Lives in Cricket No 1 - Allan Watkins

Elder daughter Judith travelled widely working for an American digital equipment firm but has now returned to her roots in Monmouthshire and lives just outside Abergavenny, while Jane, the youngest of the family, lives in Ipswich and works for a firm of solicitors. She and her husband, a lay preacher, are much involved with church work. Allan’s children have given him seven grandchildren and, to his great delight, he is now great- grandfather to two. Allan lost his beloved Molly in 2003. His loss is the greater for having depended on his wife in so many ways. “She was the one with the brains,” he claims. “She looked after me and she did everything for me.” Financial matters and filling in forms were always Molly’s preserve. “She would even have put out the right things for him to wear,” said one of his children, conscious that such matters as the choice of tie and whether he should be wearing a suit, can gnaw away at Allan as he mulls over accepting invitations to attend reunions, aware that such mundane, almost irrational, worries have always blighted his life. Judith remembers the problems she and Molly had in persuading Allan that he would enjoy an evening at the Savoy Hotel in London ‘Go Back to What You Love’ 103 Family gathering for the christening of grandchild Hannah. David is second left, Allen third from right, Judith next to Molly and Jane with baby Hannah.