For those who may or may not have heard – our friend David Rodger-Sharp passed away recently.
He was quite a character in Henley, he owned a jewellery shop in his name and several other businesses. We didn’t know him for that. We knew him because he was a person who came to our recovery groups. Sometimes in person in the Recovery Café at D2 Centre in Henley and often online at our fortnightly Virtual Recovery Café.
We remember the first time he came along. A guy told a story about his own recovery and he used the metaphor of a person in a rowing boat, rowing away from a waterfall that was trying to take him over the edge. He’d row and he’d row and he’d get further away from the waterfall upstream and the waterfall would go out of sight and the guy who was rowing would put the oars down and relax a bit and slowly and inperceptibly the boat would head towards the waterfall and suddenly the guy would find himself rowing like mad again to get away from the waterfall and to stop him getting completely over the edge and down the other side. When he finished sharing that metaphor about his own recovery, David said:
…“that’s me, that’s my life, that’s my recovery journey. I keep getting to the edge of the waterfall and then I row like mad and then I get away from the waterfall and I think I’m safe and I relax a bit and then before I know it, I’m back in the chaos again and I’m having to row to get away from it.”
It was a fitting metaphor that David identified with and we think that made him come back and then we started to get to know him and he started to get to know others. He came and spoke at one of our Henley Café nights and he was such a great supporter of what we did.
He was one of us. Another person in recovery.
The people in recovery who come to the café are different strokes really, some look with it and together on the outside, some are struggling and its obvious that they are struggling. It’s people from all parts of society. People who use drugs and alcohol but who want to define themselves as people in recovery, not people who are addicted.
Our role is to make recovery visible and that recovery is possible and that people in recovery are and can be assets to their community. David was certainly an asset to the community in Henley and beyond.
So – we want to honour him.
We’ll be doing this at:
Celebration of Life
3rd November, Henley Town Hall, 4pm.
Tea and cake afterwards at D2.
If you would like an alternative to flowers, David’s husband John and friend Lorna has asked for people to feel free to donate to our central fund to support our ongoing initiatives and projects.
