How many faults can they find as they knock me down to build me up?

My 87-year-old dad lets me in through his electric garage door – it’s my new way in without touching door handles during the coronavirus pandemic – and he slowly appears as the door rolls up making a sound like a thunderstorm. Oh my god, his hair is getting so long, I wonder if soon he’ll look like an octogenarian Jesus?

Dropping provisions to my dad during this outbreak reminds me of the time when my parents used to leave food parcels for me at my front door and leg it back to the car when I was in the depths of my addiction. They had learned about “tough love” at an Al-Anon meeting for families of addicts and alcoholics and weren’t giving me any more cash.

Obviously, that situation couldn’t prevail and it wasn’t long before they had me in lockdown in Wiltshire, at a rehab for my own health and survival. We slept in a dorm and had to congregate at the crack of dawn for meditation before the place had even warmed up.