I paid £3.59 to discover something about my Dad and it was absolutely worth it.

It all started a couple of months ago when I asked him, “Can you think of an incident that made quite an impact in your life?” He instantly recalled a few and seemed to have quite a good supply of anecdotes, so I gave him the idea of compiling them and e-mail it to me so that I can put them into a blog or a book.

Given the lifelong tremors in his hands and the recent diminished sensitivity in his fingers caused by chemotherapy sessions in the past, did not however dissuade his from following his old school regime of taking to pen and paper. I am very sure he reached out for his favourite ‘Hero’ fountain pen rather than his Montblanc, which he reserves for special occasions! He then transferred what he wrote into e-mail, which was first proof-read by my mother. As he is not well versed with typing, he ends up never looking up at the screen and remains focused on the keyboard, while my mother is hard at work, staring at the screen, through her reading glasses and correcting my Dad faster than Gmail could. Ma is his greatest support even though he doesn’t realise it sometimes!

Yesterday I was reading one sliver of his memory and something caught my eye. He casually mentioned co-authoring a journal paper! Even though during my PhD, there were umpteen conversations surrounding my attempts to write one, he had not once mentioned his own. Armed with just the name of his colleague and his, I searched online using various keywords and within minutes I found my Dad’s name on the World Wide Web and with a simple PayPal purchase I was finally able to read the paper that my Dad wrote.

I am proud that he had used his statistical prowess to look into the effect of Trimipramine in treating depression. I am proud that he has contributed something towards treating depression.