Before I begin writing this (last) chapter I thought I’d look back at my original ‘Welcome’ page to try and remind myself why I decided to write these memoirs in the first place. My primary aim was to highlight a few of the ‘million’ reasons I love the Rock and hopefully I’ve managed to do that although no doubt a few more will come out during the course of this chapter too and why wouldn’t they?
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As a work in progress (regular readers know I don’t plan posts I literally write whatever springs to mind) I do sometimes revisit a post and check what I’ve written, occasionally making amendments. Sometimes something may be out of date order, or there may be something I want to expand on. If I were to amend my ‘Welcome’ page and add a second aim it might be to analyse why it took me forty years to return to Gibraltar but having said that I don’t see the point. I think that question is being answered bit by bit anyway.

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If I was a reader, and not the writer, I’d probably now be really curious about what became of everyone in the family during those forty years between 1976 and 2016. What became of the children who are obviously now adults, do they have their own children? And what of Carol and Alan, they must be in their sixties by now, how are they? If I was a reader and not the writer (having trawled through two chapters and become ‘attached’ in the literary sense to everyone) I’d probably be even more than curious. 

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But I’m not a reader, I am the writer; a writer wanting (and trying very hard) to stay in tune with my reader. So before fast forwarding forty years to 2016 I wanted to just reassure that all five of us are still alive, still kicking and still as lovingly close as we always were for which I feel incredibly blessed. If I said that the past forty years had been a picnic I’d be a liar but then who’s life has been a picnic? We are all just human beings doing the best we can for the people we love, and those tales are for a different memoir.

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No doubt during this final chapter I’ll drop in the occasional anecdote about the children and their lives but only if it’s interesting and in context with the theme – in other words I’ll try not to ramble off on tangents and will try to stick to the point (the point being Memoirs of Gibraltar 🙂 ). If that sounds as though I’ve given myself a good talking to its because I have – to me there’s nothing worse than reading a field full of vegetables when you want the meat. Having said all that I thought it only fair to include a few photos of the five of us in this post as they are in context with today’s ramblings.

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Finally something readers may find amusing before I fast forward forty years; my family know nothing of these memoirs (yet), such is my warped sense of humour – my plan is to give each of them a book for Christmas if I can sort books by then but we’ll see. (Shhh….you heard it here first 🙂 ).

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For now, welcome back and thank you for reading X Alan X

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