The pool was finished in time and is wonderful. The children and grandchildren have been to stay and have well and truly christened it. Finally we get a chance to use it ourselves.
Despite all the toys, books and games we keep here their favourite games are World Cup football using two upturned buckets as posts and fly swatting. This latter occupation is to the consternation of their mother who is unhappy with the killing aspect and unsuccessfully suggested they use the swatter to just frighten the flies away.
It is strangely quiet now the family have left. Whilst they were here our friends and neighbours invited us all up for a BBQ with their children and grand children plus their son-in-law’s parents. A separate table was beautifully set out for the children – our two boys aged 10 and 6 and their two girls aged 8 and 5 and we 8 adults sat to sip our aperitifs, watch and admire them. There followed a great deal of uncomfortable silence. The problem was that they don’t really remember each other and don’t have the language skills to talk to each other. I glanced at our eldest who looked as if he was hoping a big hole would open up into which he could conveniently jump whilst his little brother amazingly was quite put off his sausages!
Finally a French grandfather broke the ice by bringing out a pile of pea shooters and the children teamed up to attack us. This was followed by a game of hide and seek and a dip in the pool and the communication barrier was well and truly broken.
As we discussed the language barrier I was reminded of an amusing little story from more than thirty years ago. We had some friends who were desperate for children and eventually adopted two children from Sri Lanka. Our friend told his mother and father who lived a long distance away that they had adopted a baby girl just a few weeks old and invited them to come to stay to meet their new granddaughter. Knowing how prejudiced they were he omitted to say where the baby came from. He thought his beautiful new daughter would melt even the hardest heart and he was absolutely right. Cradling the infant lovingly his misty eyed mother said “She’s so perfect and lovely but whatever will you do when she starts to talk? You won’t understand a word she says!”
Parkinson's Disease and me 