Dinner tonight with Dad and T. I've drunken half a bottle of wine and making my way steadily through the remainder. I'm making so many typing mistakes that writing this is taking double the usual amount of time.

We went to a local restaurant called Linguinis. It was a lovely meal. Dad brought over a scooter (the trendy sort) for T as Alex (my sister) no longer used it, probably because she's nineteen and too big for it. T is over the moon. She scootered all the way to the restaurant. I gave Dad two crossword books, by request. He's horrific to try and buy for. At least I know he'll use them.

My mother moved house last week and found two things of Dad's, which I returned to him. The first was a picture book on Napoleon, written in French and printed in 1910. I didn't know, but he has always longed to know what happened to this book from his childhood and this was the best present I could've given to him. He talked about it all night. The other thing was an old set of dominoes that was his grandfather's. This too is very, very old and made of ivory. T and Dad played dominoes at the table whilst waiting for our meal. Dad was overjoyed to have these relics of his childhood returned to him. Seeing his pleasure, I said, "I've got the medal too." And the final thrill was when I returned to him the medal of his grandfather, the equivalent of a French knighthood for services to France. Inside the box, unbeknownst to me, was a little lock of fair hair in plastic - this was a lock of my father's hair from when he was a child.

It was a different father tonight. He actually talked to me, asked about how school was going as if he was really interested. He wanted to understand what the teacher's were striking about, like it mattered. For the first time, I have started believing it could be different. That the father I have wanted is actually there.

Little else matters at this moment.