Visiting family, I'm up at my normal time, 5:30, usually in solitude, but this morning sharing my space with another, one who gets up as early as I do while the rest of the house sleeps on. We've done it before, quietly reading, each to our own.
Unfortunately for him, while wonderful for me, I've started a new book that has made me, first, smile, which next turned into a chuckle til finally I had to laugh aloud. With the morning ambiance, though, that almost seems wrong.
I've walked away, for now, having met the characters and been given the premise. First, a man who teaches geography to teenagers whose wife has left him and whose solution to his loneliness at his empty home is to take walks, weekend hikes, which turns his loneliness to solitude (love that: loneliness to solitude). Then there's a woman, a proofreader and editor of books who lives alone, seldom socializing, who has, over the years, lost her friends, while still making excuses to bow out of invites from her one remaining. Finally, Cleo, the deputy head of the school where Michael works and the lone friend of Marnie. She worries about both. The hike is her idea. Seven people in all will be going.
They will be doing what I've dreamed of - taking a long hike in Europe, this one going across Northern England. And, just as I've wanted to do, stopping at places along the way to overnight. (No carting around all that equipment for me.)
Can't wait to get started on their, and my, journey!
Pick It Up
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