Stu Gregor

I was going to start with something along the lines that this is hard to write but the sheer ineptitude of writing that would be breathtaking, this is not hard, its letters on a keyboard – what you guys are going through is hard.

I’ve long fancied myself as a writer, it comes easy, wine columns in seven minutes was my speciality – I distinctly remember Gav coming over to my place five or six years ago when I was putting together one of my last wine guides and seeing his eyes light up at the 150 odd bottles of wine opened and ready for his consumption. Like a kid in a candy store – and I swear to god he took 50 bottles back with him in the car – right now I’m hoping he didn’t drive but I’m sure he did.

I’m not Gav’s oldest mate or his best mate, circumstances dictate that those relationships are formed much earlier than when we met but I am a good mate and like everyone else at the moment feeling confusion, despair and anger in equal measure. It’s just shit what you, Maz, Gus and the family have been forced to endure, its just so bloody hard to see what good will come from this. RUOK is I suppose a beacon of hope, an initiative so important, so so valuable and it just seems so bloody incongruous that this was created at the edge of this horrible medical precipice. But long may it survive and prosper. What a wonderful legacy.

If RUOK has any single message it’s for blokes like us to share our feelings, to be prepared to be vulnerable and to really give a shit about our mates. It’s hard . . but it’s really not that hard.

So I guess Gav might teach us to be better blokes, he is a good enough bloke himself but to leave a society more aware and more caring is a legacy to which we could all aspire but most will not reach. Like many of us blokes I will miss Gav at lunch, Gav on the golf course, Gav offering forthright, no-nonsense opinions on EVERYTHING, Gav watching the footy, Gav on the drink. I don’t know much about Gav the father or Gav the husband but their hearts must be breaking. The Gregor family sends all its love and affection.

Stu, Sal, Aud and George.