Over the Last: Watching the Cheltenham Festival with my Father for the Last Time

Shortly before his death, Pat was inspired to write an essay.

It is a remarkable piece for its emotion and honesty. It is so beautiful, I felt compelled to share it.

In the end, it seems my beloved husband was a closet memoirist after all, and here he shares his feelings on grief, horses, family, mortality, cancer and even a commentary on his much discussed Irish stoicism.

He shared the piece with his sister, Barbara, who hopes to turn it into a play. He would love that.

My father Paddy and I were diagnosed with cancer the same week in December 2011, three thousand miles apart, me in Philadelphia USA, and he in Drogheda, Ireland. He received the news about the free radicals in his pancreas and I was told that I had multiple myeloma. I remember my mother calling me up in tears as I lay prone in a Pennsylvania Hospital cancer ward waiting for my first infusion. I decided at the time that I would never tell either of my parents about my illness as they had enough to deal with, and, as my mother keened, I offered up whatever semblance of soothing reassurance that I could muster, which was not much in the circumstances.

In our own ways we both probably knew that we were sick. My father had been losing weight for a while and even though his GP had assured him in August that “it was definitely not cancer” by November the script had been rewritten. I had also ignored some ominous warning signs, putting my chronic fatigue-I used to have to take a twenty-minute nap at the service station on my way home from work-down to overwork, and my own weight loss down to my “new regimen.” The week after diagnosis I was hospitalized to stabilize my freefall and start my treatment and those seven days were among the most difficult of my life. The myeloma had eaten away at my spine resulting in a half a dozen compression fractures and, along with the calcium sludge in my blood caused by the attacks on my bones, I was in an agony I have not experienced before or since. Late one night as I tried to weather another in what seemed like an endless litany of wrenching spasms that left me breathless and unable to even scream in pain, I opened up to Michelle, my nurse for the evening, about my father’s diagnosis. As I spoke about him and how close we were out of nowhere I was suddenly howling great gobs of sorrow, seemingly unable to stop myself. When I was finally spent I felt acutely embarrassed by such an untoward and uncharacteristic outward display of raw emotion and I apologized profusely to Michelle. She assured me that it was quite all right, and I confess that I did feel momentarily the better for having vented in such a spectacular fashion. The upshot of my 3AM crying fit was no doubt a nice red biro line in my file about my “fragile state of mind” and for weeks afterwards as I sat in the out patient infusion suite and had my weekly dose of titrated poison I was visited by a well meaning but ultimately clueless social worker who had made it her mission in life to get me to talk about “my feelings.” I hadn’t the heart to tell her that it was too late, I had already shuttered that part of me off to the rest of the world, and I would deal with my issues in my own way as I had almost always done, without any outside help. I am Irish and repression for us is both unconscious and an art form.

After I was discharged in early December I remember a telephone conversation I had with my father. He asked me if I thought that he should “get a bit of chemo.” Being newly arrived on the shore of the cancer-industrial complex and very impressed at how efficient it all was, I encouraged him to go for it, sure what did he have to lose? I also telephoned his oncologist, a nice young man who assured me that even though the prognosis of pancreatic cancer was never good, a round or two of chemo would slow the disease down and, if done right, wouldn’t unduly disrupt my Dad’s quality of life. I was satisfied that this was a decent course of action. We wouldn’t surrender to the fates, and, all things being equal, Dad wouldn’t be miserable. Though I fantasized about telling him about my own battle with cancer I didn’t mention the fact that while he went in every Tuesday I was in on Thursday receiving a similar cocktail of cancer killers, nausea abaters and steroids. What I could share with my father was the currency we had always traded in from the time I could read and make sense of a racing page, and that was horses.

You see I grew up steeped in horse racing. How could I not? We lived over P.J. Corcoran’s bookies shop, in the town of Drogheda and my father would pause on the bottom of the stair on his lunch break and shush me as he listened through the wall to hear the early racing results. At the time he was a grocer, running the family shop next door to Corcoran’s, and he would reach into the breast pocket of his white shop coat and pull out his betting slip (we called them dockets back then) to check and see if any of the horses he backed had won. It was the early 1970s and he was about turn his back on bagging sugar and tea, and polishing apples to open his own turf accountant business, what became Betaway, which at its zenith had four offices. What was evident then and always was his deep and unabiding love for the sport of kings. No matter how many times individual horses let him down or how steep the losses were in the shop from a heavily favored horse-the tumultuous local gamble on the Mick Cunningham trained Irish Fashion in the Schweppes Gold Trophy comes to mind-his ardor never dimmed, not for one second.

As we both struggled to come to grips with the new reality of our weekly treatments, we retreated into the practice that comforted us as even as it confounded in equal measure-that of picking winners, and, most importantly, identifying what horses would be Cheltenham horses. I spoke with Paddy every two days or so and always on a Friday and Sunday night. Friday was for going over the cards for the weekend and Sunday was for the weekend post-mortem. My father was also suffering from the onset of dementia. It hadn’t reached a crisis point but the times when he would forget what he had done just the day before were increasing. Remarkably, the dementia did not seem as if it wholly translated to racing, and as we chatted about this trainer, or that jockey, whether this one particular horse would be suited to the Neptune Investments over two miles and five furlongs instead of the Supreme Novices over two miles and half a furlong, he was often crystal clear in his recollection of the form and his thoughts on what that meant for the Festival. The Sunday conversations were invariably long, meandering and, if I’m being truthful, not a terrific way of predicting winners. But they were life sustaining for both of us. For those few hours, there was nothing but horses, jockeys, tracks, trainers, and the unremitting hope of the winners to come.

If Paddy had one trait that stood out among the many good ones he possessed it would be his unwavering optimism. The glass was never merely half full for him, it was brimming and spilling out over its edges. This was perhaps best illustrated as he fulfilled his boyhood dream of horse ownership, which he was fortunate enough to do from the late 1970s through the early 2000s. He was a small independent racehorse owner and I don’t believe he ever bought a horse that had hit a median price at the sales. In that regard, he was lucky enough to have most of his horses win at least one race, and to have the great fortune to have one, Dromod Hill, win feature handicaps at Leopardstown and the Galway Festival in 1987. That the same horse broke down in the Galway Hurdle with the race at his mercy two days after his triumph in the McDonough Handicap is proof positive of the cruel and often short journey between the highs and lows in racing. After Dromod, Paddy’s horses never quite scaled those heights and though some races were won, many more were lost. But through it all Paddy believed that the next time the horse ran it would work out. The horse needed a new distance, better ground, softer ground, a right-handed track, a stiff left-handed track, blinkers, a cross bridle, or a sheepskin noseband. A typical conversation between us would be where I would say I saw the replay of the race tonight. He replied: “yeah the horse ran super well for a mile.” “But Paddy”, I would point out, “the race was over two miles.” His response always was to give me ten reasons why the next time the horse ran it would be different and she/he must surely win. I rarely debated the points with him, content to let his optimism hold sway.

In January 2012, I concocted a quite possibly painkiller influenced plan that I would travel home in March to watch the Cheltenham Festival with my Dad. I had done this on a few occasions before-there’s nothing to beat being among other racing fans when the Festival is on and hiding out in my Philadelphia basement with a laptop doesn’t quite do it for me. In the years when spring break (I’m a college professor) does not fall on the same week as Cheltenham I make sure that I have a sub for my Wednesday classes and after Monday I’m off to commune with my Racing Post, trusty notebook, and laptop. But in January 2012 I was still in a great deal of pain and I was regularly taking opioids, which may explain my momentary loss of reason. My wife was against my traveling especially as I had only just begun to walk without excruciating agony, but she recognized the need for me to undertake this trip. Now all I had to do was convince my doctor that I should take a week off treatment to go watch horse racing with my father in another country. With a fair degree of trepidation, I broached the subject with Lee Hartner, who has been my rock in the oncological storm since the day he first diagnosed me. Maybe because of, or in spite of, the red biro note about my crying fit, Lee never hesitated in giving me the go ahead. “I think it will be good for both of you,” he simply said. Now all I had to do was find a few winners and the job would be Oxo.

The prep races rolled past and the weeks counted down and soon it was time to travel home. Being physically compromised and needing to stand frequently so as to not cease up are very much verboten in the post 9-11 world and so my flight home overnight on the Sunday was fraught and uncomfortable but I arrived in more or less one piece. I had told my parents the week before that I was coming back and our reunion was warm and wonderful. I bought the Monday Racing Post at the airport and together my Dad and I pored over it, forensically searching for clues to the puzzles to come in the next four days.

Tuesday morning was chemo treatment for Paddy, a swift dose of Gemzane, and I went with him to the infusion at the local cancer center. I was struck by the similarities in rhythm and style to my own experiences. Cancer and its treatment is truly a global phenomenon. Paddy didn’t much like getting infused-in a few months he would decide that he had had enough-and this normally polite and patient man was distracted and ready to bolt out of there as we waited for his blood tests to come through prior to treatment. To distract him I had brought the Racing Post and a slew of dockets for us to pick out our day’s selections. Tuesday is always the day of maximum hope and like many other punters I often succumb to the temptation to back too many horses on the first day of the Festival. But there’s nothing like hope, and this year it would be no different (my father’s optimism might be osmotic after all). My plan was that on Tuesday  we would set ourselves up with a fat bank with which we would punt the rest of the week with the bookies money. With Paddy’s chemo infused-they were actually super-efficient and terribly nice-we headed back to my parents’ house to take up our stations to soak in the pre-race coverage. We rang in our multiple bets to Powers-Paddy had an account with David ever since he began to stand decades ago under his grandfather Richard’s banner-and we settled down to find a few singles to go with the hopelessly optimistic Lucky 15s and 31s that we had placed.

And then it was time. The prep races, preview nights, and pundits had faded into the background and now it was the horses turn to take centre stage. Just after 1.30PM the primal roar goes up around Prestbury Park along with the tapes and the runners in the Supreme Novices take off. That moment never fails to give me chills, it is the distillation of expectation and excitement that requires no further intoxicant to feel its lightheaded warmth. In an eventful race Cinders and Ashes bounded up the hill to win by a length and some change from Darlan and Trifolium. Our (un)lucky 15s and 31s took a body blow as our selection, Steps to Freedom, trailed in a disappointing fourteenth. Still we watched in awe as Sprinter Sacre solidified what would become an exhilarating and brilliant chasing career by bolting up in the Arkle, and though our hearts and money were with Hurricane Fly in the Champion Hurdle you could not help but be impressed at the manner of Rock on Ruby’s victory. Quevega accomplished her perennial victory in the Mare’s Hurdle with a minimum of fuss by four easy lengths, her fourth of what would be six wins in the race that she made her own. The first day’s sport was winding down and Paddy’s energy was fading as the effects of the morning’s chemo asserted themselves. Briefly we were almost back level for the day when our each-way get out of jail bet in the last race, Red Star Line, ran well but was ultimately a well beaten second at 14/1. As we scanned our selections picking whatever crumbs of comfort and counting the cost of our day’s punting we immediately started looking to the next day’s card. Sure, we didn’t have that bank that I had planned, not yet anyway, but there is always tomorrow and we did have some mighty craic soaking in the superlative racing and the tapestry of stories behind each winner.

 Wednesday of Cheltenham 2012 became a Nicky Henderson benefit day as he trained four winners, including Finian’s Rainbow in the Champion Chase which we punted. I briefly got ahead for the week when I had a few quid each way on Son of Flicka in the Coral Cup. The bumper, which has always been the Irish punter’s get out race (hence it ends the card usually), wasn’t kind to us as we ended up plumping for the wrong Willie Mullins horse Pique Sous-the winner Champagne Fever started his own little Cheltenham love affair with his victory that day. All things being equal we just about got our money back on Wednesday but we were enjoying it so much that I don’t think we really cared. By the end of racing each day Paddy was ready to take a nap and I sat with my mother drinking tea as she shared her fears about Paddy’s cancer. One of the remarkable things about the last months of my father’s life was that he and my mother spent every waking moment together and behaved as if they were newlyweds enjoying each other’s company and giddily sharing stories from their five decades together. I know they both derived huge comfort from that time.

Thursday signaled the move from Old Course to New Course at Cheltenham and as Paddy and I attempted to source some winners we tried to factor in the different strands of Cheltenham form, whether a performance on the Old Course could translate to the New Course, as well as factoring in the ground, distance and especially for handicaps, weights. This time the lucky 15s and 31s had three winners, Sir Des Champs in the Jewson, Riverside Theatre in the Ryanair and Big Bucks in the World Hurdle. There was not much joy to be had in the handicaps but all in all we eked out a little profit on the day. Paddy admired Nicky Henderson as a trainer and I think as a bon vivant.  I think he felt that Nicky would be great to talk horses with over a bottle or two of wine, and so he was delighted at the stellar week that Henderson was having even if we had not backed most of his winners.

But I could see that Paddy was struggling. As much fun as we were having talking nothing but horses, he was visibly exhausted by the end of each day’s racing and he was forgetting things. His birthday fell on March 20th and my mother’s was on March 25th, so my sisters and I took them both out for dinner that Thursday night. We had a terrific time but the next morning all recollection of the night out had been wiped from Paddy’s memory banks, and he only vaguely recalled it when we showed him pictures of he and my mother blowing out candles. All week he had insisted to me that he was going to be 72 and when I asked him when he was born, he would shoot back quickly, “1935.” I would remind him that the year we were in was 2012, and he would stop, ponder a beat and say “Jesus, I’m going to be seventy-seven! [pause] You know I was always good at Maths.”

Gold Cup day was upon us and I made it my mission that we would end the week well. All throughout Sunday conversations we had talked about Hisaabaat, Dermot Weld’s Triumph Hurdle hope. Hisaabaat had taken his time to win a hurdle race, running well in graded company while failing to win a maiden on a few occasions. He put that right spectacularly in the Grade 1 Spring Juvenile Hurdle at Leopardstown and we both felt he was a decent Cheltenham prospect, especially, as Paddy pointed out, “Dermot Weld doesn’t take them over to make up the numbers.” We backed Hisaabaat on the day at 25/1 and 20/1 and it very nearly came off. Only the diminutive Countrywide Flame, who he had beaten at Leopardstown proved too good for him as he filled the runner up spot. Again we were hitting the woodwork and I felt that it was time to surrender to the professional tipsters. Paddy would have one good winner, and, as Pricewise made a compelling case for Synchronised in the Gold Cup, I placed a good bet on for Paddy at 8/1. My own nap for the week was Boston Bob in the Albert Bartlett, and while I came up short and indeed backed Long Run in the feature I cheered lustily as AP McCoy booted Synchronised home in the Gold Cup. “Did I win?” he asked me. “Indeed you did old son,” I replied. After the post-race reaction Paddy dozed off in the armchair and missed Salsify winning the Foxhunters and Attaglance win the Martin Pipe. He did wake up for the Johnny Henderson Grand Annual though by now we had pulled up sticks for the week. Synchronised had brought him into profit and he had the satisfaction of backing the Gold Cup winner, though he kept forgetting he had backed it whenever anyone asked him if he had any luck for the week. While I lost money over the four days I gained an immeasurable treasure trove of memories of that time we spent together that I draw upon regularly like a thirsty man does a well.

You see this was the last time I saw my father conscious. My health battles combined with the diagnosis my youngest daughter received that June of metachromatic leukodystrophy (MLD) an incurable and degenerative neurologic disease meant that traveling back home was out of the question. We still spoke several times a week and always about horses. Paddy suffered a stroke on September 22nd and never regained consciousness. I was home in time to see him before he died on September 25th, and in my diminished state I am proud to say I hefted his coffin with my uncles and cousins as we buried him three days later. We had nothing left unsaid between us-he knew I loved him even more than racing itself and I know it was mutual.

******

Two years ago, Dr. Hartner summoned me to his office on the Monday of Cheltenham week. Oncologists do not ask to see you to tell you how well you’re doing and sure enough the myeloma that had been pretty much kept in its box by stem cell transplant and maintenance chemo had reappeared like gangbusters and I was to go into active treatment for the foreseeable future. Frankly I think I was more annoyed that he scheduled a scan for me on the Thursday morning, which would ruin that days’ live viewing of the Festival. This time around has been a slog, at each turn the myeloma stabilizes and then spikes. It’s getting clever you see, figuring out ways around the drugs to strip my bones of their calcium. I am about to enter a third new phase of treatment, the other two having had early success but ultimately losing out and at the moment my prognosis is unclear. But in the time I have had, which has been mercifully long, I have managed to accomplish some things in my father’s honour.

Last year my cousin Ambrose, my daughter Camille and I went to Cheltenham for the Thursday meeting of the Festival. This was my first time at Prestbury Park, which Paddy, it is sad to say, never had the opportunity to visit. From the moment I walked in to the course it was like a magical dream, and the whole day there was one of the greatest of my life. I was stationed at the rails when Bryony Frost stood up in her irons to greet the crowd after riding Frodon to victory in the Ryanair, and I cheered Paisley Park and said what I thought was goodbye to Faugheen who went out on his shield in the World Hurdle (what did I know?). We brought my father’s flat cap that he wore when going racing and took pics of the cap in various places around the track, the winning post, the parade ring, the winner’s enclosure. Before we left for our plane back to Dublin I hung the cap on a bench dedicated “In Loving memory to Chris “Porky” Masters also known as ‘Lord Porkington’ who enjoyed and contributed to the spirit of Cheltenham Racecourse.” Though my father never got to Cheltenham a little part of him was left there, well at least until the cleaners came.

This year I hope to watch one more time and I have been assiduously scouring the trials and scribbling my notes. I eagerly anticipate those chills before the tapes go up at 1.30PM on Tuesday. Each year I think of Paddy at that moment and that wondrous time we spent together in 2012. I might be going over the last or I may yet have a circuit to go. Either way I will fight what Alastair Down has referred to in his beautifully written appreciation of Henry Cecil as the “long defeat.” Who knew there was so much to enjoy in such an endeavor? Just because you know the result doesn’t mean that the journey can’t be joyous.