‘Tales From the Road’ is a photo essay by photographer Harry Rose created during a 6-week road trip across Scotland. Through this personal diary, he explores his feelings around losing his father to cancer and finally letting go of the pain he has been carrying around with him for so long.

Photography Harry Rose

In 2011 I lost my father to prostate cancer and since then, without fully realising, I let myself fall into a deep depression as I let the grief take a hold. His loss became an anchoring point for all the negative things I felt about myself and the world around me. I was in my first year at university when I lost my father, surrounded by unfamiliar faces in a place I was a stranger to. I found the entire experience to be one of uncertainty and instability. I was still figuring out who I was as an openly queer man navigating a world built for heterosexuals. When I graduated, I threw myself into jobs and experiences to help myself become a success, determined to make something of myself to help ease the pain of what I went through in my early 20s.

Seemingly, my feet never touched the floor. From one job to another, relationship to relationship, I looked for father figures in partners, friends and bosses who simply weren’t up to the task of being what I so desperately needed, a guide through life. A male figure that could understand the feelings I was feeling. I realised that this pursuit for answers on how to live life turned back to the past and I emulated the best characteristics my father had. He was a selfless and enthusiastic man who gave so much energy, time and love to those who deserved it. He was a high school teacher at an all girls school. The impression he made on so many was only fully realised by myself when he passed away, with an outpouring of stories from current and past pupils, saying how much he made them laugh and feel like they could achieve things in life. When he was in hospital before being transferred to the hospice for end of life care, one of the nurses caring for him was a past pupil of his. She told my family it was an honour of hers to give him the care and support that he had given so many. This in itself, as I write, is enough to bring a tear to my eye on how strange, beautiful and unpredictable life can be.

My dad also lost his father to prostate cancer when he was 21 and at university. The parallels of history repeating itself in our family felt tragic and unjust. What made my fathers experience of cancer that much heartbreaking, is that he had lived through it before as a son watching his father slowly pass away. This level of knowing your own fate and the impact it would have on your children and partner whilst being helpless with an incurable disease, truly breaks my heart.

“The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun.”

Christopher McCandless

I did my best to repair this broken heart by adopting as many of my fathers positive attributes as I could. Giving my time to people, colleagues, friends and as many people as I could until there was nothing left to give myself. I inevitably filled the whole of losing my father with spending money on clothes, food and drugs. Gaining weight, pushing myself into a deeper depression without knowing what I was doing or anyone around me to tell me what was happening. With the help of friends and a new partner, I was able to address the negative things I was doing to myself, one by one dismantling them until I reached the hardest task of them all, the grief.

After talks with friends and my partner throughout lockdown, I felt I was ready to cast this weight off and let it be carried off with the tides. I wasn’t just cutting off the grief, but the suicidal thoughts and my low self esteem. A new physical horizon was needed, to help build a new one inside of myself. Nobody needs this pain I carry around with me, least of all my father. I want to be better, I want to look upon the world with a learned yet hopeful face. So we packed up our things and headed north, to live on the road as digital nomads.

Every hour of fear I spend
My body tries to cry
Living through each empty night
A deadly calm inside

I haven't felt this way I feel
Since many a year ago
But in those years are the lifetime's past
I did not deal with the road

And I did not deal with you, I know
Though the love has always been
So I search to find an answer there
So I can truly win

Lyrics from Storm by Fleetwood Mac

It was on a walk in Perth, Scotland before our trip began where my boyfriend and I had our first deep conversations about my father and my guilt of not being able to save him. The Christmas before his last, for some reason I went to my room and cried as the rest of my family were laughing and enjoying themselves downstairs. I still, to this day, don't know why I was crying. Perhaps it was a strange understanding that this might be the last, carefree time my family would all spend together, with all members present. It's in that moment, which I guilt myself over. I knew something bad was coming, just not what. Dad had had back pains for some time, which transpired to be a symptom of his terminal prostate cancer. My boyfriend stressed how I couldn’t have known or done anything, that it wasn’t my fault. With this being the first time I felt able to open up about these feelings, we packed up our things and headed for the open road.

About Harry

Harry Rose is a queer photographer, producer and editor based in London. He’s the founder and editor of Darwin Magazine. You can see more of his work on his website or follow him on Instagram.

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