What is it about Friday 13th?
A chapter from my new book!
Friday 13 December 2019 - Balsall Common, Coventry, England
My dad had always been suspicious about Friday 13th. Then on Friday 13th December 2019, he passed away.
In the lounge room at ‘631’, the property in which he lived with my mum for over 50 years and after which my business is named, my dad’s ‘chosen chair’ sat opposite an old style, stand-alone ‘box tv.’
On top of the tv, Dad had a series of blocks. One set of blocks had numbers representing each date of the month, the other had days of the week. Each day, one of dad’s morning rituals was to get up from his chosen chair, go over to the tv and turn the blocks to the next day. 01 would become 02 and Tuesday would become Wednesday and so on through the month.
Whenever it came to ‘Fri 13’, dad would turn the blocks face down so you couldn’t see the day or the date. By this stage in his life, Dad spent a fair amount of time in his chosen chair reading a newspaper or a military history book or watching the tv. He told me he didn’t want to see ‘Fri 13’ starring back at him when he looked up from his reading or as he watched his favourite shows.
Dad dying on Friday 13th December 2019 is difficult to comprehend, given his feelings about that date.
I had visited Dad for the last time in early December but had returned home a few days before he passed. Early on the 10th December, just before I left, I sent my ‘children’ a What’s App message saying:
‘Grandad is very thin and his breathe is very shallow. He is also so pale. He can only have a little time. Just wanted to let you all know. Make the most of everyday.’
Make the most of everyday.
I replay that line to myself over and over again. It adds fuel to my desire to make the most of my opportunities, to continue to learn, develop and grow, to make an ever bigger difference to others and to pass The Rocking Chair Test.
Why play small when we only have this one shot at life? Why play someone else’s music? Why not work out your purpose, passions and ‘dream life’? Look to build a life and career around the things you love and enjoy, that provide a true sense of fulfilment. Look to create a vision for your dream life, translate that vision into goals and then action steps. You may not achieve all your dreams but you will live with energy, purpose and intention.
Once I had sent the message about my dad it was time to go.
Normally I enjoy travelling and love to fly across the world even on my own. I get lost in my own bubble - reading, journalling, listening to music and thinking ( which I call extended Mozart time). I love this space and quiet time.
This flight I was consumed by something different: My final conversation with my dad.
The final chapter of The Rocking Chair Test details this conversation. I have added the final parts of the chapter here, for those who are yet to read my first book:
What was he trying to say?
After walking along the beach and talking with Nick, I realised it was not about cricket. Dad was imploring me to use what I had to the best of my ability. It was about finishing what I started. It was about my POTENTIAL.
I have not lived up to my potential in sport, business, or life, and he knew this. He was encouraging me in a language we both understood to do better and go for it. I rethink that conversation frequently and replay his words as follows:
‘Find the extra 13 runs to finish the job (score a century). Be the best version of you. Be amazing. Use your talents to the maximum and strive to reach your true potential. Live life to the full. Share your GiFTs so others can benefit too.’
I am sure that conversation was ringing in my ears as I wrote: Make the most of everyday!
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Dad was right.
Too often in my life I have been in ‘cruise control.’ I did well at school, the same at University, and had some success playing sport. In terms of my corporate career in both the UK and Australia, I had operated at a senior level, leading significant teams and achieving great results. I had been in the top 1% of employees when you look at a typical organisational hierarchy. However I could have done better in all aspects of life and business, when I measure myself against what I see as my own potential.
Dad died on Friday 13th, and as you will see GiFT631, the business I had worked so hard to build, crashed on the very next Friday 13th - Friday 13th March 2020.
Our last conversation centred on me falling 13 runs short of something dad believed I was more than capable of achieving. The significance of the number 13 and particularly Friday the 13th was not lost to me.
100 - 13 = 87. In cricket, particularly in Australia, 87 is called ‘the devil’s number’. Given it is at the heart of so many conversations between me and my dad, it seems an appropriate name. It started in Australia during Christmas 1929, when a child called Keith Miller who went on to become an Australian cricketing legend, went to see the most brilliant cricket player of all-time play. The young boy’s hero was Donald ‘The Don’ Bradman. During the game in question, played in Melbourne between Victoria and New South Wales, The Don was batting and playing amazingly well. Suddenly and surprisingly, he was out for 87, or 13 less than a 100. Over the years the number 87 gathered pace as a cricketing superstition. *
Remarkably after Friday 13th December 2019 and Friday 13th March 2020, Friday 13th would prove to be a significant date one more time in 2020: Friday 13th November, the next and last one of the year.
It was on that date, at the Gold Coast Casino that I first stood on my feet to speak at a conference. Unlike much of the world events we back up and running by that time, all be it with many restrictions. I was asked to speak at a hastily arranged conference and life had gone a full circle in just 3 ‘Friday the 13ths!’
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As I flew back to Australia, after leaving my dad for the last time, all I knew was grief and a deep sense that I had disappointed him and not lived up to my own potential. Christmas Day enabled an explosion of grief - a release I needed to put many things behind me and set up what I thought would be a game-changing year.
It certainly turned out to be a game-changing year - just not in the way, I hoped and expected. Like millions of small business owners across the world I was confronted with a global pandemic that would threaten my business and way of life. Years earlier when I had left a senior position and all the benefits of working for a major bank to become self-employed. Part of my vision was to become the CEO of my own life, where I could decide where, when and how I worked. I wanted time and financial freedom and the ability to make choices and decisions on my terms. I wanted to play my own music.
Within 3 months of the start of the year all that was being threatened.
* For cricket lovers: Keith Miller later explained that The Don was out for 89 and not 87 that day. The scoreboard at the Melbourne Cricket Ground where the game was played used to be a bit slow and the numbers went up a bit late. Hence when Keith looked to see The Don’s score when he was out it was still showing 87 and not 89. It was only many years later when he checked with the official scorer that it was: Bradman bowled Alexander 89!