From the other side

After showering in the gym this morning I was stood in the changeroom with a towel on.

I wanted to say to the guy stood near me; "dude - you can stand there and do your hair and wipe your brow with a tissue and fiddle with your hair (again) and stare at yourself in the mirror for as long as you want."

"It makes no difference no matter how long you stand there. I am NOT going to take the towel off"

So anyway.

While on my self-imposed exile / seclusion / holiday I got a letter from Jean.

Jean is her real name and she lives in Cape Town. She wrote because I had lent her a book and she wanted to return it.

Jean the most amazing woman I have ever met in my entire life.

I was given her number by a friend and went to see her before I left South Africa for London. I made the appointment and went to her house.

Once there, she took me into her consulting room, we sat down and she asked for a personal item of mine, like my watch.

After she started her tape machine recording, she held my watch, closed her eyes and began talking.

I still have the tape and on Thursday, after I got her letter, I listened to it again.

She starts off by saying "some of what I say won't make any sense now. But if you listen to it again in five years perhaps it will..."

"I see you living in a house in London - it looks quite posh. The area, I mean."

"I see cameras - about your job - don't worry about it though, They have one lined up for you. You won't be in your first job there for long though.

The first place you work in the UK has a glass building - on the front. I see trees there too."

"Then you move. I get a B... _ _ _, perhaps... Yes."

"You have a sibling. James... No - it's a girl. She isn't in South Africa. I see her in London but she won't be there for long. I get her in the south of France."

"I see a map on the wall behind you - and there are links with Britain, and the west coast of America."

So here are two pictures, the first is the borough in which I now live, the second is where I got my first job.

This the post suburb and have a look at the glass-fronted building...

At the time of the tape, my sister was in London but then moved to live in Antibes for two years.

She now lives in San Francisco on the West Coast.

The cassette goes on for an hour and she gives people's names, names of places etc. which now makes complete sense.

The cryptic bit is at the beginning of side B.

"Do you write? I just see you typing at a computer. Like a diary but it's on the computer."

She also talks about other things like family and friends who I've known but who've died.

I guess I should introduce you to one or two of them sometime.