Good things in my neighbourhood

So, a client says to me, just as an aside, “why is it that we go on holiday to get away from where we live and the people who live where we holiday are going somewhere else for theirs?”

The idea of needing to get away would suggest that where we are is never really good enough. I get it that the act of taking a break, of doing something different, is stimulating and often relaxing but the question got me thinking about do we appreciate where we are and what we have? Are we able to enjoy the space that we live in?

I am reminded of the amount of time when Rie and I have been driving around Europe and have been spellbound by views and vistas. Yet there are many times when we have noted that we have views like this where we live. There is a beach on an island in the Florida Quays that people go to every evening to watch and marvel at the sunset. It’s a lovely sunset. But, when I watch the sun going down over Hilbre Island and the Welsh coast I am stunned on a daily basis.

I live on a peninsula named Wirral. It is known as the insular peninsula mainly because people, once they arrive, never leave. I know many people born in Wirral that have never travelled anywhere else, not even for a holiday. I note that those that do manage to leave often return after a few years as though they have been drawn back by some invisible elastic umbilicus that will not let them truly leave.

Wirral sticks out into the sea with estuaries either side. There is the river Mersey between Wirral and Liverpool and the River Dee between Wirral and Wales. Both estuaries empty into the sea so at the top end of Wirral there are beaches, and all the fun of the holiday trade. There seems to be a balance here of industry, residential and holiday occupation and accommodation.

Where do you live?
How well do you know your own area? What do you know about its history? The month on May is local community and history month, maybe a good time to get to know where you live?

I have lived all over the world and only came to Wirral with work and stayed because of Rie, and now I can’t think of a better place to live. Like most of the British I feel that the weather could be warmer and that the sun could shine some more but all in all, I live in heaven. Within minutes I can stroll down to the beach. In twenty minutes I can be through the tunnel and in the centre of Liverpool. In twenty-five minutes I can be in Chester and in forty minutes into the mountains of Wales. The motorway system that runs through the middle of Wirral connects us to the rest of the UK and through to Europe.

Once I became interested in the Wirral and began to look around it I found places that are gems. There are areas of richness and poverty, areas of beauty and the not so beautiful. I discovered that Paul Hollywood’s dad had a bakers in Wirral, that Lillie Savage was brought up here and Wirral has been home to Ian Astbury, Ian Botham, Chris Boardman, Fiona Bruce, Elvis Costello, Dixie Dean, Daniel Craig, Chris Farrell, Austin Healey, Paul Hollywood, Simon Rimmer, Eric Idle, Paul O’Grady, John Peel, Patricia Routledge, Harold Wilson, Glenda Jackson, the list goes on forever. And there was a Viking parliament in a place called Thingwall apparently a corruption on Ing meaning assembly and Voll meaning field- Amazing.

Anyway, I digress. My advice to you is to get to know where you are. Don’t become blind to what is around you and certainly enjoy your holidays in foreign parts but maybe begin to understand why people from other parts of the world might like to come to where you live for their annual holiday.

Take care and be happy

Sean x

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