My family and my British friends

I met Cathleen, who became my best friend at the band which we regularly attend. I was strongly attracted to her. This worried me when she told me she had a partner. However, my worry turned to relief after she disclosed that her partner was a girl, not a bloke! Our sense of humour was similar, whenever we were together there would be laughter. We were both loud, often getting odd looks from our colleagues. At one outdoor grandstand event, in the cold of early Spring, I remember her telling me,

“I’m going to take off my pants!”

I was shocked,

“What do you mean, ‘take off your pants’?” I questioned.

“Wait and you’ll see,” was her quick response!

My curiosity aroused, I watched her as she unzipped her long weatherproof trousers, stopping half way up her thighs, to reveal shorts at the top of her long legs! Whenever she wears these trousers, we always quip over this joke from the past.

Another time we had an extraordinary good laugh was when driving to her grandmother’s wake. She took a shortcut the wrong way up a one-way street. I was sitting in the front passenger seat while her partner Flora was at the back. Flora almost had a fit while we were rolling in hysterics. Flora had noticed a police car checking driver’s speeding not too far away. Fortunately he hadn’t seen us and there was no traffic coming in the opposite direction.

After her skiing holiday, Cathleen told me she felt safer skiing while it snowed because she couldn’t see the huge drops on either side where the mountain fell away from her! I laughed, asking her if it wasn’t like what the blind man said to me as he crossed a busy thoroughfare, what I can’t see doesn’t frighten me!

We have many fun times together.

My good friend George Marsh and his partner, Sue, moved away to live on the Isle of Wight, so I don’t see them as often as previously. I went to visit them in the late summer, last year (2016). They kindly drove me around the island to sightsee before we returned to their home to enjoy a delicious lunch. I caught a Ferry back to the Mainland in the evening.