4th July 2015

In The Beginning....

Gosh! It's now the morning after a farewell supper at Janet's house and so much happened last night!

Firstly (and not surprisingly), Johnny and Josie announced their engagement... and we were there along with Lorna and Chris and Toni and Laurence (our neighbours). As you can imagine, Janet was beside herself, as we all were and the joyous screams  from the gaggle of girls surrounding Janet's I Pad could be heard throughout Blackwell, so much so, that Elle ran across the road from our house to see what the cacophony was all about. Congrats to Johnny and Josie!

That really set the evening off with a bang, only to be followed one hour later by Elle successfully landing a teaching job in Barranquilla, a city on Colombia's Caribbean coastline. Unbelievably, she starts her two week induction on Bogota on 26th July!

We all celebrated somewhat enthusiastically....and as if to celebrate all the great news, the 'fireworks'  were superceded by a superb thunder and lightning show.

So, on to our globe trotting expedition. It was a year ago that Kate wanted to "have a word with me" at the top of our garden and she started the conversation with the fateful words... "John, I have something I want to tell you... I think we should have a gap year."

I was simultaneously both dumb-founded and overjoyed.

This giant leap emanating from my lovely wife who has, for her whole 55 years, always lived within 5 miles of the A3400 and never more than 10 miles from Stratford upon Avon was quite a shock. 

Shakespeare would have been lost for words!