Village columnist David Storey remembered

The organic movement in Ireland has lost its main protagonist with the death of David Storey on 20 January, 2006. Be...fore I knew David, he was a teacher, a talented musician, a songwriter, an author, an organic farmer and a family man. We first met 15 years ago when he came to set an exam for the class of trainee organic growers to which I belonged. He asked difficult questions then, and continued to for as long as I have known him. He was a regular visitor to my smallholding during his organic inspection tours in the area. We debated organic issues with passion over many cups of tea and not a few glasses of whiskey. David joined me in the fledgling Organic Matters magazine in the mid-1990s, first as a columnist and later as co-editor. His witty and sometimes acerbic columns were compulsory reading for the organic and green constituencies in Ireland. His writing talents soon found a wider audience through his Organic Diary and regular columns in the Irish Examiner. He contributed to other newspapers and publications in Ireland and the UK and more recently to Village. His writing appealed to so many because he had a gift for simplifying complicated subjects and making the unpalatable acceptable through humour. Another chapter of David's journey began when he was diagnosed with a serious illness over a year ago, and his search for truth took on a new urgency. It was a year of healing and reconciliation helped by the love and support of his beloved wife Karin and all his family. He left this life last week, that journey as complete as it could have been. I have lost a true and dear friend. In iothlainn Dé go gcastar sinn. Cait Curran Editor, Organic Matters Magazine David Storey's final Natural Life column is printed in this issue