It's a crisp cold misty Saturday morning as I walk along the canalside to the supermarket. Gulls were tiptoing along the thin icy surface of the canal, and a heron on sentinel duty at the dock gates waits patiently for its food. I get the morning papers, the milk, cakes and Ariel pods for the washing machine, knowing too that the cleaner who comes once a fortnight will call today.
When I get back I notice that Sandro had tried to ring me from Cambridge. I call back. Amazing news! Sandro had rung to say that in mid-January he is moving with Liisa to Finland. He has a new job there. I knew that this was his ambition, but I had never expected this to happen so soon. I am so happy I pushed him into getting a Polish passport which would enable him to pose as an EU citizen at airports, and in terms of work permits. For Albina and me that is a shock. When do we have our occasional chats? Will we able to stay in contact? But Sandro and Liisa had only one concern. Can we take all their plants? They can't take them to Finland.
We talked though our plans for Christmas again in light of the new circumstances, but we are still reeling with shock. Christmas may be the last opportunity to travel a longer distance in the car for me. Especially as we had planned to spend a few days with them visiting the Suffolk countryside, that Albina and I know so well from when we lived in Ipswich in the 1970s, and later, when I was the Euro Parliamentary canadidate for Suffolk and S.E. Cambridgeshire.
The fact is that driving with Albina as a passenger can be a little crazy. She used to be an aggressive driver in her younger days, quick to break speed limits, quick to react to mishaps on the road, and quick to criticize other road users with volatile epithets. She tolerated my presence in her car only as a navigator, as her sense of direction was hopeless. Now she has problems keeping her hands raised to the level needed to control a steering wheel, so she leaves driving to me. I am generally a quiet unadventurous driver. Like Kipling's Kim, I see myself as a "Friend of all the World", never in competition with other drivers, polite and unfussed. Except when Albina sits beside me, because she thinks she is still driving, screaming still at other road users, and when they are not available, screaming at me. "Why did you let him in?", "Use your horn", "Keep up to the driver in front", "Keep more to the left", "Don't be so slow", "Stop speeding", etc. Obviously I try and ignore this, but it is not easy, and she can upset my calm approach. I keep worrying that her aggressive back seat driving could cause me to make mistakes. But if I remonstrate she would get into a huff. Yesterday she got so angry with my responses to calm down, she said she would not travel with me to Cambridge at Christmas, as she was fed up with getting so irate with me. I ignore this as I know with time the mood passes.
Certainly, since today's announcement, she has not said anything about not going to Cambridge with me at Christmas.
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