Coming Home

I have to plan how to get from Nova Scotia to New York for my flight home. It feels a bit like a puzzel - one wrong move and I might end up days or kilometres away from my destination. It has been a theme of my time here that public transport in the province is going down the pan Originally I thought it might work well to take the ferry from Yarmouth in the south, across to Maine in the US, but I soon find out that my guidebook is a few years out of date and this ferry no longer runs. This is contributing to the decline of Yarmouth, as they are losing tourists and business. I can get the train to New York, but this involves travelling 1000s of kilometres back into Canada via Montreal, which doesn't seem very appealing and this is also the route for the long-distance bus, which I hear is ceasing service before Christmas. It is a 'don't-start-from- here' kind of place. Perhaps the provincial government doesn't want tourist here, or maybe they don't want the locals to leave.  After doing some research it seems that a flight is the only viable option. Actually it turns out to be two flights; the first to Pennsylvania and then a really nice 1/2 hour one in a little propeller plane to La Guardia airport. I was last here nearly 5 years ago, for a great reunion with my lovely college friends and I feel a little sad, that it hasn't worked out to see Lindsey again this time. It is a clear sunny day as we fly in across New York harbour and the Statue of Liberty raises a hand to wave. I can see the whole of Manhatten - the space where the Twin Towers were; the Empire State Building and Central Park. Then we fly up the Hudson River before looping back round to land at La Guardia airport, where the runways seem to be floating on the water.

Plane to New York

 

I take a shuttlebus to transfer from La Guardia to John F Kennedy airport and then settle down for a 7 hour wait for my flight to Hearthrow. I seem to be is a state of suspended animation where time passes neither quickly or slowly and I don’t do anything other than eat occasionally and wait.

By early evening I am on the plane, but we have to sit on the tarmac for an hour and a half while we sweat and fan ourselves, because some passengers have not boarded the plane and they have to find and take off their luggage before we can take our queue in the line up for take off. The captain and crew keep us well-informed about our progress and there is a rather disconcerting announcement to say that a jet engine in the rear of the aircraft is not working, but reassuringly this is the explanation for the excessive heat in the cabin because it powers the air conditioning. Eventually we take off and have an uneventful flight. Looking out of the window as we come into land at Heathrow in the early morning I can tell that I am back in the UK, as the farm landscape of fields and hedges is very familiar and the London roads are curved, rather than laid out in straight gridlines. 

I come out into the arrivals hall it feels like a scene from ‘Love Actually’ as Peter is there to meet me, with a bunch of pink roses. He is the friend I was with in New Zealand at the time of ‘the robbery’. When we parted there we thought that another time and place might bring us together again. We have been e mailing each other over recent weeks and this now feels like the right time and place. I have kept this part quiet from most of you and I have even concealed my intention to create this bubble in time and spend some days with him before returning to Devon. I feel somewhat uncomfortable about this deception and now need to come clean. We spend a lovely few quiet, reflective days together staying a friends’ house in North London and it feels like a buffer and transition between my travels and returning to Devon to my local family and friends.

I know I am in the UK, but it doesn't yet feel like 'home'. I get used to the traffic being on the left and how to cross roads safely. Wandering up the Holloway Road feels like a continuation of my travels, with sights that I would normally try and capture with my camera.

A few days later Peter and I say goodbye (for now) at Paddington Station and I catch the train to Plymouth. Leaving London and rushing through the English countryside in the train really begins to feel like being home. The layout and look of the landscape of farmland and villages is so familiar and so far nothing appears any different from what I remember. The journey is the reverse of how I started my travels a year ago; it feels like re-winding back to that time and place, but I know that once my view becomes more focussed on the really familiar details of home, changes that have taken place within this last year will become apparent. Some I am expecting and predicting and others will no doubt catch me by surprise . After Exeter I start to concentrate more fully on the passing scenery – the iconic section along the coast past Dawlish and Teignmouth; Newton Abbot from my childhood and adolescence; Totnes where I will soon be living; Ivybridge where I lived and worked before leaving England and on to my final destination of Plymouth where Kate and family live. I find myself reflecting on my travels and musing about the choices and decisions I will soon be making which will shape this next phase of my life.

Kate and the grandchildren meet me at Plymouth station. They all look great and my eyes fill with tears as we hug our hellos. Megan is not at all shy, but Elliot looks unsure and a bit confused. Back at their house they show me the chart on the wall, amongst the postcards I sent, which has been counting down to my return over the last days. We sit in the garden in the sunshine with toys around us and within an hour or so it begins to feel very natural and almost as if I haven’t missed anything over the last year. I am so happy to be back and re-involved with their lives again.

Megan and the Granny Countdown Chart

 

Me, Megan and Elliot

 

THE END