Year To Remember 1995

Outside the Croydon Register Office

Good times don’t last for ever, as the saying goes! On our return from one of the most memorable holidays in 1994, my life was turned upside down when my partner suffered massive stroke. It took almost a year of living in hospitals up and down the country, (Pinderfields in Wakefield, Frenchy in Bristol, Gloucester hospital and finally Cheltenham Hospital at home ) together with a big help from brain surgeons, consultants, speech therapists, physiotherapists, dieticians, strings of nurses and doctors I managed to put my partner back on his feet again. However one essential part of his body, his memory refused to function and for that he depended on me for twenty four hours a day, seven days a week.

My next step was to make "an honest woman of my self", after all I have been engaged for 7 years. At the grand age of 45 when most of my friends were into their second honeymoon; I arranged my first and only marriage to my partner on 5th April 1995 at Croydon register office where we were supported by his family and his friends. After receiving our marriage certificate we caught a train to  Brighton, to be beside the sea side, of course!  

 

Seven years later I had this to write about our day by the beach :   

 I remember the day we married

We finished our wedding vows in the city hall
and returned for our honeymoon by the sea.
The emerald blue sea which clung to our planet waited
calmly for us in the midday sun.
As the evening approached it made waves
and the never tiring waves continued
the performance to brew up a stormy night.
That night we were left wondering where we belonged?
Was it fish and chips by the sea or do we
go into the town for our meal?
The honeymoon night I shall never forget as I
heard the sea waves beating against the sea wall.
They continued pounding of the sea pebbles and
the noisy chatter of the seagulls left me wondering
what the next day held for us?
The following day as the sun made its appearance for the millionth time
we ventured out to discover:
the dead seagulls which were beaten against the sea wall
were being swept away slowly by the in coming tide.
We saw tons of jelly fish, sea shells and pebbles too.
They had been rolled into the land during the night and lay motionless awaiting fate.
Some were rolled back into the sea by the gentle sleepy waves
some were picked up by the birds and some were in the hands of the shell collectors
and the remaining billions of them made their new home where they laid.
The morning of the second day seemed promising
as the calmness of the sea meant we could see the boats sitting on the horizon line.
The early morning swimmers took to the sea without any fear of the storm of the night before.
We had two more days by the sea and I remember
that they never matched up to the night of the honeymoon storm.

                                                        

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 In the same year of getting married we were invited to Dublin by friends of by my newly acquired husband so off we went and enjoyed the hospitality of the Dubliners. Our journey there also took us to beautiful city of Cork and not so beautiful train ride to Belfast railway station,  again to meet up and say hello to some old familiar faces.

 

In the autumn we had invitation from Edinburgh and hopped on to a train to meet up with some Scottish friends and enjoyed their company and also sights of one the beautiful city in the World.

 

Our life at home in beautiful Cheltenham was in slow lane, my husband had taken early retirement at the age of sixty and I took up full time job as his carer at the age of forty-five. Besides running of our everyday lives together we made sure all doctors and hospital appointments were followed, we never missed Sunday mass at the local Catholic Church and our love for silly game of cricket got us out of our comfort zone and join the barmy army of the cricket world, life can’t be bad whilst we lived the life of O’Reilly?