Caroline

I did not grow up with my father. We first met when I was eight then twice a year around my birthday and Christmas until he moved to Africa for three years. When my mother Mair died suddenly in 1968 I was relocated from Bloomsbury to Belgravia. Then boarding school and life eventually carried me to New York City first for studies and then once again completely by chance in 1983. And this is where I have lived ever since.

My father wrote:

“Noretta had an old friend in Maine with a penchant for young English au-pairs who had just appealed to her for a replacement. Off went our young lady to get acquainted with dreamland. Content as she had been to have arrived in the USA, it was a subsequent stay in New York that kindled a life-long love affair. On her last day she knocked on the door of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, demanded and was granted an audition and moved to New York shortly thereafter. This was later enriched by three seasons with the Quinzaine des Realisateurs at the Cannes Film Festival.

Connections she had made then opened a position on Steven Spielberg's explorations in Sri Lanka, where her next nine months were spent against a darkening political background which eventually defeated the project. Caroline's return was a weekend of celebration, the more so as she was evidently starting a new job in London the following week.

At that point we had a visit from Noretta's old friend Francis Heilbut, a New York pianist who passed through every summer for a concert tour mainly of Germany and Austria. As he had an aversion to flying, he was booked on the Queen Elizabeth 2 where he sailed in great style in return for two full-length concerts during the voyage. This time he was travelling alone, as the friend who was due to accompany him had had to cancel his trip. Jokingly, I whispered to Caroline, 'If you play your cards right, he might offer you a lift to New York in his Stateroom!'

And so it was that she came to New York for the second and fateful time. As she breezed out of the door in high excitement, she said, 'Flying back Sunday, ready to start my new job Monday.' Three weeks later came a postcard, 'Met my friend Gerry who runs the New York Design Group and has offered me a job.' One ecstatic young lady. Barely a week later, a young Romanian architect walked into the office enquiring for a job. Six months on and they discovered a common interest in European films, were soon engaged and planning their wedding in London in December. But in September Caroline rang to say, 'The bad news is we have cancelled plans for the wedding. The good news is that we are in Las Vegas and got married this morning!' And in May 1987 she blessed us all with grandson Paris Alexander Ionescu. His story continues further on.”

It may not have been exactly like that, but close enough.

Over the years between trips to New York for the biannual Keyboard Trust concerts at Steinway Hall, various celebrations in Thailand, Germany, Italy and the UK, a mutual trust and understanding developed. And for the past seven years or so with very few exceptions we have Skyped, Zoomed, WhatsApped, or otherwise spoken every Sunday afternoon over coffee in our respective homes where conversations have taken flight, questions asked, psyches probed, secrets revealed, and sins pardoned. Although perhaps not the most conventional of father daughter relationships, in retrospect ours became anchored by a tremendous love, respect and appreciation filled with joy and laughter. My father died peacefully with me by his bedside. He made sure I understood how much I was loved and called me his “marvellous girl”, and I guess that’s alright by me.