Coming back from another day spent at my mother's I remember this post, blogged backin April 2006,about my father's drcline and death. My parents were so different, and so similar. They were divorced when I was six.

The theft of the Grandfather Clock was, as it were, the last straw.

My father was coming up to his eighty-first birthday, living in the gathering mist of senilescence. That is, he could still, after a slight pause, remember who we all were; some of his mind was still working. But he had lost interest in philosophy politics - and his financial affairs, now I had taken over managing them. None of the family could believe that the principal passions of his life had just... gone.

Dad still had an interest in sex, though.

Ever since he became an invalid, he'd had women looking after him. At first we had employed a series of middle-aged housekeepers with some nursing experience, but he kicked up a terrible fuss, bad mouthing them at every opportunity. He hated being "mothered". And employing a man (we did try once. Dad's sulk was epic) was out of the question.

By now he needed help 24/7. So my sister and I had to recruit a harem, maximun age 23. Language studentsor refugees, from Eastern Europe. Many passed through over a period of more than 3 years. Most were hardworking and sweet to him. The house was certainly more cheerful with them there.

But the one who stayed longest was a strange, disturbed young woman, who, I suspected had suffered a nervous breakdown during the horrors of the Yugoslav civil war. She never left my father's side, at least when i was there. I wanted to talk to him gently, father to son. We had a lot off issues between us - not all "private" - but Tania's presence and conversational interventions made it impossible to talk intimately. She wasn't good at taking hints.

Much worse than that, though, was the way she encouraged my father's fantasies. He was losing it - but slowly. So when he asked "where am I?" I thought it was a good idea to tell him the truth: a house in West Kensington he had bought ten years ago. Tania had another approach. On my arrival he would tell me "Today were are flying to New York. In this room!" My father looked pleased at the thought, but confused. They would build up the fantasy together,the house spinning over the Atlantic, miles from reality and me.

I would have sacked her. But my sister thought Tania was wonderful - sis always puts herself out for the underdog - in this case, the underbitch.

At last Tania went back to Croatia. We had three girls then. One afternoon, we all had tea in the main downstairs room where my father lived and slept. I had my back to one wall, my father, flanked by the girls sat in a line opposite. Dad touched one of the girl's knees and then exposed himself (it was easy, wearing pyjamas, but I'm sure it wasn't an accident.

The girl on the other side of my father covered him up. The girl he'd touched looked embarassed but didn't complain even when I talked to her afterwards. Maybe it was a regular occurence, but I don't think so. I think my dad wanted to show me he was still a sexual contender.

Our relationship was fraught and as complicated as relaiohsips can get. I'll have to write a lot of posts as long as this one even to begin to sort it out.

The harem was falling apart - the worry, the logistics, the cash to pay them, clearing up after dad incontinence. and I was in a pretty bad state as well, though at least i had my own flat to retreat to.

Then, a few days into the New Year, someone smashed the front door and stole the Grandfather clock in the hallway, worth £10,000 and uninsured. He/she/they went into the main room and saw my father in bed (he saw them, too, too confused to be worried) They were probably planning to strip the ground floor of anyhting they could find.

Next morning the police came round, with the CID to follow. One of the girls did a bunk, probably because she had visa problems, but we couldn't be sure.

After this there was no real choice: my father had to go into a Residential Care Home. He lived there just two weeks, and then died - three days before my birthday, in 1996.