Thank you John

In Memory of John O’Brien

There were several key conversations behind the creation of Citizen Network, but one of the most important took place in a bar in Vancouver in 2015. We had just heard the news of the death of Judith Snow; we had already lost Marsha Forrest in 2000 and so Kate Fulton and I were thinking about the future of the Inclusion Movement. How could something so important, so inspirational and so joyful feel so fragile? For those of us inspired by John, Judith, Jack, Marsha, Beth and more—what was our role? What do we do next?

It was this question that put Kate and I on the path to create Citizen Network—although I don’t suggest we answered that question correctly. Our best efforts only seem to transmit the fragility forward. Perhaps fragility is an essential part of anything with real value: a flickering light we try to keep alight and hand over to others, even in blizzard conditions. One great comfort is that I can now see many others, using different methods, who are also doing this work. There are lights ablaze all around the world and in many different languages and contexts. We are not doing this work alone and even if we fail, others may succeed.

Today I’m sitting wondering what to say about the loss of John O’Brien. John meant the world to me. He was intellectually and spiritually the centre point of all my work. My loss does not compare with the loss his family must be feeling. But to me John was a friend, an ally, a mentor and a role model. I will never again get an email with something unexpectedly helpful to read; I will never get the chance to chew something over with him; I’ll never get the chance to listen to his gentle voice as he takes you deeper into a subject to reveal dimensions to our work I’d never imagined.

One thing I’d like to share is this poem by W H Auden, written at the request of Stravinsky, to commemorate the death of JFK:

When a just man dies,
 Lamentation and praise,
 Sorrow and joy, are one.

Why then, why there,
 Why thus, we cry, did he die?
 The heavens are silent.

What he was, he was:
 What he is fated to become
 Depends on us.

Remembering his death,
 How we choose to live
 Will decide its meaning.

We live in a time when everything seems so fragile; but we can choose to live in ways that honour him. Some things we just can’t control.

I’d also like to share some memories. But I was troubled by the problem of how best to do that. John and I both shared a religious faith, so it feels wrong to talk about John in the past tense. I was also struck at his Remembrance Service at how uncomfortable John was made by praise. Certainly I never told John what he meant to me or thanked him for the support he gave me. So I thought I would just thank John now, in the present tense. I am confident that John is in heaven, so there is no need to worry about false modesty. In fact, if Dante is right, John will be in the Seventh Heaven with St Benedict and St Dominic; although I think he will have formed a third interlocking circle, wheeling in a furious Hasidic Dance with Judith and Marsha and drawing in Simone Weil, Martin Buber and the Baal Shem Tov.

Thank you, John.

As a shallow young man, with a head full of political theories, you showed me a different set of values that made more sense to head and heart than anything I’d read in university. When I listened to the tape of your talk to Learning Disability Nurses in England, lent to me by Steven Rose, I started to find the language I needed to articulate what was in my heart. Inclusion, diversity and real human equality were never part of my education in political philosophy; but what you helped me see gave me a more hopeful vision of what it means to be human and what principles we need if we are to live together with justice.

As an inexperienced young man, desperate to do the right thing, I discovered the real examples that gave me the confidence to try out new ideas. On my first study tour to Wisconsin, with Nan Carle, I found the examples and ways of working that inspired all the work I did in London and Glasgow. Everywhere I went I found traces of your thinking. The people I met didn’t treat person-centred planning as a method to be done to people; they knew that it was a living and creative force, guided by listening and testing things out in practice. I discovered that Support Living was not a model to be commissioned; it was the ongoing work of helping each person build themselves a home where relationships come first. I discovered that work, in all its forms, was possible for all of us.

As an over-eager advocate, fighting to create system change, you taught me how to see things from new perspectives and how to live with the inevitable failures of success. At the TASH Conference in Atlanta I remember the friendly, but quizzical, twinkle in your eyes as I filled in my PATH and articulated, for the first time out loud, my plans for the next 15 years. And as I achieved much of what I had set out to achieve and saw the Imposter of Triumph turn into the Imposter of Disaster, you buoyed me up with support, understanding and no judgement.

As I tried to gather my energies for a more uncertain journey, working to bring the ideas of inclusion into the world of social policy, trying to build a community that connected the hyperlocal to the global, you joined in. One of the best days of my life was when you agreed to become a Fellow of the Centre for Welfare Reform and at each step of the way in developing Citizen Network you never poured cold water on my wild dreams—you just held out a helping hand.

So, thank you, John. You touched so many people—people who are better, braver and stronger than me, people who have faced far more challenges than me. I am so grateful for your support.

Simon Duffy