Categories: uncategorized
Date: 24 July 2005 22:56:29
One thing I'm trying to do in my final few weeks in London (about 5 or 6 weeks to go, though that still feels so unreal!) is to catch up with some friends down here whom I've not seen for a while before I head on up to the other end of the country. Today, after nipping into church early for Morning Prayer (I don't usually surface that early on a Sunday!) I headed down to Tunbridge Wells to see C, who was one of my housemates when I first moved to London 15 years ago. Of the four of us in that original house in Forest Hill, R and R have both married and had children and seem to be living happily ever after, whilst C and I remain not-so-gloriously-single-with-complicated-lovelives in our mid/late 30s (I'm the mid :) ). Strange how things work out (or not, in our case!).
We spent a long time catching up - we started as soon as I arrived (at about 10.30 this morning), continued over the (not very detox-friendly) lunch, carried on as we drove to Penshurst Place and wandered round the grounds and gardens, still carried on nattering as we got back and sat in her garden, and were still going strong after an equally detox-unfriendly tea. I had said to Mary that I would try to make our church's monthly alt/emergent evening service at 6.30, but we were so engrossed in conversation that the first time I thought to look at my watch it was 7.45! Oops. At that point I made my excuses and said I ought to head home, and it was starting to get a bit chilly in the garden so we came in, talked a bit more and then discovered it was nearly 9! And the thing is, we probably still had a good couple of hours of conversation in us before we'd even think about flagging and calling it a day. We don't see each other very often, but I'm so glad I made the effort to go and see her. A very very good way to spend Sunday, for sure (and much more fun than packing!).