never made the West End or Broadway didn’t hinder him one bit.

He took it to the world, literally whenever and wherever he could.

In shops, in the street, in restaurants.

Nowhere missed out on a song or dance.

At times, it could make you cringe…..because you couldn’t go anywhere.

You were now associated with this guy who’d just spontaneously startedsinging Don Williams, ABBA …The Marseillaise…..

It didn’t matter what it was…he’d have a good go at it….over the loosest of connections…..as you noted on the pub TV that ….”The French hadwon the rugby that day….” Off he’d go…..(ANTHEM)

I referred to those moments as being ‘Von Trapped.’

Other occasions, it’d be a little tap dance or soft shoe shuffle…. in the bakery aisle….just because. And oddly, at that moment, even though you didn’t know it in advance….and I don’t think he did either….he just felt like it….but it turned out to be what the old lady on the other side of the aisle needed exactly at that minute in her life….as her frown turned upside down.

He would burst into song or dance the way petrol bursts into flame when it meets a match. And Trevor met his match, when fate served him Edna.

I can’t tell you much about their earlier days when they were courting….but I can tell you about every day I’ve known them.

Connected by a deep love, a bond in each other and their faith in God which has seen them through…well, everything life’s thrown at them.

Quite recently I came across a photo of Trevor and Edna walking out of the church just after they were married, and Trevor’s glancing at a friend as if to say…”Hey, check this out…I won the lottery.”

He looked like a guy who’d just been given the moon and the stars and the galaxies above…..and yet the closest he ever came to reaching that analogy was when Edna, on occasion would say….”choose your planet”.

She too, wasn’t completely immune to the occasional embarrassment of the spontaneous light entertainment department.

Yes. With Trevvie, you genuinely never knew what was coming next.

Well, for the most part. Some things were absolutely regimented, like the way he would answer when you asked him how he was.

“How are you Trevor?”

“Very well, very well”….Or if you happened to mention you were tired,he’d jump in with…. “I was born tired, and never recovered”.

It may have occurred to you by now, that, for a lot of the time, Trevor behaved like he was about 6.

Not far off….maybe a shade mature, but you’re certainly in the right ballpark.

And you know what, that’s why every kid who ever clapped eyes on him, loved him.

They recognised a kindred spirit.

A playfulness. Devilment. Fun.

Latterly, the last couple of Summers we’ve had this big blow up pool in our back garden, and in the non Covid times, every kid in the neighbourhood would turn up with a towel and a bathing costume.

And delighted at this, on the back porch would be Trevor.

He reached into his pocket, pulled out a handful of coins and scattered it across the bottom of the pool. So the kids could dive for it, grab some cash and maybe buy a sweetie when they were dry.

From then on Lynne christened it, The Trevvie Fountain.

Every year, when the Christmas Tree was erected, you’d find Trevor on the floor underneath, with at least one grandchild beside him, looking up….at the lights and ornaments as they glistened….because it’s the best view, don’t you know.

He’d have been a very good Santa. Maybe he was….And like Santa, he was known by many names….Dad, Pops, Granpa, Papa, Pappy, that manny in the street who was dancing round the Copey last time I wasin….

I was always fond of Uncle Treasure.

That one tickled me, as I’m sure it did him.

More than anything, he was a man who delighted in….who revelled in the glory of his family.

He was so incredibly proud of all of you, to the point he’d sit and say after a meal with us “ I just can’t get over how lucky I am”.

For a man who didn’t gamble, much like when he got married, he thought he’d won the jackpot.

The last time I saw him, was at our house.

He wasn’t feeling well, and we’d taken him down with us because his breathing was laboured.

He struggled to get up from a seat.

So it came as a real surprise to one of the paramedics who was on hand taking checks, when he tried to make a song from the bleeps made by the machine measuring his blood pressure.

The surprise made even greater by the fact she was sounding his chest at the time, receiving the entire song in Dolby Surround Sound via her stethoscope.

We implored him to stop….”I’m sorry” he replied, like a scolded child, as the paramedic moved round to the other side with her stethoscope once more…and he mock screamed “Ah…it’s cal …it’s cal”……most likely perforating her other eardrum in the process.

Shortly after, the decision was made to take him to hospital, and as we helped lift him into the ambulance….the other, quieter paramedic finally spoke, whispering to me… “at least you’ll get some peace for a wee bit now, eh?”

Too much.

Trevor visited Edna at Allachburn Nursing Home twice a week with Lynne.

To my knowledge, he never once complained they were separated.

The closest he came to that was when I’d wait outside to take him home again, and on a good day, you’d know…because he’d come bouncing back to the car… “How was Edna today, Trevor?” “Oh, she was in great form today”, he’d say…and then pause for a beat before adding…”I just wish I could take her home with me”.

On one of his last visits there, Lynne told me how they gently danced and sang their way down the corridor arm in arm.

On a point of order, we have explained to Edna that Trevor has passed.

We wanted her to be at the Falls Of Feugh this afternoon, but we’ve opted not to at the last minute….You can of course arrange to see her at Allachburn in the future, but we would ask if she doesn’t bring it up, maybe don’t mention Trevor, because each time she learns about it, she’s doing so for the first time….and as much as I laugh and joke with her and still call her Wizardora, I would spare her that pain if at all possible.

OK, I did say I was up here to try and reflect the thoughts of Ruth, and Lynne.

These are Ruth’s.

For all the times you messed the kitchen up whilst cooking. For all the times you broke a glass while telling a story. For all the times I’d cringe when you’d break into song. For all the times we’d all avoid eye contact as you strode across the floor for the first dance at family parties… I wouldclean the kitchen 5 million times over. Break a glass with you. Burst into spontaneous song and fight the cousins off for the first dance, just to be able to do it with you.

Love you, and miss you, my Dad.

And now Lynne’s.

When I think of my Dad, the first word that springs to my mind is Joy. Joy in his wife and then with his family. My Dad could find the joy in any situation. I was never without a dance partner, lead or backing vocals, or someone to go sledging with…….as a fully fledged adult. I feel like I’ve lost a sidekick, only I was the sidekick to his lead.

He taught me many lessons in life, but the most important thing that he taught me is always try and find the joy. Always loved. Always remembered. Always blessed. Finding the joy.

Thank you Pops #BeMoreTrevvie

I was trying to think of how I would sum up Trevor.

First of all, he was a ‘Yes Accelerator.’

Whatever you asked of him, he’d answered ‘yes’, before you’d finished the question. “Could you lend me?….YES.”

“Any chance you could pick me up at 3 tomorrow morning from…?”.YES”

“Pappy, can I play with the chainsaw in the ga…..?” “YES”

Most of the time it went fine.

He just wanted to help. At all times. He was a serial people pleaser.

Second, he was so dependable when you needed him, he was kind of like a St Bernard.

That also holds true because they aren’t the most tremendous tap dancers either, and he was never that far from a brandy.

But take from it most, he was always by your side in a jam.

And third – I always used to say this – Trevor Sassella was the most thrawn man I’ve ever met.

“You can’t say that at his funeral” people would tell me.

But it’s true.

And at times it could be infuriating, because no matter what you asked of him, he was just going to do things his way regardless, but you know, thrawn can be a superpower too.

When everyone else in the room would go in one direction, Trevor would be the guy who’d say…. “No, I’ll stand with you.”

And he did. On more than one occasion.

Because more than anything, he believed in his family.

And, more than anything, he loved a family party.

And that’s where we’re going next.

The nature of a service of this type, or a wedding, anything which veers from the traditional Sunday version is that a Church or Chapel is occupied in part by people who ordinarily wouldn’t be here.

For those people, I wanted to offer you this.

Whether you believe in a hereafter or not…..whether you think you’ll never hear from Trevvie again, you’re wrong.

Dispensing with God and religion, and sticking merely with every day fact – you’re here because you knew Trevor.

And regardless of what you think….every life that comes into contact with another, leaves an indelible little mark, or in Trevor’s case….a cracking big enormous one.

And each life, leaves an imprint on the others it comes into contact with.

An embedded memory, which surfaces, often at the least expected time, in the strangest of ways, to comfort, raise a smile, and console.

Whether you believe in God or not. I have them in abundance. It’s to be expected. But you’ll have them too, I guarantee it, at some point.

Don’t fight that spontaneous soft shoe shuffle when it arrives. It’s a gift.

And to those who shared a Church with Trevor, you’ll know how faithful and devoted a man, Trevor was.

To his wife, to his family, and to his God.

He was a child raised in the church. A BB. A Sunday school teacher, a communicant, a worshipper, and now, without a hint of fear in his passing, is closer to his God now, more than ever, and took huge comfort in that.

That was his life.

That is who he was.

Let me just pull this last part from my own Dad’s speech.

If there’s one question that’s been asked of us more than any other this last little while it’s this……

“Is there anything I can do?”

Yes, there is.

Rejoice in what you had, not mourn what you’ve lost.

Laugh, not cry.

Thrive not crumple.

Blossom, not wilt.

Jazz Hands, not knuckle drag. That’s what Trevor would have wanted.

And if you want to use those Jazz Hands in this next hymn, I’m sure he’d approve…..

This blog won’t be about anything in particular, other than subjects which interest me.

Things I’m passionate about, professionally interested in or moved by.

I guess the first represents all three of those.

This is actually a replication of a post which I wrote initially for LinkedIn.

It received just shy of 50,000 views, so I figured it may as well run here too.

“I’ve been match day stadium announcer at Pittodrie for Aberdeen Football Club since the 2005/2006 season.

I’ve witnessed 5 managers take the reins full time. Jim Goodwin makes 6, and today I also got to introduce once more to Pittodrie, our greatest boss ever.

If you know me at all, even a little bit, you’ll know how honoured and privileged I am to be the current custodian of that position.

As Sir Alex stepped out, the crowd erupted and the RDS display came to life.

I cannot begin to articulate how magnificent it looked. I felt like I was 6 years old again.

Football TEAMS have ups and downs. Football CLUBS are like family.

There for you forever.

I’ve had many great jobs in my life.

None beat this.

Thank you for giving me that opportunity 🙏🏻❤️

Thanks for coming home Fergie. ” #SAFhomecoming #OADAAD #COYR