BECAUSE he existed in a different age, where men smoked plain cigarettes and drank from their early teens, there was never any likelihood that my father would reach his 100th birthday.

Sadly, quite the reverse. He passed away three months short of his 63rd birthday when I was a young man of 22.

So last week when the 100th anniversary of his birth dawned, I drove to Inverness where we lived, and set about something of a homage.

You will know me as an avowed atavist and I make no bones about this. As I paralleled Loch Lomond before climbing into Glencoe and barrelling down Loch Ness, I recalled many moments of our time together.

His birthday was on Hallowe'en yet without fail, when I was a wee lad, he would give me a present.

When the best man at my aunt’s wedding suffered a dose of the vapours, my dad stepped in and gave a brilliant speech, without rehearsal or notes.

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Having been in the Royal Navy during the war, he resolutely refused to go abroad, claiming he had seen enough of the world, until my mother dragged him to France where he realised you could sit in the sun at street cafes and eat and drink for pennies. Cue four holidays a year in France!

And it was his stories of World War Two that made me want to follow him, and indeed his father, into the military.

The Navy was beyond me but the Army Reserve was well within reach and I joined 30 years ago. When I retire next year, my entire military career will have been down to him.

But long before I put on a green suit, his lifestyle caught up with him and he passed suddenly, way too soon.

I have no doubt the daily tot of rum and as many cigarettes as you wanted, to counter the paralysing fear of U-boats on the North Atlantic convoys, played a part in his declining health.

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So a century on, I sought out the location where and when he was born, according to his birth certificate.

The tenement attic where he came into the world is long gone, but thanks to satellite imagery mixed with old maps, I found the exact spot. Sadly it is now a roundabout on a dual carriageway, but there is enough pavement to do what I needed to do.

I laid a flower and stood in silence, a hundred years on. The unseasonably mild weather blew a warm breeze on my face and the traffic seemed to stop for a while.

We had our ups and downs, of course, as all fathers and sons do. And I walked away that night regretting them, wishing we had had longer together, that he had enjoyed his retirement, more holidays in France and of course seeing his beloved Caley lift the Scottish Cup.

If you still have your father, hold him close.