“The East is not only … something geographical”
(Herman Hesse)
🪴 The house
On the 4th of June 2001, I completed all the legal procedures, handed across the final payment (in cash), and moved into this house in Calpe.
I have lived here ever since—longer than in any other place in my life.
Losses
1. The garden is on three levels. Behind me in this photo you can see three palm trees.
2. In this photo, you can see a fourth palm, at the edge of the upper level.
3. That palm was destroyed by the palm beetle, as were two of the three palms at the front. There is now only one living palm (the one on the other side of the gate)—which gets monthly attention.
Gains
When I first moved in, there was a pretty shrub by the shelter which houses my gas bottles.
Ten years later, this is what had become of that shrub.
In 2002, my sister Elizabeth found a tiny honeysuckle plant on the hillside east of my house.
By 2010, you can see what became of the honeysuckle, via a spoken commentary, and guidance from my granddaughters Jess and Phoebe, in this very short video.
At the end of that video, you will have got a glimpse of my old swimming pool, which was cracked apart by subsidence in late 2023. In 2024, my daughter Imogen and my son Piers paid for this beautiful brand-new pool, complete with underwater lighting.