My friend Gerry Mcgowan

 Old Bank  of England Pub, photo by Naviquan

Met  my old  friend Gerry Mcgowan yesterday evening. Went to the Old Bank of England pub. I like it, and took Steph there when she came to London. The pub during the week is busy. The staff were very pleasant and sold me a nice pint of ESB and I sat waiting for Gerry.

Be there in  two minutes. said  the message, and he arrived ten minutes later.

Gerry  looked good. He was slim and wearing stylish glasses. But he spoke softly and the noise in the pub was loud. We spoke of Belfast and mothers and Lecce, where Gerry lives. When he first arrived there there were  no tourists, but it is now a tourist destination, its rocky shores populated periodically by these northern seagulls. Gerry has an olive grove, chickens and his wife is a town doctor. Lots of people know me, he says, but I don't always know them.

Speaking of Italy, It's not about Berlusconi, said Gerry, it's more complicated than that. You have to study the way things are configured. Gerry has never been an idealist.

Let's get out of here it's doing my head in, said  Gerry.

At that point I realised  that my jacket and mobile phone were missing. The were stolen off the back of the chair where I sat while we were talking.

Did you see anyone behind me Gerry? 

No. he said.

I liked that mobile phone. It has pictures of our holiday in Morocco, of my family, my walks.

I phoned Carmen and she must have been asleep and so I phoned Anne on Gerry's phone and she solved my problem immediately. She changed my passwords on Google and Facebook in a flash. Later on at home I had the number barred. But they still have some of my data and photos and the phone.

Gerry hadn't been to an Indian restaurant for a quarter of a century, so we allowed ourselves to be ushered into a restaurant near Charring Cross and it was pleasant. We talked of  our children and the stages of life they were going through and how to use music to teach English. His son played the piano wonderfully then moved to the guitar. My three all sing and play the guitar.

When I was in  my early twenties I used to visit Gerry in Vaudeville Court in Finsbury Park and he was my mentor. He taught me subtlety. I would come out with some statement and he would laugh and contradict me and I would have to think again. Gerry had been on the original Civil  Rights marches in Ireland. In the 80s he gave me a couple  of books on French political theory and told me to read Gramsci.

One of the kindest  people I know, he was wonderful father to his little son Clayton, when he was allowed to be. He gave Clayton space to be himself. It was awe inspiring to watch with what respect, love and seriousness he treated his son. Though he won custody when Clayton was ten, Clayton's  mother disappeared into the deepest darkest place in the American Midwest. Gerry hasn't seen Clayton for 19 years. If only  Clayton would get in touch with him now he has grown up.

It was very frustrating then, to only be able to spend an  evening with Gerry after so long and to have been distracted by the theft of my mobile phone.