Tightrope

About a year ago, I passed through Brussels on the way back from a weekend in Bruges.  I did not realise at the time but that weekend sort of changed my life.  It did not seem like a life-changing weekend: I ate a lot of fudge; got very wet and windswept; and washed my hair in the dark. (Power cut). I ate hot salty frites in 't Zand next to a sleeping funfair.  

 

And then I went home.  But some process had started in my head.  A year prior to this my daughter had moved to Paris, where she still happily resides.  Something about this inspired me and I knew that if I was going to do something, I wanted to do it soon.  But "soon" when you are in your late forties takes a lot of planning.

In just under seven weeks I am moving to Brussels.  I don't yet have a job.  Several people have called this brave (and I suspect they have gone off and given meaningful looks to each other, and pressed their lips together).  I'm not brave.  Brave is Shelley Winters in the Poseidon Adventure.

A few weeks ago I went to Go Ape on the Surrey/Hampshire border.  This is a picture of someone who is not me, but I did this.

And when I was walking across that wire, about forty feet up, I just kept telling myself to put one foot in front of the other.  So that's what I'm doing.