Lilian Feary RIP

'The ticker, the curse of the Fitzpatricks.' It's a one-liner inserted by Irvine Welsh within the first 50 pages of Trainspotting. Did Irvine and Lilian whose maiden name was Fitzpatrick ever meet? It would not surprise me; they were the same age, both from Edinburgh housing schemes and both enjoyed a night out. Lilian was not a user of illegal drugs but in her younger days she went drinking and dancing and the two may well have met at a disco and 'had a blether.' (that's Scots for a chat).

Lilian is now dead. She was a year younger than me and never lived to see 60. Her brother Laurence Fitzpatrick, the father of my elder daughter survived cancer to die of a heart attack at the age of 54.

It's completely f**cking unfair, almost the entire family died before their time due to heart attacks. Lilian's mother died when she was 2, her father when she was 19, her elder sister Rena who at the age of 18 shouldered the responsibility of effectively becoming Laurence and Lilian's mum (there was a large age gap between Rena and her two youngest siblings) also died early as did another sister. 'The ticker the curse of the Fitzpatricks.'

Lilian was a big woman, warm and friendly with a good sense of humour. She was very much the 'head of the clan', always there for her three daughters, her six grandchildren and her two nieces Tammy and Maryanne who came to live with her after their father died. Her death will leave a hole in many people's lives.

I learned of her death a few hours ago on facebook and I can't sleep. I am in my sitting room reading 'A philosophy of Boredom' by Lars Svendson. It's a well written very thought provoking book. Svendson slices through our experience of boredom with the sharp blade of his mind and ''turns the water to wine', somehow making boredom interesting.

Lilian, who left school as soon as she could to work in a paper mill would have no idea what philosophy is and would not give a damn. I wish I had spent more time with her when she was alive.

Right now I am not bored, I am unhappy.