Cassandra Gardiner returns with this week’s offering. Guest opinion articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the publication. Ed
Celebrating their Diamond Wedding Anniversary this weekend, Aunt Phylis and Uncle Den, not forgetting their crazy dachshund cross who spends most of her day ratting under their shed, are throwing a big party.
Den a devoted QPR and England fan – once highlighted amongst a conga-line of English World Cup fans, happily waving his walking stick, on the front cover of The Sun – delights in updating anyone on current and historical sporting fixtures, with a fondness for explaining why the game should have gone in favour of his team or sportsperson.
Life beyond the Iron Curtain
With an early interest in politics and life, Phylis (taking Den) travelled beyond the Iron Curtain in her twenties experiencing Russian living and working conditions in the 1950s.
Returning to the UK they’d been black-listed. Her strong beliefs continue and in the 90s, turned down an invitation welcoming Tony Blair into No.10 for his first appointment as Prime Minister, proclaiming ‘he isn’t true Labour’.
At Den’s 60th birthday BBQ, in the small garden of their three bedroom semi in Greenford, where they have lived since marriage, raising four children, a cousin mentioned how peaceful it is sitting on the top of the world. Enquiring, I asked have you climbed Mount Everest? Smiling, he recalled when he fell-off the edge of the highest mountain on Earth.
At the top of the world
Seeing a queue at a restricted passing point, the weather good, he and his guide aiming to make their next camp before night fall, agreed a riskier route across ice. Whilst crossing, for a brief moment his crampons were not attached and he slid. Dropping to the floor, his guide slammed his ice-axe into the frozen ground, stopping himself from flying off the edge, saving them both.
Special moments
As times change and family get-togethers are complicated by distance, busier lives, expense, situation and perhaps lessening appreciation of others as we strive to place our own life in perspective, this gathering of our gene-pool, sharing history, celebrating togetherness and merrily dancing the night away, is special.
To read more of Cassandra Gardiner‘s work, visit her blog.
Image: Rob Gallop under CC BY 2.0
