Smash hit

To see the illness overtake him, that was a long process. He lived with that illness for many, many years. It was trying to hold him down, but he had an amazing resilience. My father put up with a kind of pain I don’t think any human could comprehend.

In those last weeks, even as life slipped away from him, his resilience was as strong as it always was. That autumn he’d been invited to the MTV music awards. He had been nominated for the Hurt video. Daddy found that a blast; he loved the idea that his music was being embraced by a younger audience. He never wanted his music left in some dusty museum in Nashville. My father had always lived a youthful life. As we talked about going to the MTV awards — we had discussed that he might perform there — he was just as eager about life as he ever was. Then, suddenly, he was gone. I didn’t expect him to go, but I guess the fact that my mother had left his side meant he wanted to go join her.

The last thing he offered to me was that I was a child of God. He told me that I was blessed and should move forward in life. My father loved to laugh, he loved a joke. He had a quick wit and he had a way of endearing himself with even the biggest rock stars in the world.

One time Bono came to the farm. My Daddy went to receive him and had him sit at the table and hold a moment’s silence. Then, when all was quiet, he looked up at Bono and winked. “I sure do miss those drugs, though,” he said. Bono didn’t know what to think — my father and him had a real laugh at that. That’s how I would like to remember him: sitting with his friends and family, singing songs and laughing.

The Times bfi London Film Festival is on Oct 19-Nov 3 (www.timesonline.co.uk/lff). Walk the Line, The Times Gala film, is on Oct 27 & 30 at Odeon West End 2, and on general release in January. Johnny Cash: The Legend is out now on Sony

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Marrying into the country set

By wedding June Carter, Johnny Cash joined one of country music’s founding families.

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