how we met!
AFRICAN ROMANCE:
That’s what our friends used to call us and tease us. From the moment we met something inside me said let go, don’t be afraid to love, enjoy the ride. it was the summer of 81. i was on a plane headed for London to get myself situated at a college in Oxford. Elizabeth my sister hurriedly said call Kenny he is great he is studying in Oxford, he knows everything about everything. Input the number in my bad and didn’t think much of it.
After a few days in London i thought what if she asks him whether i had phoned! So i decided to call and just say hi. I was taken aback when he said he could come over and we could chat about my plans and see if he could be of help. that was him, always willing to help others.... So i casually said yes and went about my day.
That evening i will never forget. I was wearing a cream skirt suit, I was at Mrs.... bed and breakfast for young woman.. and she shouted up the stairs, you have a visitor! so in my stocking feet i quickly went down the stairs and came face to face with Kenny. But all i could see was a smile and a Hawaiian shirt! OMG do people really wear these shirts? anyway he said grab your shoes and lets and find somewhere to sit and talk.
That was HIM. He always was ready to help someone. and for the next 31 years he never changed. the rest is history as they say. we were inseparable from that day. he said you have to come to Oxford, don’t change your mind. lovely place. he was a 3rd year Architectural student and Full of Life. for the next week we saw each other every day. as long as he had seen to his Mother's needs for the day, cooked and cleaned, then he could come. I always loved that about him - his Mum came first.
There are a few things that i will never forget. we saw each other every day for the whole week and he said change your ticket stay a while longer, what was i rushing back to Switzerland for? we did go and change my ticket somewhere near Leicester Square. he said lets and promptly parked his car on a double yellow line - it won’t take long. of course the car got clamped and i felt mortified - £35 pounds it cost...
we drove around London, we sat on park benches, we ate Chinese foods, all sorts of things, it was a magical 10 days. and so our African romance blossomed.
London, the city of great adventures!
It was magical for me……
Share your love story, contact me if you would like to. I found writing my own story such a good healing experience. Why? Because I could appreciate that I was so fortunate to have had the opportunity to experience great love. Not everyone is able or is lucky enough to have that. So though I miss him every single day, I can look back and smile about the fun that we had. It has helped me to face the loss, accept that it was for a season and that I would not have swopped it for anything!
The Kannellies Community is all about healing, healing is about acceptance and then about moving on; not forgetting. We have to put one step in front of the other and carry on. It is how we carry on that is important. Life throws us curve balls and everyone has their fair share of curve balls!
Even if you do not want to share your love story, write it down in your journal, just for your eyes. If you have children they will one day ask you how you met, and the early years before they came to this world. Be ready to share with them. If you have written it down, reliving it with them will not be as painful. Just remember that they will want to know if they do not know already. It is part of their own life story too.
As i landed back in Geneva got home and wondered how i was going t explain that i had met the most awesome man? but i said to myself mmm.... summer love and all that. Let me keep it to myself. Maybe nothing would come of it, who knows, and i had promised myself i would just enjoy it and not over think it all.
The very next day Kenny called and we chatted and chatted and it seemed he felt the same as i did. we had a beautiful connection. so i thought i better clear it with my sister and so one evening i asked her is she had any romantic feeling about him since she had introduced us. such a relief when she said no there were just friends.
well that summer was one to remember. for some reason i had a couple of people looking for a romantic relationship with me when i got back. but i said hell no! excuse me. He had captured my heart - forever - so you must be wondering what i meant by African romance? I think it was my shyness and his boldness in professing his love for me? his protecting arm. and i was young in the June a month before I met him i had turned 20. that is not young in many people's estimation. i had never really been serious with anyone, just little romances here and there.
so our love story began. A year later we were parting ways again and then he shot out some words which later i took to mean marry me - please let’s stay together, be the mother of my children was what he had said. we were on the tube and he was taking me to the airport.....
