Audrey

March, 2006

It has been great to receive a couple of letters from Audrey. She wrote at Christmas to say that she had met up with Betty for lunch, the first time they had got together in fifteen years.

Audrey was on a trip to visit her children on “the mainland.” Tim is now in the Dental School at Sheffield. Before he left home to start his new life, he and Audrey spent six days climbing in the Lake District. Martin is a banker in Hull, working on “doing up” his warehouse apartment in the city center, all “glass and stainless steel and leather”, according to Audrey, who has enjoyed helping him out. Audrey’s oldest, Julia, is coming to the end of her Ph.D. work at Manchester. The topic is Water Resource Management. Take a look at this interesting site. She and Audrey visited Dublin on the occasion of Audrey’s 65th birthday.

Audrey also went traveling with Rob last summer, visiting her brother in Hampshire, her old classics master (still umpiring hockey and doing Italian degrees at 81) and friends from Kenya and New Zealand.

I take leave of this part of Audrey’s life by quoting verbatim from her letter of October, 2005:

“I have just begun a two-week residential care job for a man of 100—ex naval officer from Kent—banned from Care/Nursing homes for “attacking a worker.” The pay is extremely attractive, but not much else about it is: just pull on the rubber gloves, reach for the bleach and think of the money . . .All night long (despite sleeping tablets) he traipses from bed to bathroom, tap-tapping with his stick like Blind Man Pew in “Treasure Island.” “Ahoy there”, he bellows to summon me and I’ve just delivered the 5th mug of tea.”

Audrey leads an active and interesting life!

September, 2005

When we collectively last heard from Audrey, she was chronicling the career plans of her children, planning more long walks and generally anticipating with horror the coming of hip replacements and botox.

I am happy to report that she warded off the latter developments and had great success with the former. “Tim and I kept to the plan of walking the entire Pennine Way, from Derbyshire to Kirk Yetholm in the Scottish Borders (270 miles.) Took 19 days, an unforgettable experience of fun, challenge, comradeship and sense of satisfaction.” That was, I think, in 2003. In 2004, “Tim and I did a 200 mile coast to coast walk in the summer: good fun and a good bonding exercise. I shall be sad when these adventures come to an end, as I fear they shortly must as he branches out”.

When Audrey wrote the above at Christmas 2004, Tim was having interviews in Dentistry. The previous year, Audrey reported that he “did impressively in his GCSE’s, gaining 11 A grades, of which six were A*.” Audrey was especially proud of her role in Tim’s A* in French: he was drilled by her in grammar, and those who knew Audrey’s attention to detail will find his result no surprise.

Julia, Audrey’s daughter, is moving through a Ph.D. at Manchester University in Natural Resource Management (water) and she spent some time in Pretoria, studying the 1998 Water Act and its implementation in the Transvaal. In one of her earlier reports Audrey had talked of a “memory lane” trip with Julia around the old Bedford haunts. She attempted something similar “in Manchester, where I grew up: it wasn’t a huge success. No good pretending it means anything to your family: indeed I think it can shatter illusions they may have created. As for myself, I feel I’ve done with it now, and the way is forward, not retracing old ground. A sobering day, it was.”

Martin, meanwhile, “is in the latter stages of HSBC Executive Banker training, currently in Malta. (Lucrative, but oh so BORING.)

And Audrey? Well, she wouldn’t be Audrey if she weren’t looking around for some new challenge. There’s Interior Design, “We have had an extension built on to our Manx stone cottage (circa 1870) and it’s been fun co-coordinating the fitting out (on a budget of course, but the result is looking very stylish.)” As of a year or so ago, Audrey was working three days a week and there was “swimming again—lunchtime pensioner rate.)” And last Christmas Audrey, together with Julia, was making her own Christmas cards. So what’s the latest, Audrey?