Living in Taverham

"Who is she.....who IS she????!!!"

..........a quote made popular by Nikki, Britain's latest evicted housemate on Big Brother. Yes, sigh....... sad, but true..............I have become a victim of realty T.V. But only British, not American, which makes one ponder. Still the question begs - who am I?? I'll start at the beginning.....

My name is Jill. Born and raised in Juneau, Alaska until age 12, my parents and I moved to Aurora, Colorado where I spent the rest of my growing up years. My mother, being from England, met my dad during WWII and immigrated to the States. My father worked for the airlines which allowed us to travel frequently. We often visited relatives in England and it was on one of these occasions, that in 1979 - at age 22 - I met the love of my life, Roger. He was a friend of my cousin and we enjoyed a whirlwind relationship of 5 days before I had to return home. We continued our new-found love by corresponding over the summer with letters, phone calls and cassette tapes. In October 1979 Roger visited me for a month in Colorado, and I then returned to England to spend Xmas with him and his family. As it happened I ended up staying, finding work and spent almost a year living as a Brit. In June of 1980 we went on "holiday" to Greece with friends where I learned I loved Souvalki and hated Ozou! But, as my time was limited due to visa rules and regs, I returned to Colorado and we ended our relationship soon thereafter. To say I was heart-broken is an understatement.

So what did I do?

What every girl should do - I moved to San Diego, California, home of sea and sun, beach and boogy boards, glamour and glitz. I found a job, and ultimately a short-lived marriage (to an Englishman to boot!) and out of it came a beautiful bouncing boy, my son, my pride, Kellan. I was divorced when Kellan was 7 months old and lived most of his life as a single parent. Times were difficult financially as it wasn't until Kellan was 12 that we received our first child support check. After years of only dreaming to afford a trip to McDonalds (no lie!) we had enough money to take us on two trips that year - one to Maui, Hawaii and the other back to England! Now don't get your hopes up here.........I only visited with Roger's parents. He, I found out, had been married in 1987 and was happily so. Not that I thought anything could happen, but you always wonder about your first love, ya know?

Fast forward to 2004. The internet had made it's arrival in our home about 8 years before and both my son and I enjoyed surfing the web daily. It was on one of these occasions that, on a whim, I decided to look Roger up on the web. It was a perfect way to get back in touch with his sister with whom I had corresponded with occasionally and lost contact after she moved. I boldly thought "oh what the hell??!" and punched in his email address. After a day or so I was shocked to find an email waiting for me saying how nice it was to hear from me after all these years and how was I??? After learning he was now happily divorced, the next couple years found me living my life on the pc. where we could talk daily with mics, the next best thing to the phone, and it was free. Between that and texting we would spend nothing short of 5 hours a day discussing simple every day ordinary things in our lives, comparing tomatoes and tomatooos and becoming familiar with the 8 hour time difference. If it was 10pm San Diego time, it was 6 am English time - it's a date! Roger came over to visit me in October (spookily so as it paralled the time frame of our relationship of 1979) and I went over for Xmas and stayed thru till March. After 26 years apart, we were engaged on the steps of the Norwich Cathedral on Valentine's Day 2005 and married on Coronado Beach, San Diego, California Oct. 1st, 2005! After a honeymoon in Kauai, I relunctantly left my son, now age 20, behind to live his life with family friends - his choice.

So where am I now?? Living in Taverham - a village/town outside of Norwich, England! We have a ranch style home ("bungalow" they call it here) that we have gutted and started anew. Everything - and I mean everything - needs replacing. We are currently living with a foot-wide trench through the middle of our kitchen for plumbing. After living in the 70's we have torn the original cupboards down and made way for french doors to be put in where there was once an outside wall. There's dust and dirt covering the place including the oven which now proudly sits on the lovely white plastic picnic table we once used for dining on. We have managed to make the front yard/garden look fanstastic after removing 40 ft. trees whose roots were damaging the water pipes. Now the chaos has moved inside and I must say, Jingle, my cat, has remarkably done well putting up with having her food/water dishes repeatedly moved from room to room. But then, after an international plane trip over I think it's safe to say she could deal with most circumstances. At age 17 - what a trooper!

In February 2006 we were featured on Britain's answer to "Good Morning America" - a program called "GMTV". I answered a request for love stories which included obstacles in getting together. Suffice to say we were chosen, along with 3 other couples to be interviewed (one couple per day) and were given an all-expense paid trip to London for the weekend. Our 15 minutes of fame - I'll be giving autographs shortly.

I'm working at the University of East Anglia in the Science Faculty Teaching Office and recently passed my 3 month probationary period. Safe to say they like me. I have my own office which looks out over the broads (rivers - get your mind outta the gutter). England is now entertaining a "heat wave" that rivals San Diego temps. While I'm lovin' it, everyone is hating it. We will be returning to the States for a 3 week visit end of August and I can't wait.

So that's my life so far. Moral of the story? "Never say never"! I'll endevour to keep you updated as my life progresses. I like this blog stuff. :)

Cheerio for now!

Jill

posted by Jill @ 4:03 AM