Day 79

Sunday May 9

A wonderful late Sunday morning on Hampstead Heath and for the first time I actually stop and watch a cricket match as Maja’s transfixed by this mad looking game played by men all in white. We’ve just bought ice creams and it seems just too perfect to be able to enjoy them in the sun while taking in this perfect scene of Sundayness. The ground is just off the main walking path a little beyond our entrance to the heath. It’s also behind a line of trees so this enormous playing area is almost concealed from the main thoroughfare. We find a free spot on the grass next to the boundary and settle down for an hour or two in the sun as gentle battle commences in front of us. As for the rules, rather than attempt to explain the intricacies of cricket, the fact that this game could go on for a whole day, and the fact that the highest level of the game can last for five days, I just answer questions as they come up from the action in front of us. How do they score? The two men in the middle run from that end to the other end, and back again if they can, and again if they really think they can. Why aren’t they running now? Because he hit the ball all the way to the edge of the field so that automatically gives them a score of four. And so on. A truly wonderfully lazy activity for a Sunday. On walks around when I’ve seen games happening, I have sometimes stopped and watched from the path for a little while. But this is the first time I’ve ever come in and really taken in a game. We stay for an hour and a half maybe until Maja’s decided she’s seen this thing now and we should carry on with our walk.

Back home and we resume our attempt to find a new one. In another country. And in the country. We’re thinking about budget and the fact that we really do need a house, not an apartment but a house. There’s no way our budget would allow for one in a city centre and most of the ones we’re seeing aren’t even near any towns. That’s fine. We’re thinking small, out of the way place. Maybe with at least one or two local shops so that we don’t have to drive everytime we need a pint of milk. You get the idea. We’re not expecting to be anywhere near anything that might resemble even a small town, but something with a near enough convenience store would be just fine.

We’ve found a place we really like in Mayo on the northern west coast. It’s a big three bedroom place, but because of its isolated location is well within budget. Although we’ve not had much luck with progress, we really can’t believe the size of the places we’re seeing for what we’re looking to pay. I call this house, have a chat with the landlady, and she says, ‘Yes, we can hold it for you.’ Wow. Great. I load up for the next part of the discussion/negotiation then she adds, ‘But if someone comes in the meantime we may have to let them have it.’ What? That’s not holding it. What if we offer to pay right now? ‘Why would you want to do that?’ she asks. What do you care? I think. You’re being offered money right now to give us the place. Six months up front. If anything, this only makes her more suspicious. ‘And you’re in London now?’ Yes. ‘And you want to take it and pay for it now?’ Yes. ‘And what would you be doing that for? Sure you’d have to see the place first.’ Oh here we go again. It’s like she’s trying to persuade us not to give her any money. Surely that’s our decision. I patiently explain that this would mean that we had a place to go to, so we could leave whenever we were ready and just move in comfortably. ‘But in the meantime you’d be paying rent for a place you weren’t living in?’ Yes. ‘What would you be doing that for now?’ Oh, I can’t get through here. ‘We’d have to meet you first, you know,’ she says. Oh dear. This isn’t going anywhere. ‘But we’re in England and are trying to secure a place in Ireland so that we can move there.’ ‘Well maybe you could come and see it before you decide,’ she says. ‘There are a lot of people interested. It isn’t only you.’ This just isn’t working. She then says she’s looking after it for her daughter. So negotiations are going on at a remove here. Never a good way to go. I feel we’re in the middle of a circular conversation so I thank her for her time, say that we may be in touch again and we hang up. 

We realise this just isn’t happening. We’re just going to have to go. People want to do the whole face to face thing rather than do a let on the phone. Fair enough. I totally get that. So that’s what we decide to do. Drive there and just turn up. Get ourselves in situ. I call the lady back, say that OK, we’ll come and try to meet, and she agrees that if we get there and meet her, we might be able to do something. 

But given her total refusal to commit, we accept there’s a possibility the house may no longer be available when we arrive. If that’s the case, we decide we’ll simply make a plan and get something else. What that plan could be we have no idea, but surely we’ll be able to come up with something.

So this is it. We’re going to start tomorrow by beginning the search for a car. Once we have that, it’s just a case of loading it up and leaving. Next stop, our possible house in Ireland. Mayo? 

Casting its shadow over all this is Maja’s upcoming but yet to be booked surgery. We’ve been toying with the idea of her going to Sweden for it, then coming back here, then we go to Ireland. We really don’t like the sound of that, so we come up with this wonderful plan. She books the surgery for something like in three or four weeks. In that time, we move to Ireland, get settled, then we both go to Sweden for Maja’s surgery in the knowledge that we have the place in Ireland to come back to. If, if if, we can get a car tomorrow, we think we can make the move this Tuesday.

With that, we go out to The Camden Head in Islington where we hang out with Alex, the chef and producer/songwriter I’ve played bass with, and his friend, Raul. We’re outside in the beer garden and we also chat with the bar staff as they pass by when they get a moment or two. Prominent among them Tom and Molly. I’ve known Tom years, mainly from Kristoff’s bar The White Hart, but also from The Marquis. And Molly we met at that part here a few weeks ago. When they’re finished, they come and join us and we then tell everyone our wonderful, foolproof plan. We’re going to move to Ireland. On Tuesday. In a car we don’t have to a house we don’t have on a ferry we haven’t booked. They all fall about in hysterics and the sheer audacity and adventure of it. Brilliant, they agree. Right? What could possibly go wrong?