If there’s one thing that’s nicer than going on holiday, it’s getting home again. Particularly this time: the whole week we spent away, I was excited about coming home. It was a great holiday, soft splashing waves, sunshine and unfamiliar cheeses: the whole Bounty bar paradise package. I couldn’t have asked for more, but I’d arranged for the tent to go up in the garden at home while we were away, a surprise for the children. For nights I lay awake in my air-conditioned, five-star, fully serviced, grace-and-favour villa longing for that lovely old tent, turning it over and over in my mind as I dropped off. I got quite despondent two days before our return when I called the parish for a news update and heard it was raining: raining, windy and horrible. Brainwashed by cloudless Mediterranean skies my elaborately formed picture of a canvas arbour in a sunny English country garden collapsed like a cloud of cold steam.
I think I told you about buying the tent.
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