Over the years I’ve written these for so many other people that it was inevitable that one day I’d have to write it for myself. It is with great sadness that I report the death of my sister June Tennant, who died from a massive brain haemorrhage, in Auckland, in February 2003. She was 68 (17 years older than me, as she was my half sister by Mum’s first marriage. Both of us were the only children from those respective marriages).

June was a child of the Depression. The marriage broke up when she was only a kid. There was no Domestic Purposes Benefit in those days, so Mum cleaned offices at night and was manpowered onto the Wellington trams as a clippie, during WW2. June was married at 19 (I was the two year old pageboy, with the lucky horseshoe, at the wedding) and had four kids within short order. Her husband, Cliff, spent 40+ years on the Railways, working his way up the Main Trunk Line. They lived in Railways houses in places like Taihape and Hamilton’s Frankton Junction (as it was called then), right next to the tracks or shunting yards, with June having to master the art of cooking on a coal range. Throughout my childhood and youth we spent our holidays with them (great fun getting taken for rides on jiggers and going to the Railways Christmas parties for kids). Because my nephews and nieces are only a few years younger than me, we grew up together as playmates (but they still call me "Uncle").

June and Cliff didn’t get their own home until they permanently settled in Auckland. They were married for a few months short of 50 years. She lived for her four kids – Colin, Laraine, Brian and Pam - and six grandkids. She was extremely houseproud and had a range of interests, such as china painting and flowers (she and Cliff worked as volunteers at the Auckland Botanic Gardens). Plus she worked in a wide variety of jobs and was fiercely independent (she was very proud when she got her driver’s licence at 46 – something her 52 year-old brother is yet to do).

Throughout my adult life I always stayed with them whenever I was in Auckland (they lived in Weymouth), whether I was there on holiday or on CAFCA business. Politically, we were broadly in agreement, although we didn’t have much in common in terms of lifestyle (I was always her "hard case stirrer of a younger brother from Christchurch", she was very much a New Zealand woman of her generation). But we always enjoyed each other’s company, we never had a single row or cross word, and had a bloody good laugh together. She lived an "ordinary" life but one which she invested with the warmth and love of her own extraordinary personality (which was evidenced by the range of people at her funeral).