My Parents Visit

My parents visited the weekend before last. It was their first visit to us since we moved to the midlands. They said they’d be leaving their home at 8.30 but I wasn’t surprised to get a text at 7.45 saying that they were then leaving. I wasn’t surprised either later when they said they'd been kicking their heels for some time waiting to leave at 7.45. They brought an old chair for us to increase our sitting options by a third. I lifted it out of my dad's car and put it just inside the front door. It's still there. It seems pointless to put it in front of the tv that only has one channel. As soon as they arrived we went straight into a tour of the house. Since we’ve removed the hand rail on the stairs they ascended on all fours. Much to my surprise they really liked the house. My dad likes to play it safe and if buying a house would opt for a brand new one, not one that needed work in every part of every room but he could see the potential that we’d seen when we’d first viewed it although he did have some concerns about the cost of the entire project. I think because we presented as calm about it he was reassured. We’d booked them into a hotel because of the state of the house so after re-fuelling them with several very strong cups of tea we delivered their car to their hotel and then went for a wander around Leamington. Like a couple of five year olds they were full of questions; What’s the name of the river? Why is it called Royal Leamington Spa? Why is there a statue of Queen Victoria in front of the town hall? We didn’t know the answers to any of these so had to read the little plaques and signs around the town. We found an advert for guided historical tours of the town during the summer evenings. We should sign up. My dad moves a little slower these days and my mum’s poor hearing and memory make for a lot of repetition. She asked Marianna five times if her parents had visited us here yet and she asked me the same thing about my nephew twice. Although as proof that my memory is no better I don’t recall what that question was. We stopped in Jephson park for more strong tea and they resisted Marianna's encouragement to return to the hotel for a nap and then the three of them engaged in their favourite activity and toured the town’s charity shops. If Marianna’s bank card was stolen and the thief used it the bank would wonder why less money was coming out of the account. Having said that I was the only one who bought anything. In the evening we went to The Saxon Mill for a very lovely meal and afterwards took a brief walk towards the ruins of a stately home. Marianna accosted a man carrying a guide book who clearly hadn’t spoken to another human being for many years and looked quite terrified. He informed us that we were looking at Guys Cliffe House. It’s the first house I’ve seen for some time that’s in a worst state than ours.

On the Sunday we went to Kenilworth Castle which was very impressively organised with lots of accessible information and interactive activities to keep a 39 year old occupied. The grounds were very beautiful and the staff extremely helpful in a particularly unEnglish way. Mum and Dad weren’t too interested to read about the history of the buildings and artifacts, claiming they were too old to take on new information and so just larked about but they did listen to the audioguide which we all wore. It's the first time i've visited somewhere like that with my parents when i wasn't wearing my school uniform. We went on from there to the Fleur De Lys at Lowsonford for more lovely food. Satiated, we returned home to provide them with more super strong tea. "Will you be providing any Grandchildren any time soon?" my mother asked, being uncharacterstically forward. I hurried them towards their car and we waved them goodbye as they headed back to the Fens.