Moving on

If I look back over my life I must have moved on many times. I moved on after my divorce, I moved on after redundancy and I moved on after many bereavements. One doesn't forget the deceased but learns to live with the loss. I have always said that the three best things I ever chose to do in my life were, learning to drive, getting divorced and giving up smoking. At my age is it possible or do I need to move on?

Four years ago, I was living in France and now I am living in Kidsgrove the town where I was born. Is that moving on or moving back. Any way it happened like this.

I sold my house- well I thought I had. We signed the compromise, and I was delighted. I searched for properties in the UK. I had been steadily packing bags and boxes and giving things away, taking stuff to the dechetterie and the charity shop. On the Monday I should have signed the final papers and would have departed the next week; I had a farewell meeting with my Monday group. We met for tea, cakes and games and to speak French. We were in a cheerful mood but sad that I was leaving. It was celebratory in a way sharing presents and cards. Laughing and crying, all very emotional. It was that afternoon that it began. I heard a drip. Water was dripping from the bathroom via a light to the floor in the vestibule.

I spent the week mopping up, ringing plumbers, paying plumbers, contacting my insurance company and peeing and pooing in the garden as the water was turned off. Then the nightmare commenced. I awoke on Friday morning and listened for the drip, drip dripping. Silence. I went downstairs to find that the ceiling had collapsed. I can't remember exactly the sequence of events that followed but it involved more plumbers, experts to find the leak, insurance investigators and finally informing the buyers of the catastrophe which of course led to delaying the completion date for two weeks.

I was so fed up with pooing and peeing in the garden and the constant delays that I found a removal man who agreed to take me and my cats to the UK for a reasonable fee. My village in Brittany had no public transport. None at all. With all the other reasons for moving was that I wished to stop driving. So, I sold my car.

I arrived in Kidsgrove with all my furniture and boxes, so many boxes and no car.

At first, I woke in the middle of the night thinking about boxes and furniture then, I decided it was no use lying in bed thinking about it, so I frequently got up at three or four in the morning to deal with them.

On Sunday October 20, 2019, I wrote this list.

1) The house in France was still mine

2) France Telecom/Orange still continued to send emails and probably bills - I didn't dare to look

3)The buyers were yet to sign*

4) I hadn't received the insurance money*

5) I was still paying for a) Water b) rubbish collection c) electricity in France*

6) I was paying for a) Council Tax b) Gas and Electricity in UK

Yesterday I received a bill from the plumber in France. He said that he had fixed the leak.

All problems did get resolved and the boxes were emptied, and the furniture installed or given away. I found a brilliant builder on Facebook, and he installed French windows and a new second hand kitchen also super-duper fitted wardrobes in my bedroom. I was even given a piano and the builder heroically managed to get it into the house.

Although I lost a spectacular garden, I have created a very interesting garden here. It gives me great joy and I begin everyday by taking my cuppa outside.

I don't need a car here. I have a supermarket across the road, another 200 yards from my door which I access along a tree-lined path and a third in the opposite direction via a path lined with mature trees. I have a bus pass. There are frequent buses to Hanley, Crewe and Newcastle. I can use the money I save from being carless on taxis.

So, have I moved on? Not quite. I still cry when I read my old blog called "Living and Gardening in Brittany". At least I have two functioning toilets, no peeing and pooing in the garden which is a good job as there really is no room for that sort of thing here.

My new blog is called "Living Life in Reverse and Adapting to the Present and Looking to the Future." What a mouthful. Perhaps I should call it Janus.