Friday, September 19, 2014

A sad week

Waiting to leave


We've been consumed by sadness all week after the devastating loss of a friend's son. A lovely 20 year-old young man in his prime with so much to live for. Life can sometimes be inexplicable.

It has also been a hard week: The AC has stopped working in the bakery, the truck has broken down again and brown matter continues to rain down on us. This is all further enlivened by the brutal summer heat. I saw someone talking about 45C temperatures and even if this is not quite accurate, it certainly feels like it. Put simply, life feels a bit like Purgatory right now.

Amidst this, James left for his 2.5 month travels on Wednesday. In some ways it was good to put him on a plane because he's off on a fantastic adventure, but I felt psychically ill as I watched him walk through Customs. He arrived safely in Ireland of course and we'll all soon adjust to the new order, but it felt like going against the laws of nature there for a while.

I've never given too much thought about whether we are "good parents" or not. I'm not sure how one benchmarks such a statement. Nobody sets out to be bad parents, do they? The term is actually ridiculous. We all want to be normal and for our kids to be happy. We all want to provide the best for our children.  We all try to protect our kids from how messy and less then perfect life is most of the time. We all try to inspire that only hard-work and discipline make for success, and even then there are no guarantees (as I can personally attest to this week). We all battle with the 'generation-gap'. We're all distracted.

I suppose the first time you start letting your children go, is the first time you start fearing about the future. You have a good look around you and it feels like the forest in the Gruffalo - monsters behind every bush.  You do a mental check-list with yourself that you have prepared the child enough for the big, bad world out there. You look at your child for the first time as the world sees him. You worry that you havn't done enough or too much or of the wrong thing. You worry that they will be frightened or lonely. That they will not be able to manage.

I hope James stays safe and is hungry to learn and has an extraordinary time. I hope he does amazing things.  I hope we've given him enough to help him on his way.

I hope there is a heaven and I hope Michael goes there. I hope he also has a good journey and that he finds peace.








Sunday, September 7, 2014

.......the other side of Summer

Anegada Days

Well it's already September 7th today and Summer holidays are drawing to a close with Georgie & William back at school on Wednesday and James off on his travels next weekend.

We had a good break over Festival Week sailing up to North Sound and then Anegada, where we lolled around eating, swimming and reading our books. We did manage to do the walk from Pomato Point to Cow Wreck Bay and didn't see another living soul the whole day. Amazing.




The boys also spent a lot of time whizzing around in the rib. Even the 8 year old was gleefully tearing around (don't tell the Moorings) whilst George belted out "We're on the Hiiiiiighway to Hell". Boy Paradise.

Please note the skipper has his RYA Level 2 Power Boat certification. 

We had our usual share of holidays dramas: Props falling off, over-heated engines, anchors that didn't work and then a sudden gale-force storm which hit us with all our full sails up on the way home - but despite all of that, we did relax and re-humanised ourselves again.

We spent a couple of weeks back on Tortola as I'm still working full time at Osiris and Tyler hung out with the boys and got busy with our new premises, which are cracking along. It all felt very civilized as our alarm clock only went off at 7am instead of the usual 4am.

Fire Proof Building

At the end of August we went over to St John's, our sister USVI island.  We did a day hike on the Reef Bay Trail which we really loved. Dotted along the beautiful rainforest path were fascinating sugar plantation ruins, 2000 year old petroglyphs and valleys of land crabs.  We had forgotten just how much we enjoyed  hiking and it's something to look forward to now that the boys are a little older.

We had an excellent meal at La Tapa, a grown-up sundowners at the rather jooshy Caneel Bay  and our little hotel was perfect for us. Once you look past the flaky-hippy veneer, we really loved St John's and it's definitely our new bolt hole when we feel we may be in danger of common assault on Tortola.

St John's National Park, USVI: Reef Bay Trail

Speaking of which, September is my least favourite month of the year on the island. It's stinking hot, the humidity runs at 100% and the mozzies drive one to distraction. Tempers are short and the invisible fault lines are tricky to navigate. It is very easy to offend someone in September. Then you have to live with it for the rest of the year and perhaps till the end of eternity even. Island life does have its shortcomings, as we know. In fact Island Life would be quite nice if it was in, say London or Las Vegas, but you can't have it all, I suppose.

The good thing about September however is that the island looks beautiful. Everything is lush and flowering. Coral trees are vivid orange, hibiscus and oleanders are everywhere. It's hard to be grumpy for too long.

Our driveway

Last week was our second birthday for the bakery's operations and the week previously was our fourth anniversary living on the island. With only about 6 weeks to go until we open the new premises, the days go by in a blur. We are fiendishly trying to recruit staff, order new equipment, deal with banks and shippers, work with the builders and not lose our minds. Some days we do. Some days we don't.

It's not so much exciting as it is terrifying, exhilarating and exhausting. Lots happening, lots of change and lots of lists.

Sounds about normal for us then.



Messing around with Anderson/Brockbank, the BVI Olympic Sailing Team