Mike Inkster. A personal tribute to my closest friend
 
Mike Inkster (and he was definitely a Mike rather than a Michael to his friends). Where to start?

Well firstly, although I miss him greatly, this cannot be a sad eulogy.
Mike didn’t do sad. He didn’t do depressed. He didn’t do angry, bitter, upset, spiteful, malicious or any of the negative emotions that most of us might feel from time to time.
Or if he did, he never expressed them in front of me.

In over 40 years of friendship, I – and I’m sure this is true of all his friends – only saw:
Happiness
Laughter
Fun
Humour
 
Every situation and any conversation always started and ended up with smiles or laughter with Mike. And it’s a further personal tragedy for me, that with him died the only person who could be counted on to laugh at my jokes.
 
All of which is why Mike was so well liked and loved by his friends and family.
It’s only at a funeral - when you really think about these things - that you realise how much this is true. It’s why every member of my family who could make it, is here – my eldest son and his godson – Benedict – my daughter, wife, mother and brother; my sister wanted to come but she’s on a plane to Scotland. Everyone who spent any time with Mike loved him and remembers him for that sense of fun and laughter.
 
So even though I’ve shed many a tear over the last few weeks when thinking that I won’t be able to see my pal again, I’m going to remember Mike’s spirit of humour in all circumstances as I t

EXPLANATORY NOTE: Mike and my friendship was based on sending each other up…so much so that our conversations consisted of taking the mickey out of each other at every opportunity. We have been called “the odd couple”.
 
FOOD
Mike loved his food and he always seemed to manage to time his arrival to just before we – whoever we were at the time – were going to eat, thereby getting a free meal. Particularly true when we were growing up, but also evident in his 50s as this short text exchange that I found on my phone demonstrates:

Hi Dave. I've changed my sales area to TW and KT postcodes [THIS REFERS TO HIS SALES JOB WITH THE FSB]. Can you let me know the best time to cold call your mum and when the cooked breakfast is likely to be on the stove?? Mike.
 
ME: She gets up a little later nowadays...id leave it until 9
 
MIKE: Thanks Dave. I may just wait until lunchtime instead, it's likely to be a bigger meal!

MUSIC
I don’t think that Mike was aware that music continued past the 60’s. And of course the only band that really mattered was the Beatles. He knew every song, on every album – running order, words, who wrote and sung it - and had just about every book on the subject. Mike was always good for a pub quiz… as long as there was a Beatles question.
 
COMMONSENSE
Mike has many, many strong points.  
It’s fair to say, however, that commonsense was not one of them.
But this was as much part of him as the laughter. And boy did we laugh at the things he did/didn’t do. Never with malice. Just part of our friendship.

So many examples, but for some reason, one in particular comes to mind.
Failing to teach Mike how to tie a bowline – a commonly-used knot in sailing.
 
It’s normally easy to master, and taught as:
“The rabbit comes out of the hole, round the tree, and back down the hole again”. It’s fairly simple.
Well – after 30 minutes of trying to get Mike to do this, that rabbit had been up and down that hole so many times that it didn’t know what time of day it was.

Suffice to day, I failed to teach him.

But then again, Mike never did like boats.
 
 
AGE
Mike’s hair went from fair to white seemingly overnight. Of course this was another excuse for mockery – as I could introduce him as Grandpa. (Ironically I have just found out that he also referred to me as Grandpa to our mutual friend Chris).
One summer Mike came with us on a family outing to Arundel castle. As we got to the ticket office, I asked (jokingly) for a family ticket – including an OAP ticket “for Grandpa”. Sure enough – without any question – I was handed one family ticket and one OAP ticket.

Out of hearing distance, we laughed and laughed…even more so because at every time when we might need to show our tickets as we went round the castle, Mike was worried about being found out.

I’m sure he appreciated the money saving though.
 
MEMORY
Intrinsically linked with age, is memory, and one natural ability that Mike had in abundance, was a great memory – particularly for dates. He always remembered birthdays and other anniversaries of everyone he knew.

Of course, when he demonstrated this, it would usually be the source of laughter. So for example, we might be talking about the Beatles album Abbey Road; Mike would know the exact date that it was released. And probably the exact time.
I would then call him ‘Rain Man’ – after the film about an autistic savant with an excellent memory.
And he would reply “Quantas never crashed” – a line from the film.
And we would laugh. Every time. Without fail.

TRAVEL
Mike liked travelling, and went to see his extended family in Australia a few times (and various cousins, uncles and aunts also visited the UK many times).
Mike and I went on a gap year to Australia in the late 80’s.
So many memories come to mind, like on Australia Day 1988, Mike got so sunburned, and his exposed skin so red, that you couldn’t tell when he had taken off his singlet. The burn has left a perfect, impression.

Not a man blessed with tanning capability.
 
But the memory that we laughed at the most times was when we were in a wood yard in Perth, stacking planks across two runners that kept the planks off the floor, one on each side.
I would go down one side and Mike down the other and lay the planks flat. In a Laurel and Hardy moment, as we were doing this, I trod on my end of one of the planks that we had just laid down, causing the other end to shoot up into Mike’s groin and crush his testicles (not a word you would expect to hear too often in church), making us laugh uncontrollably and possibly ruining any chances of him producing offspring.

Which bring me onto…
 
LOVE
Mike was not the most successful at getting girlfriends – and since I was the same, it was part of the reason we saw so much of each other – especially in our late teens and early 20’s.

So luckily, crushed testicles never did prove to be problematic.
 
However, latterly Mike was harder to get hold of, and I believe that this is because he did meet someone special – Carol.
(I’ve not met Carol until today. He was a bit weird in that he kept parts of his life completely separate; school friends, work friends, family almost never met).
 
I’m really happy for him that he did – eventually - find female companionship – and thank you Carol for being the part of his life that I suspected he always wanted.
 
And that was one area that I certainly wasn’t going to be a surrogate for.
 
The other aspect of love of course is familial love – and although he did not have children himself, he absolutely adored his nephew, Samuel, and niece, Miriam. He talked about them often and although Mike would think that talking about love – was a bit “girly” – it was clear how much he loved them and that he would do anything for them.
 
To finish, Mike Inkster, my closest friend, Godson to our eldest son Benedict:

I can’t believe that you will no longer sit at our breakfast bar demanding “more beer” and laughing…at everything.

I can’t believe that you will no longer be looking for that next meal.

can’t believe that I will no longer be able to share jokes with you.
 
I – and I’m sure all of us – miss you greatly.
 
Thank you for your humour
…your warmth
… and your laughter
…and for being a big part of our lives.

Thank you Mike.

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David Robinson (and Elizabeth, Benedict, Laura and Adam)