The ‘gig’

I went to see Mrs Hunter having phoned first and making an appointment with her ‘personal secretary’. The house was huge and I was let in through a big electronically operated gate. A maid answered the door and I was asked to wait. Mrs. Hunter was very nice and showed me the terrace where she wants to install the piano. The garden is beneath and she is having a marquee installed (with heating !) etc. I was allowed to meet the piano, a huge piano which hasn’t been played much, I imagine. When I tried it I was relieved that it is still in tune. I told her that I was a little concerned that she would be disappointed at how little the sound would travel. I get the impression that as long as they have a piano and someone playing it doesn’t matter whether anyone can actually hear it! However, she had prepared a list of tunes she would like and I am to let her know the tunes I’ve chosen to fill in the rest of the evening. I also asked her about dress code, my dinner party dress will be okay. She then left me with her personal secretary for the rest of the details. I’ll be playing for 6 hours, I’ll be fed and can take breaks as and when I need them. Good job it will be on a Saturday night.

More work

Even more spare time will disappear, at least that’s what you’d think if you listened to Charlie moaning. Remember the man who asked me to play for him and his wife when I first started playing at the hotel? He asked me if I would play at a party he and his wife are organising for a charity. They are paying me quite well for a long evening. I have to make an appointment to see his wife about the arrangements.

Timetables

It’s amazing how my calendar is filling up again: As well as my teaching job, I have the Hotel, the library (my timetable allows me to continue helping out with reading on, Wednesday afternoons), piano lessons with Jess and now dance which will take up two mornings and an afternoon as on Saturday mornings I will be helping out with the little ones. I visited Lydia and her cats and we talked about what she wanted me to do and then we talked about my parents. When they returned home my mum didn’t know that she was pregnant with me.

I told her about where I met Charlie, the site of where their house used to be. She wasn’t at all surprised.

Dancing again

A month or so back I was thinking of taking up dance again, but didn’t get round to doing anything about it.

The other day I was shopping at the supermarket when a voice behind me said ‘Hello Andrea’. I tuned round and said,’ I’m sorry, Andrea was my mother’. There was a very small woman in front of me in her fifties who looked vaguely familiar. She looked me up and down and apologised, she said that I looked so like my mother as she remembered her and apologised again. Lydia had been a friend of my mother and father’s when they were living here. She was a professional dancer so moved in the same circles as they did. I remembered her from their funeral. It wasn’t long before the subject of dance came up. She remembers my mum writing that I was enjoying dancing lessons when I was small. I carried on until I came here so I haven’t danced for nearly a year now. The long and short of the story is that she will give me lessons in exchange for helping her with the classes of the very young students. She walks with a stick (cane) since a bad fall a few years ago and really needs someone to physically help with the lessons of the smaller ones. We agreed to give each other a month’s trial.

Ideas man

Charlie got back really late from the game the other night, I was actually asleep and he woke me up. He told me I smelt lovely, which I hope I did after a long soak in bath oils to soothe away my troubles. He announced that he’d been thinking, I couldn’t help smiling at that so he hit me over the head with a pillow. Then he remembered my headache, fortunately it had gone by then. He thought it would be nice to go to the cabin for a weekend, so that I can see what it’s like in autumn. He doesn’t like to see me so sad – although he understands how worried I am. He thinks a change of ideas would be a good thing.

We also decided to visit the sea the day after when we finished work. We finished early enough to get there, go for a long walk before it got dark and then stopped off to eat on the way back. It certainly made a change. The evenings are really darkening now.

Bad day

After the news on gran I certainly have had trouble sleeping. I feel like a zombie a lot of the time and so I forget things and get things wrong, so eventually logic says I would have a bad day. Today was one of those days when you just wish you could hide in bed. First of all I forgot to charge up my phone so when I ran out of petrol (gas), I couldn’t contact anyone, so I had to walk to the nearest service station, beg a container and walk back to the car. That made me late for my class and I couldn’t phone in to let them know why. Even though Dan is my boss and I know him well, he was pretty cross and gave me a good talking to. I was working all day and the nail on my little toe needed cutting. What with the extra walking, my foot started to hurt around midday and I didn’t have time to run home to change my boots. For some reason my students weren’t in the mood for work and my afternoon didn’t run smoothly at all.

When I arrived home with a splitting headache, Charlie was already there, so I just flopped down on the chaise lounge, kicked off my boots and told him all of my troubles. He was an angel and massaged my feet for me. It felt so nice. I suggested we had an early night so we could continue the massage. I forgot, he was going to watch the football with Dan. So I couldn’t even expect him to make us something to eat as they were eating out. Laura is visiting her mom as it is her birthday.

Ironing and a lovely long hot bath. That’s my evening!

bad news

I just had the phone call that I thought that I wouldn’t get for a few years yet. Gran has had a stroke. She can’t be too seriously ill with it because she has given strict orders that I stay put; I am forbidden to go and visit her. I just hope that she doesn’t get worse. I haven’t spoken to her myself so I don’t know if her speech is affected or not

Charlie is being very kind to me. He spent ages yesterday evening listening to my memories and looking at some of the photos that I have here with me. I kept him awake because I couldn’t sleep. I expect we’ll catch up tonight.

The muse

Watching Charlie working on something to do with weight, space and speed…

ANGIE: I wish could understand your work better
CHARLIE: It’s not that difficult once you know how
ANGIE: When I was young, I learnt all of the formulae that I was supposed to for school but I could never understand the ‘how’, ‘why’ or ‘when’ part.
CHARLIE: Never mind, you can be my muse.

My first pupil

I answered the door yesterday afternoon and was surprised to find a very smart woman in her late thirties standing there. She presented her excuses and explained to me that she was Jess’s mom. Jess looks like a miniature version of her! I invited her in and over a cup of tea we talked about why she had come. Jess has been nagging her to buy a piano for a long time and she wondered if I would teach jess how to play when she bought one. I think that it is a lovely idea but felt that I should make it clear to Katie, Jess’s mom, that I’ve never taught piano before. She understood why I told her that and didn’t seem to be discouraged by it. She hasn’t spoken to Jess about it yet and indeed they haven’t even chosen a piano- she wondered if I could go with them when they buy one. I told her that I’m not really and expert but I’ll be happy to go along and give her what advice I can.

She really is a nice person, she is an interior designer and I can’t honestly see why she and Jess’s dad would have been attracted to one another. I must ask Charlie about that.

Birthday girl

My birthday was on  Saturday this year so I didn’t have to go off to work or do anything. We got off to a good start by having a lie in, even though I woke up early, I still get excited about birthdays! Charlie made brunch. He gave me flowers and some beautiful earrings, I suspect Laura helped him there, they were the ones I really wanted. During the afternoon Laura and Dan and Bill and one or two others came round for a drink and some cake. Laura gave me books and Bill a CD of some music I mentioned that I liked ages ago.

We dressed up and went to a super-dooper restaurant which must have cost a bomb, it was perfect and really romantic