I’ve mentioned before that I have known my friend Andrew Simpson for a very long time – I’ve just done a sum and it seems we have been friends for roughly 3/4 of our lives! We met when we were 18/19 in our first year as students at Manchester Polytechnic, and have been close ever since. I lived in Manchester for many, many years until I moved to the west country. By that time we both had families, but thanks to the phone and then more modern technology, we have remained close and in contact,. We’ve continued to be involved in the important times in our lives, partners, children, and for me moving house. We were both teachers in similar sorts of school, although I moved into working with children in “alternative” education.
Now we both write blogs – mine is an everything blog. Andrew, as a history expert and writer, explores and investigates past times and places, including his own patch, Chorlton-cum-Hardy in Manchester. I also write about the places in my own and my family’s past, Cambridge where I lived as a child, and Somerset where I live now
In a recent blog, Andrew has reflected on looking back and reflecting on past times and places:
https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2019/03/dont-look-back-thoughts-after-finding.html?
My featured image is of the Portland Arms Hotel in Cambridge. I never lived there but my dad and his family did from the early 1920’s until about 1950. However, it is deeply embedded in my ‘home thoughts from afar‘. I grew up with the stories of dad’s life there, and it has become part of my own story, if not actually my own past.
