It was Moira who was keen for us to make the move… she felt that we needed to have a home that was relatively straightforward to maintain in our dotage (not something that could be said of our 175 year-old Southville house!). We’d talked about a possible move for some time but, frankly, I wasn’t that keen and would have been very happy (or perhaps simply too lazy or stubborn?) to have remained at Mount Pleasant Terrace (MPT) for the rest of our lives. But we were also conscious of the cost implications of maintaining an old house and so that, in the end, was the driving force for our move (despite my own reservations).Inevitably (thank goodness!), it was also Moira who did all the homework (what might be available; size; location; costs etc). I rather opted out of the process – almost on the basis that if I didn’t think about it, we’d stay in our old house!In the event, after perhaps 2 or 3 months of ‘trawling’ by Moira, we began the ‘serious’ process of seeing what was available in April.
We put our house on
the market at the end of April and were very fortunate to have the sale agreed
within a matter of a few days. Somewhat ridiculously, you might think, we ourselves
only actually viewed one other property before seeing the property that ended
up becoming our home. That was at the beginning of May and, again, things went
ahead without a hitch and our offer was quickly accepted (and so we were in the
fortunate position of having no chain in either selling or purchase!). We ended
up ‘moving in’ on 24 August.
Everything
has gone remarkable well (so far!) and, even though there were no serious
glitches in the whole process (and neither of us had jobs to maintain or
childcare to manage!), we did find it all pretty stressful. It certainly made
us appreciate the fact that we’d moved at the ‘right’ time… the thought of us
moving in, say, 10 years’ time made us realise that, by then, we’d have become
incredibly dependent on our children to help us move. The business of ‘downsizing’
has obviously been quite tough at times (especially given all the stuff we used
to store in the basement at MPT and ALL of our books – well over 2,000 of them)(we
gave away some 600 others to charity), but we seem to have managed the changes
remarkably well. Much of our old furniture has been sold or given away and
we’ve managed to purchase more practical replacements. Thanks, in part, to the
wonderful help from son-in-law Dave, we now have shelves, worktops and storage
units in place (I did produce some shelves myself, but not in the same class!).
Thanks to Mary+Amy (Painting in Plaits), we’ve redecorated the living/dining
area. We’ve installed a new carpet, changed light fittings. In short, within
four months of moving, we’ve basically managed to ‘sort out’ the apartment to
our satisfaction… and, as an added bonus, we didn’t put the heating on until
the start of December!!
So, coming towards the end of the year, we look back and feel very ‘good’ about our move. We love the apartment’s location – within a stone’s throw of College Green – with easy access to a multitude of bus routes (including to Ru+Stu’s and Han+Fee’s, as necessary), train station, theatre, cinema, concert halls, galleries, harbour, church and the like. I particularly love the fact that the Watershed cinema – somewhere I would frequent on almost a weekly basis pre-Covid - is now only a 5-minute walk away… so I’m hoping to get back into cinema-going again in 2022 (albeit still cautiously). We’ve also been pleasantly surprised that supermarket (and other) deliveries have been very straightforward and efficient. There are some downsides, of course. The main one is the lack of small, independent stores nearby… we have the fortnightly farmers’ market at St Nick’s (and, of course, Hugo’s fruit+veg and Storysmith bookshop is still only a 30 minute walk away). I love walking through College Green in the early morning (especially with the sunlit breaking through the trees)… and having Brandon Hill on our doorstep (literally) is a huge bonus.
Obviously, moving away from MPT has also meant that we no longer have the studio in the basement… and, of course (and very sadly), Ru has had to find herself alternative studio space. We hugely miss having Ru with us on a regular basis for morning coffees and snack lunches. In the same way, we miss having Iris+Rosa round for supper a couple of times a week after school. Obviously, our apartment is no longer on the school route, so things would have changed anyway but, after 18 months of ‘lockdown’, they’re both 20 months older and far more independent are into very different routines these days.
Our apartment is two floors up from the street frontage (four floors up on the south side)(and with a decent lift!). We love our south-facing balcony – which runs the full width of our living/dining area and allows in plenty of sunlight. Living on an upper floor level, we’ve also discovered the added bonus (given the fully-glazed ‘wall’ between our living/dining area and balcony) of being even more aware of the sky… and, strangely, of the birdlife. Perhaps because I’m more aware of observing early mornings from our balcony, I haven’t been on as many ‘dawn walks’ as I used to… but I’m also aware that the Broken Dock/Millennium Promenade might have become my ‘Marina substitute place’ (although it’s more impressive at dusk than dawn).
Some people
will no doubt see our move as something of a concluding chapter as we enter our
‘declining years’(!)… but, perhaps somewhat strangely, we see it simply as the
next chapter in our ‘life adventure’ together. We don’t quite know what the
future will bring, but it feels like an exciting time - with fresh challenges
and new things to discovery and enjoy.
We feel very fortunate people. X
Photo:
balcony skies.
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