I had a different image for my PaD today but to be honest when I saw John Waine’s posting about Máire, I have temporarily lost my interest in lovely stories. I know that Máire was a great educator so I picked a shot of some phonics graphemes, that I’d really only intended as an aide memoire so that I could find a tenuous link to say how desperately sorry I was to hear of her passing. I am fully aware that her expertise was in tertiary education but I’m sure she would agree that education starts in primary school, with learning to read.

From the comments on John’s posting, the other pbasers who knew (either in person or in cyberspace) Máire, remember someone whose kindness shone through and whose humour we loved. Yep – ditto to that. She “looked after” me through my degree with words of kindness and encouragement. She didn’t think for one moment that I’d not succeed. Given that we never met, she showed an absolute trust in my abilities that were way beyond my own belief in myself and in part, it was her encouragement that kept me on the straight and narrow.

One evening, a few months ago, I was “chatting” with Máire via pmail and, as it was late in the evening on a Friday night, I may have had a few glasses of the red stuff (OK, I HAD). It had been a lovely conversation and as I am the world’s most “loved up” drunk, I finished the conversation with a pmail that read “I don’t know if you know this but everyone on pbase loves you”. At the time, I regretted being such a gushing fool and wished that I'd been less forthright. In hindsight I am glad because it's my experience that we rarely think of telling those we love that we love them until it's too late. It wasn’t quite the last conversation we had, but looking back on my pmails, we chatted only a few short weeks ago and she gave no hint that her illness was back.

Máire could tell a good story…she once told me that. I’ll try really hard to find a good story for tomorrow in her honour. In the meantime, and forever, Máire, my friend, rest in peace.