Most of this vivid dreamscape is, of course, entirely visionary - allegorical, certainly, based on real-life experiences perhaps, but nevertheless it is not somewhere you or I can ever physically visit in real life; at least, not in this particular variation of the universe, but don't get me started on that 'cos that's a whole other story about a dream I'd have to tell you.

The only exception to my dream landscape is my grandmother's house. There it stands, solid as reality - albeit with an extra storey which I can never quite manage to visit, for some odd reason. My nan's house is timeless, pristine, and obviously represents some deep-rooted symbolic meaning for my subconsciousness which I never quite grasped until, perhaps, this evening.

The odd thing about nan's house is that I am not the only one who returns to it repeatedly in dreamtime; my sister (8 years my senior) dreams of it frequently too, and so did my mother (although I'm not sure whether or not she still does). Of course, our maternal grandmother was a hugely significant figure in both my sister's and my life. She lived in the same street as us, so her home always represented a close-by safe haven and place of love and fun and indulgence. Nan herself was a fantastic character - a very down-to-Earth East End no-nonsense Londoner, and yet an incredibly sensitive woman, probably the first in the family to actually realise I was gay way back in my childhood years, and do nothing other than to nurture and develop me into being the person I am today (she taught me how to use a typewriter when I was about 4 years old; I used to write her stories by the time I was six). Nan died some time ago now, early 1990s, the house having since been sold off and, regrettably, falling into a general state of unrepair, inattention and non-appreciation; never mind, in dreamtime it's as it always was, give or take the extra storey.

When Eric and I were back in London earlier this year - due to my father's passing away, and subsequent funeral - we of course spent a lot of time with my sister huddled together recounting our respective childhood memories in the local pub, the "Hare and Hounds". One of the things both Tina and I again remembered was this strange preponderence we both had with nan's house in our dreams. We wondered what it could possibly mean.

This morning, as I was waking, and struggling against the inevitable moment when I finally had to admit defeat and actually acknowledge the alarm clock and get up, I was having one of those waking dreams, the ones you either never recall at all or remember in stark and absolute clarity.This morning's was one of the latter type. There I was, in my nan's house, talking with my recently deceased father in the back room, and watching as he carefully placed Widget, my even more recently deceased pet cat, on his lap. "I'll look after him," said dad, already intent on grooming the softly purring Widget. "You get yourself back across the road." And so I did, returning to my family house where Eric was around somewhere, where Mushroom and Moth were waiting patiently for their next meal, where Eric's twin brother and several climber friends were crashed out in their sleeping bags on the kitchen floor, where a whole throng of Greenpeace colleagues were milling around in the back room having sandwiches and drinking beers.

As Eric and I shared morning coffee - in the real world, I hasten to add - I told him about the dream and remarked that it seemed to clearly be the case that, on some Freudian level, nan's house not only represented childhood safety and innocence but also another world, that of the departed, whereas "crossing over the street" signified a return to the normal every day and familiar life as it was upon wakening.

The really startling thing was relaying that story to my sister, back in London, over the telephone this evening. As soon as I began to mention it she remembered with a jolt a dream she had had about a year and a half ago. She had dreamt she was standing in the kitchen of nan's house, cooking steak for herself and her late partner Michael, who died three years ago; while she was talking to him in the kitchen, her own cat, Bobolink, who was also dead by that time, came bounding down the stairs to join them.

So, what is it about this small, unassuming, terraced house in the East End of London that it has become such a strong symbol, such a strong repository of childhood memory and such a potent portal into an "afterlife" of sorts for three separate members of one family? Why do we all go there in sleeptime, and why do we always meet our dearly departed - whether human or animal - in that house? Very, very odd.

The best thing about it all is that at least it's oddly comforting that, in some weird sense in a half-remembered dream, Dad was looking after Widget, despite the fact they never actually met each other, let alone the fact that Widget never even set paw in London.

Well, good then. Even if it's all just the result of random thought patterns and electrical sparks and tangled memories darting between my synapses and jiggling my hypocampus (or whatever), then at least it confers upon all of them some sort of incredible immortality, at least from my own personal perspective. Who needs to imagine heaven, nirvana or any other sort of afterlife when one can always trundle back, nightly perhaps, to a cosy little living room in a quiet little terraced house and have afternoon tea with ones dearly departed? So what if they are electrical impulses generated only by REM and the power of dreaming? At the end of the day (or maybe I mean at the end of the night?) those are some of the best conversations and some of the nicest experiences I've had, and it's fantastic to know that, one way or the other, I can still talk to dad or still give Widget's tummy a rub and hear him purr.

Now, that is an afterlife!

Widget was born on 30 November, 1993. You might wonder how I can remember the date so exactly. Well, that part's fairly easy.

At the time, Mushroom and Moth, the two grey twin sisters (who, wonderfully, are still with us) were fairly young females; Mushroom had had her first (and only) litter about a year previously, and I had kept one of the three male cats she gave birth to, a black-and-white cat called Toby. Toby was short for October, the month in which he was born. (As a side story, when I took him to the vets - for the usual, albeit horrible, castration - I was asked for his name...I replied "Toby." A very stern, matronly veterinary assistant fixed me with a withering stare and said, "I meant his full name." "Well, we call him Toby-Tums at home," I said. She tutted. "Name, name, name!" she barked, shuffling her file cards with great agitation - I figured that they obviousy liked to give their patients the same surname as the owner, but I wanted none of that and decided to play her at her own game: "Well," said I, fixing her back with a steely stare equal in portion to what I was receiving, "In that case I suppose you should enter him into your register as October Stomach!".)

So, given that Toby had been named after October, when it seemed apparent Moth would have her litter in December it seemed logical that one of her cats might be named Dexter. But Moth had other ideas, and sure enough she managed to deliver before that deadline. 30 November, 1993, I came down from my bedroom to find Moth in the throes of labour; she delivered five kittens, three of which survived, and the silly little white-and-black lump that I instantly fell in love with was spared the name Dexter and called Widget as an alternative.

For those of you not familiar with a widget; a widget was the equivalent of a thingummy-bob, a whatyoumaycallit, an oojamaflip; the small, nameless gadget you couldn't be without. As fate would have it, the English beercan market was planning to launch draught-type beers in a can at the same moment, and decided to call the small plastic apparatus installed in the bottom of the can to give the draught effect a "widget"; the television commercials followed of course, with English comedian Jack Dee memorably dancing with penguins and extolling the virtues of the new alcoholic technology to a merry little tune that went as follows: "It's got a widget, a widget, a widget it has got". So, consequently, my poor baby kitten grew up in constant surprise that not only did I refer to him by this unique sounding duo of syllables, but regularly every evening the television set seemed to address him every half hour too. No wonder he learnt his name so quickly.

Widget had a hard time fighting for his position in the already existing family of three cats; mother Moth, who had already once tried to abandon her kittens by lying low in a neighbour's coalshed for three days until I finally rediscovered and fetched her home, having weaned her babies onto scrambled eggs and bottled milk much to her delight; aunty Mushroom, who viewed her nephew much the same way people looked at Damien in The Omen trilogy; and cousin Toby, who sat patiently watching me carving a hole in the back door with the saw attachment on my Swiss Army knife in order to fit a catflap, and who then promptly exited via said catflap never to be seen again, having by such time figured out that he was never going to be a match for the newcomer.

Widget's childhood was much the same as a human child's - learn by experience. His favourite learning experience being, of course, that if he waited long enough behind the already notorious catflap, he would inevitably be there when Aunty Mushroom came home, ready to smash the flap down on her head with a swift right hook as she tried to come in. No wonder she grew to equate him with the Antichrist.

Widget's life changed drastically, as did Mushroom and Moth's, when in 1995 I relocated to Amsterdam. I moved with a car filled with my most precious possessions - my books, CDs and stereo - plus the three cats and my dog Barley, courtesy of the North Shields to Ijmuiden ferry. I slept in a dormitory of forty people, where the favourite topic of discussion during the overnight trip was apparently who could fart or belch the loudest. The cats, however, were temporarily "adopted" by the young radio operator who allowed them to stay with her in her cabin; they travelled in luxury and had the pick of the kedgeree leftovers from the morning breakfast.

And so, little Widget became an Amsterdam cat, at just under 2 years old (although, like most ex-pats he staunchly refused ever to respond to a Dutch command).

What else will I always remember about Widget? Ah, Widget; first to greet you when you got home for work; as the only other "boy" in the house, always assuming that he was meant to sleep in the bed with us (mind, he did give wonderful back massages on Saturday and Sunday mornings when I slept in); my little assistant, always sitting and watching carefully and with interest every project Eric or I ever undertook, whether it was cooking a curry in the kitchen or sawing wood to make bookcases; the little monster who slept on top of the telly and always managed to allow his tail, or a straggling foot, to dangle disruptively down over the screen just at the crucial part of a thriller; the cat that loved parties, and, while his mother and aunt scurried away under the bed whenever we had parties, would gladly join in and be petted by 20, 30 people or more; and the cat that loved kids, befriending our very dear and close friend Tamara's little 2-year old Nick (with the assistance of his favourite dried snack which we taught Nick to feed him).

In January, 2006, everything changed. Widget fell ill, and after a couple of days of trying everything we could think of, we rushed him to a vets - recommended to us by Tamara - after he literally keeled over one morning. The vet - a wonderful woman called Barbara - was completely non-plussed as to what was wrong with him; but it was serious. By the end of the week, Widgie had suffered both a severe liver and a severe kidney failure. We told Barbara that he had eaten (without permission, of course, but such is the way of cats on a scavenger feast during the wee small hours) a mixture of tuna and onions. Onions, as you may or may not know, are very dangerous to a large proportion of animals (we didn't know until afterwards and as a result of lots of Googled research); there is something in onions which dangerously weakens animals' blood cells, in fact it came to light within veterinary circles in a big way only recently when one of the US' leading child food manufacturers added onion extract to baby foods - for a long time, baby foods had been a staple recovery food for cats and dogs at veterinary surgeries, until a few years ago vets noticed that animals were far from recovering but becoming worse! Even Barbara had to put Widgie's mystery illness down to this in the end: so, please - if you have pets of your own, don't let them eat anything that could have onion juices, extracts or tissue in it - check ingredients labels very carfeully on any little treats you might consider feeding them!

Against all odds, Widget did recover, and after two-and-a-half weeks was able to come home. But he was never quite the same. His poor little body was severely damaged, and he was becoming increasingly incontinent. Still, he was there in the weeks surrounding my own father's death, a time of many late late nights when all I needed was a strong, stiff whisky and a cat to cuddle. But, as weeks wore on, Widget's condition deteriorated more and more, and we finally decided that it was no longer fair to keep him suffering; well, he never appeared to be in pain, but at the same time, after 12 and a half years, you kind of know when your own cat has had enough. An appointment with Barbara was duly made.

Strangest of all was the night and the morning before the appointment - our friend Maarten, one of the cats' big friends seeing as he is one of their regular catsitters when we're away and is here at least once a week or so, came over on Thursday night to see Widgie for the one last time. I was feeling horrible; guilty at condemning such a beautiful creature to death the next morning...Moth was sitting on Eric's lap, and I actually apologised to her for having to make such a decision about her flesh and blood. And you know what? She looked at me, sat up, crossed from Eric's lap to mine, licked my eyebrow, and returned to Eric's lap. Freaky or what?

The following - dreaded - morning, I got up and found Moth and Widget curled up together in Moth's basket, an event we've only once (and recently) witnessed before. It was almost as if they knew. The cat carrier was set up, and both Mushroom and Moth gave it a thorough examination before Widget was finally guided into it. Eric and I took Widget to see Barbara for the one last time, and she confirmed that our decision had been right; Widget was in a bad way, no recovery since the beginning of the year, further deterioration and little chance of anything being done for him. It was really time for him to go. And he went very quickly, very easily and very quietly. Even Barbara, who must have to terminate god knows how many animals a year, had to stifle a tear at Widget's passing.

Back at home Friday night, Eric and I were stunned when Moth suddenly decided to sleep on top of the TV set, something she's never done. Maybe it was her own way of coping or remembering? Anyhow, Mushroom and Moth sense that he is gone now, they're both very clingy (in a sweet way) but also very affectionate and attentive to our own emotions.

I'll make no excuses; I WILL miss Widget. I am not one of those people who will wholly impose human characteristics, emotions or sensitivities onto cats - that said, it's clear to me that cats are very capable of having unique and individual personalities, and Widget's was a fantastic one. But, Widget was, as much as a pet cat could be, a good and true friend. I'll miss those little back-massages and wailing complaints when we arrived home late and the eternal struggle to read a book or newspaper when a lap was needed. I'll miss Widget, but I'm glad that he had the life he had. In his little life he met brain surgeons and climbers, child psychiatrists and Greenpeace activists, novelists, journalists, film-makers, witches, millionaires and a whole host of other ordinary, wonderful people Eric and I like to call our friends; and they all loved him too, they had no choice - as soon as they sat down, they had a lap available, and that was all that Widget ever needed.

To Widget. Long may he stalk through the grass and recline in the sunlight and hunt in the moonlight of whatever realm he now makes his home in. To Widget. To my baby boy.