I loved going to the referee camps each year, mainly because Hilda was there. As an instructor, I would sit with Hilda whenever Ken was speaking, and I didn't need to be part of it. She was always positive, inquisitive, caring, and just plain "sweet"! I miss her and Ken, and I cherish the photos we took together. They will both be forever in my heart.
For many years, every June, we would meet Ken and Hilda at the Los Angeles airport and take them to their hotel, ready for the Ken Aston Referee Camp in Long Beach. Although the flight was long, they never complained and were always eager to hear all the latest news about AYSO. In later years, Hilda's legs really started giving her trouble and were often badly swollen after the flight. She just considered them a "nuisance". Over the years they visited us at home in La Mirada and met our children and grandchildren, and after Ken passed away, when we were visiting family in Wales, we would make a point of visiting Hilda at their home in Essex. She always wanted Brian to get some fish and chips for our lunch, from her favorite fish and chip shop. She always asked about our family, always remembered special things about each one - she had a fantastic memory. If you asked her where she and Ken had stayed in a particular country, Hilda would not only give you the name of the hotel, she would describe in detail, the room, the meals, where they visited, how many steps they had to climb, etc.etc. Unfortunately we were not able to visit her after she left her home to enter a nursing home, but were kept up to date with e-mails from her son, Peter.
She was one of a special couple who we considered ourselves very lucky to be able to call great friends - almost like family. We missed our telephone conversations with Ken. Brian spoke to him on the day he went into surgery, not knowing at the time that it would be the last conversation he would have with him. Hilda used to telephone us regularly after Ken passed away, and even telephoned Joan's sister in Wales, just to keep in touch with everything. Now Hilda has gone to join Ken and she will be greatly missed.
Obituary
Hilda Catherine Aston (née Conelley)
1915 -2010
Hilda was born 10th September 1915 in Barkingside, Ilford, second child to Alf and Kate Conelley. It is interesting to note that she was born only 10days later than her eventual husband Ken who was born in Colchester on 1st September.
By the age of 5, both were living in adjacent streets near to Barkingside, became friends at the age of about 12, and in modern terms were ‘going steady-ish’ from the age of 14. So when Ken passed away when both were 86, they had been together in a relation of 72 years!!
Both went to the Ilford County High School for girls at Gants Hill and boys at Barkingside; they matriculated well. Hilda took employment in London, working for a trading company specialising in tea from the Empire. This continued during the wartime, including the blitz. No stopping Hilda from doing what she wanted to do…….
Hilda married Ken in 1940, after several near miss events which brought the relation to the point of finishing!! Both would freely admit that they were stressed to the limit by two serious events: Ken teaching Hilda to drive with a zero tolerance approach - which was just a practice for the real job of teaching his long suffering son and author of this text, some 22 years later!!!; and the infamous cycling holiday through the Welsh mountains – where the moral is “if you must have a cycling holiday with your fiancée, don’t do it on a tandem!!” Hilda always swore that she pedaled like a maniac and was accused of zero effort!!
The blissful state of marriage might have commenced in 1940, but married life was delayed by Uncle Adolf and his Samurai friends, until 1947, when Ken returned from Singapore to become more than a photograph for his wife and new-ish son, then aged about 2. That was the beginning of residence at Trinity Road, eventually to be the marital home until this very day in December 2010!!
If this were Hilda’s obituary written while Ken was still alive, it would be very different. It would have dealt with a “man’s woman”, knowledgeable about football, athletics, motor cars and racing, an easy companion able to mix at all levels in support of the men in her life. She was a faithful supporter of Ken in his teaching career, soccer refereeing, the running of football leagues. Equally, a football supporter for her son, home and away, rain or shine, throughout the 5 key high school years, never mind the athletics, and latterly looking after son and friends for social activities, 2 am breakfasts after rallies for the whole group…. The list can continue. Then days when son and heir was struggling with O or A level maths homework!! Enter Hilda with intelligent questions, probing for explanations – which resulted in the right answers being found!! No end to the talent, it appears.
But reality arrives!! Ken pre-deceased Hilda, and a completely different side of Hilda emerged!! The perfect cook, wife, man’s woman, emerged as a decisive, self opinionated, clear thinking and determined lady, who took control of her life, battled her physical ailments, and who attacked life with gusto and enthusiasm!! The new situation was greeted with “This is the first day of my new life” – and that really sums up the iron character of the woman who freely chose to be a quiet supporter instead of a leader. She had done the job so well, that none of us realized, until after Ken had died. Perhaps it should have been noted when Hilda had diphtheria at the age of 6, a miserable disease which left her wearing special shoes and leg-irons for a year or two!! The disease was overcome, but it left an inheritance of bad circulation in the legs – the root cause of an ever increasing medical problem to compound the infirmities of old age. This was treated throughout, with determination, and an expression of optimism for the future – the time when the problems had been cured.
It is a cause for thanks and satisfaction that Hilda passed away without pain or stress, to end a very special era peculiar to people of her generation, whose life spanned two world wars. Hardship and sacrifice during those times allowed a special appreciation of the world and its valuable treasures coming from peace and prosperity.
God Bless, you Hilda, and Rest in Peace, well loved and appreciated by all you leave behind.
