When I moved from Wollongong to Sydney in 2004, the only person I knew was a childhood friend who had relocated to the big smoke. Naturally, his social group quickly became mine. Hailey, one of the girls in this group of friends, caught my attention.
One day I plucked up the courage to ask Hailey’s flatmate whether she thought I could be in with a shot. Her advice was less than encouraging: “I’m just not sure you’re her type.”
Perhaps it was hubris, naivety or both, but I decided that since none of Hailey’s previous boyfriends had lasted, being different was a vote in my favour.
Hailey and I had discussed how we’d never experienced the weekend evening fireworks at Darling Harbour. So one balmy afternoon we decided to jump on a Parramatta River ferry and head into the city to watch the spectacle. It was the first time we were out on our own. I’d worried the conversation wouldn’t be as effortless as when we were in a group setting, but I didn’t need to. We clicked better than ever. As our ferry rounded the Balmain headland, I remember the both of us doubled over in laughter as she recounted a colleague’s bizarre behaviour that week.
In the following months, Hailey and I spent a lot more time together and it was pretty clear there was something special between us. I even suggested we drop by my parents’ house for dinner in Wollongong. They were keen to meet this girl I had been talking so much about.
Meeting the parents is always a big step. But I was excited when, on a Monday morning in early October, I rang Dad to confirm what time we should arrive that evening, and what we could bring.
Then the day took a turn none of us could have imagined. Just an hour after we hung up the phone, my healthy 51-year-old father had a massive heart attack. The ambulance didn’t have any hope of arriving in time.
My family and I were rocked to our core. The next few days were a fog of shock, grief and funeral preparations, plus seemingly endless deliveries of flowers from friends, and casseroles from neighbours. My family banded together and did whatever it took to put one foot in front of the other.
Hailey and I messaged back and forth a few times but I hardly had capacity to think of, much less talk to, the girl I had been so excited about introducing to my parents just days earlier.
Dad’s funeral is largely a blur. As I struggled through a simple eulogy, I remember looking out at the packed church auditorium and being amazed at the number of people who had turned up. There were hundreds of students from the school where my dad taught, along with family friends, colleagues and distant relatives who’d travelled great distances to be there.
But from my place at the pulpit, only one face stood out. There, sitting with friends who had made the two-hour drive down from Sydney, was Hailey.
It is no small thing to meet your future mother-in-law at the wake for a father-in-law you missed the chance to meet by only a few hours. Yet Hailey took it all in her stride. After I introduced them to each other, I watched my mum grasp Hailey’s hand, the both of them in tears.
Hailey had captivated me with her infectious laugh months earlier on a ferry ride, but she won my heart that sombre afternoon in my family’s living room.
Almost 20 years on, Hailey and I have been on more ferry rides than I can count. We’ve navigated our fair share of choppy seas and uncharted waters, but the one thing we’ve tried to do through it all is keep laughing. And it’s this sense for fun, matched with her tender heart and deep empathy for others, that captures me still.
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Michael McQueen is an author, conference speaker and change strategist. His latest book, Mindstuck, is available now
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