Happy Birthday Grand Heresiarch

X L F.
Son. Brother. Father. Friend. Grand Heresiarch.

I came across an old photo of Dad and Xav digging up the concrete driveway in Curacao Place. Gumboots, pickaxes, sweaty brows. The picture stirred clear memories of the aura that surrounded Greg throughout our upbringing- paint stained jeans, three-day-old singlets, the smell of cigar, half forgotten apples, barely nibbled biscuits in the fridge. These were all traces of the presence of Greg.
As Hannah commented today: "I often enjoy the smell of cigar more than its taste". This is a sentiment that I felt growing up. Cigars- a comforting smell. The nearby presence of the patriarch (& half biscuits bound to be found somewhere... of the deadly sins- Xav was sloth, I was greed).

At the tender age of 12 I remember hiding an old cigar butt and trying to light it later on. It tasted like poos. I also found a condom packet then, embarrassed by its phallic suggestiveness, tried to burn it. It doesn't work. It's a mess.

I can only imagine that Xav lived similar experiences, and yet, and yet, he was the one to pick up the cigar legacy. He was the one who pioneered Aotearoa Heretics into the unknown world of refined cigar puffing. He crossed boundaries of race and creed. He laughed at embargoes and the West's fear of communism. He reached out to the small tobacco farmers in Cuba, Nicaragua, Ethiopia.

He took a small seed, planted by our father in our hearts, and made it grow.

Xavier, we salute you.