Beginnings Revisited

After a late and leisurely breakfast in the town of Simon, DH and I stroll around looking at the World Cup tourists while they look at us. Just enjoying the sudden warm and friendly weather, trying to guess who's local and who's a visitor so we know who to smile at. We have a rep as a friendly nation and who are DH and I to let the side down. Besides we really are. Friendly, I mean. After trundling past the art galleries; the very expensive Africana shops; along the jetty to view the tourists in the shark-spotting vessels and messing up their pics by inadvertantly being in them, we head back to the car. Now, when I'm driving, that means a straight line home. DH is not always like that. He is a man of suprises. Today he is in suprising mode so we head out away from home. "Where are we going?" ask I. Mysterious silence is all I get back: then he suddenly turns the car into a disreputable looking side street. "Let me show you the Martello Tower" says he, smiling. If I were not such a well brought up girl, I might have said something impolite like: "What the heck makes you think I would give a flying feather about the Martello Tower?" Not being one for old buildings. Well, not the town of Simon variety anyway. But I held my cool (you woulda been proud of moi) and prepared to suffer. As we turned the corner, I saw, not a crummy tower, but a small, rather rundown, playing field. "Remember this?" DH asks me. This is the very place where our unexpected romance started! On that playing field. 35 years ago. 35 years ago! It seems like just a heartbeat back. We got out of the car to take some pics. Just had to mark the moment and the memory. An officious Navy man hooted at us: he either didn't like where we had parked or he was worried about our taking pics in a Navy area. I did what I do (I think it drives my rather reserved husband nuts at times): I told the hooting man what our story was. He loved it. Totally changed his attitude, apologising for his hooty ways. Everyone loves a romantic story, it seems. And ours was really romantic, now I look back. Complete with an evil woman, trying to break us up by foul means

Plus we were the mismatch of the century; the pair most definitely destined for disaster, many people thought.

But that's another day's post.