Gone, Gone, but always called me mother

Apologies in passing to Mrs Henry Wood.

Sunday saw the departure of Son No 1, his wife and small child to Canada where they intend to live for the rest of their natural. At present they only have a Visa for two years but they intend to apply for permanent residence as soon as they possibly can, so to all intents and purposes they have left the UK.

 

I have suffered much from solicitous friends asking me in whispered tones How I Am. Actually I'm fine.

 

I knew it was coming. We went on a family holiday to Canada when son no 1 was about 12 and ever since he has wanted to go and live there. He did an exchange year to Canada as a student. He has never wavered in his intention, not even through 8 years of application problems and three changes of the rules at the Canada end.

 

So I am fine. In fact I would go so far as to say I am thrilled for him.

 

Possibly my positive attitude is helped by the fact that I know that if I had managed to get to Australia in my mid 20s rather than having to wait until my early 40s I would have upped sticks and gone to live there without a second glance.

 

It also helps that I see my children as independent beings with their own lives to live and that means letting them go where they want, and do what they want with them. We give birth to  babies, and we have to do all their thinking and choosing for them because without that they would come to a bad end. But then they grow up, and if we're sensible caring parents then the older they get the more control we relinquish. That's as it should be.

 

So no-one needs to tiptoe round me. I'm proud to have a son who can dream dreams, make big decisions, walk into the relative unknown with confidence and excitement. That's my boy.

The Best Sort of Letter

Those of you who might have clicked on the 'favourite sites' link at the top right hand corner may have found themselves on the Shelterbox website.

In general I don't bang drums for the charities I support because I am well aware that there are thousands of good causes out there and I think people find the ones that they have a passion for, and who am I to suggest that they should give money to things that chime with me?

 

I love Shelterbox because it is such a good basic idea. There's a disaster, people need certain things as quickly as possible and that's what Shelterbox does. They send out boxes and in the box are the  basics that people hit by natural disaster need; a tent for a family, thermal blankets and groundsheets, water storage and purification equipment, solar lamps, cooking utensils, a basic tool kit, mosquito nets and a children’s activity pack. 

 

When you give them money the money goes towards equipping a box. They send you the box number you have helped to fill. And the best bit - when 'your' box goes out they write and tell you where they have sent it, why and how it helped. So you have the connection between your donation and real people in a real disaster for whom the outcome would have been much less good if you hadn't bothered.

 

I recently got a letter about my latest box. It went to help people in North Korea whose lives were devastated by Typhoon Bolaven. There was little publicity about the disaster as NK is publicity shy when it comes to disasters, but Shelterbox was there - and so was my bx.

 

Knowing that gave me a little glow.