Today I write with much sadness, for today is the day one year ago your beautiful husband died.

You have been my friend since forever. I met you at high school when we were 11, back in the day when Rivers and spiky fringes were the height of fashion, and you weren’t anyone unless you had a pair of Doc Martens and an Esprit T-shirt.

We got along right from the start – when everyone else was squabbling, we were too busy playing with your Elizabeth Arden make-up box and deciding which body suit to wear with our jeans. To this day, over 20 years later, we still haven’t had an argument …. well maybe there was that one time I chucked a major spack because you put the button that the boy I had a crush on had touched, in the gravy at Harbour Chicken. I was only 14 at the time and going through one of my obsessive phases (moi?), but then that was only the beginning of the long list of my obsessions you’ve witnessed.

We have grown up together and shared all of our highs and all of our lows – from Blue Light Discos, high school crushes, getting our licences and driving around in your pink EK Holden with Sonia Dada blaring from the stereo, boyfriends, doing “IT” for the first time with said boyfriends, overdoing the face powder and Tresor perfume and catching the bus into Fremantle, drinking Tequila and throwing up whilst you held my hair back (an alarming trend in my teens), the birth of your Calvin, jobs, overseas holidays to break-ups and unbelievably shitty patches.

Whenever I have reached out for help, your hand has always been there to hold mine. I’ve dialled 000 and you’ve been there in a flash, no questions asked, and NOTHING has EVER been too much trouble. You’ve rescued me from bad relationships, you’ve driven my belongings backwards and forwards between God knows how many places, you’ve been there for me at the other end of the phone and you’ve even driven 40 minutes just to bring me cigarettes. There are also a million other things you have done for me.

Your happiness is my happiness and your sadness is my sadness. The tough times we’ve shared have carved a strength in us both and created an unbreakable bond. But, you are so much more than just a shoulder to cry on. You are one of the most beautiful human beings to walk this earth.

You know what is important and what isn’t important. You always give people the benefit of the doubt, and no matter who may have burnt you in the past, you are always non judgemental and see the good in others. I know amongst so many other things, that this is why Danny loved you the way that he did, and left his family and friends in the US, to come and live in a country he didn’t know, just to be with you.

I will never understand why someone as beautiful as you has had to endure such torture. When I think of you losing your dad and your husband all in the same year, it makes my knees want to buckle and fall to the floor. You are the most corageous woman I know. Every day, you get up and do what you need to do, because you know this is what he would have wanted you to do. That my friend is love. A love so rare and so pure, that anyone would be lucky to experience five minutes of it.

Not only did Danny love you, but he loved Calvin too. They say that you can’t fool children, and the impact Danny had on Calvin in such a short space of time is going to contribute along with the wonderful mother that you are, to Calvin growing up to be one fine young man.

You are my constant and I will love you forever.

GFA xxx