Unexpectedly, I spent the first few days of January in England, in my hometown of Grimsby, which is in the north of the country on the east coast. I had received word early Sunday morning, December 27, that my father had died suddenly and unexpectedly-if you can say that the death of anybody aged 75 is unexpected. I had accompanied both my parents in early September of 1998 on a bus tour of central Europe. At that time my father had seemed healthy and alert. I expected him to live for a few more years. But it was not to be.