Lovely to see this bumped and thanks lads. The funeral went well after battling with the priest who was very unsympathetic to any of our requests and despised what John stood for, to the point of not allowing us any of our attempts to remember the real man. So my wife was forced to resort to guerrilla tactics. At the grave side after the blessing, she brought out some balloons and a cd player and made a speech and then let off the balloons off while she played YNWA. My wife's a blue and all his old mates both red or blue and the family approved, while the priest looked on with an expression that wasn't very Christian. There wasn't a dry eye as everyone knew that John would have loved my wife's actions and would have had a little smile to himself.
I got talking to some of the lads who went home and away with John. When I say 'lads', they're all old men now and they told me John and Shanks were closer than what I realised. That Shanks would talk to all of the regulars but the great man used to seek him out at the aways and was always talking to him. John was an ordinary fan and the fact that they could share their love of Liverpool and politics with a small 'p' says a lot about both of them and the their times. We miss John and I'd loved to have talked to him this week, he'd have been excited we were top of the league but would be preaching caution, he'd have been reading all the tributes to Shankly but you'd never know he knew Shanks because that was John, modest, decent and thinking of others he'd have been asking me about the match and what Rodgers is building and I'd be trying to talk about Shankly. John loved people and loved life, always saw the good and was positive, he loved sport and you'd find him listening to the Rugby Leauge on his wireless if there was no football on. I miss him and it's sad his generation are growing old but he always had faith in the young, they're not bad it's the world that mess's them up!
