Hilary

We bought our house from Hilary, who has moved into a bungalow in Bangor. I spent many hours at Cherryvalley having tea with her, especially after she broke her kneecap and was laid up. I went to visit her today in Bangor and found her as gracious and cheerful as ever, despite remaining horizontal much of the day. She sits with her legs up on a sofa that is in front of a window overlooking Belfast Lough. While I visited her, we watched a seal swim by, many cormorants dive for fish, a human swimmer in a wetsuit (!!!) swim towards Bangor and, later, back toward Belfast.

She's a very good story teller and I loved the one about how she used to go into Belfast every week during The Troubles. Her husband and kids worked in the city and she felt it was important to go there to shop, partly to keep up the morale of the people working in the shops. Bomb scares are a real downer and Belfast wasn't much fun in the 1970s and 1980s.

She told me about being stuck on a bus into town during a bomb scare. Back then buses had conductors as well as drivers. She said the conductor had a broad Belfast accent and had the passengers in stitches telling stories during the long hours they were stuck. When the bomb scare was over, no one wanted to get off the bus. She said he had that Belfast sense of humor that is so prized by people who live here.

One last Hilary story. The first time we visited our new home, we found a bottle of wine, a bouquet of flowers and a card. This from a woman on crutches who had many other things to worry about. The card read:
"I hope you are as happy in Number 17 as we have been. I could not have left such a treasured home in better hands. With love, Hilary."

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