JULY 6TH 2008 – FAREWELL AMERICA
It’s no small thing leaving a country. It’s not just packing up the suitcases, cleaning out the drawers and cancelling the newspaper. It’s not just the people that you leave behind and the well known sights and sounds of the place. There are some things that have to be said goodbye to as well.
“Goodbye Big Bum. Don’t let anyone turn you into a taxi, and don’t try racing the new police cars”.
I found myself patting our huge white Ford Crown Victoria car that for five years had been known affectionately as “Big Bum”. The size of a small Russian tank, this monster vehicle had been used as a camper van, farm truck, removal van and general mode of transport. We had strapped things to its roof, forced them into the trunk and stacked them high on the back seat, and never once had Big Bum faltered or refused to operate under such indignities. In it’s heyday, Big Bum had been a police car and we benefited from an air conditioner that could freeze a side of beef in ten seconds. It also had an extra gear that enabled us to forge ahead of slower traffic, and would scare those who dared to take us on by appearing to be a police car in plain clothes. The car that I would hire when I got to England could be comfortably parked on the back seat and still leave room for a small passenger.
One of the first indignities that I had inflicted on Big Bum was to place a South African flag on her rear end, but this action was rewarded within 24 hours by the appearance of my good friend Sybil, erstwhile resident of Johannesburg, and situated fifteen floors below us in the same building. If ever a national flag paid off it was this one, and Sybil and I delighted in each others company over the following few years, and parted sadly with promises to meet again in the Languedoc.
For the last time, I stood in the window of the master bedroom and looked out over the Intracoastal waterway, the millionaire homes and the glittering blue of the Atlantic Ocean. We had lived a life in Florida that few would dream of, enjoying five years with all expenses paid, very little to do, and no sign of any development in the Company that had brought us there. Blessed (or some might say plagued) with a CEO who was a seventy seven year old visionary with an ego the size of the Empire State building, and who never took advice from anyone, we quickly discovered that on occasions he tended to exagggerate, especially when it came to reports of imminent signings of large contracts and suchlike. One minute he was merrily haemorrhaging money and the next he would be bleating about the expenses, and we learned to roll with the punches.
But now the party is over and we are cutting our American ties, re-crossing The Pond and embarking on a totally new life. One home-going Frenchman who has never lived in France, and one Englishwoman on the cusp of sixty, desperately trying to absorb a new language and face the possible complications of an extended family who in many cases don’t speak a word of English. Previously, we had lived our lives in West and Southern Africa respectively; we had jointly rebuilt a derelict farm in South Africa and had learned the hard way which end of a cow to inject and which end to avoid. We had coped with three financially terrifying years in England and five peculiar years in Florida during which time we had ridden out five major hurricanes including a side swipe from Katrina and a major wack from Wilma.
It’s no small thing leaving a country. It’s not just packing up the suitcases, cleaning out the drawers and cancelling the newspaper. It’s not just the people that you leave behind and the well known sights and sounds of the place. There are some things that have to be said goodbye to as well.
“Goodbye Big Bum. Don’t let anyone turn you into a taxi, and don’t try racing the new police cars”.
I found myself patting our huge white Ford Crown Victoria car that for five years had been known affectionately as “Big Bum”. The size of a small Russian tank, this monster vehicle had been used as a camper van, farm truck, removal van and general mode of transport. We had strapped things to its roof, forced them into the trunk and stacked them high on the back seat, and never once had Big Bum faltered or refused to operate under such indignities. In it’s heyday, Big Bum had been a police car and we benefited from an air conditioner that could freeze a side of beef in ten seconds. It also had an extra gear that enabled us to forge ahead of slower traffic, and would scare those who dared to take us on by appearing to be a police car in plain clothes. The car that I would hire when I got to England could be comfortably parked on the back seat and still leave room for a small passenger.
One of the first indignities that I had inflicted on Big Bum was to place a South African flag on her rear end, but this action was rewarded within 24 hours by the appearance of my good friend Sybil, erstwhile resident of Johannesburg, and situated fifteen floors below us in the same building. If ever a national flag paid off it was this one, and Sybil and I delighted in each others company over the following few years, and parted sadly with promises to meet again in the Languedoc.
For the last time, I stood in the window of the master bedroom and looked out over the Intracoastal waterway, the millionaire homes and the glittering blue of the Atlantic Ocean. We had lived a life in Florida that few would dream of, enjoying five years with all expenses paid, very little to do, and no sign of any development in the Company that had brought us there. Blessed (or some might say plagued) with a CEO who was a seventy seven year old visionary with an ego the size of the Empire State building, and who never took advice from anyone, we quickly discovered that on occasions he tended to exagggerate, especially when it came to reports of imminent signings of large contracts and suchlike. One minute he was merrily haemorrhaging money and the next he would be bleating about the expenses, and we learned to roll with the punches.
But now the party is over and we are cutting our American ties, re-crossing The Pond and embarking on a totally new life. One home-going Frenchman who has never lived in France, and one Englishwoman on the cusp of sixty, desperately trying to absorb a new language and face the possible complications of an extended family who in many cases don’t speak a word of English. Previously, we had lived our lives in West and Southern Africa respectively; we had jointly rebuilt a derelict farm in South Africa and had learned the hard way which end of a cow to inject and which end to avoid. We had coped with three financially terrifying years in England and five peculiar years in Florida during which time we had ridden out five major hurricanes including a side swipe from Katrina and a major wack from Wilma.
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