This week I was reminded why we made the right decision to move to Colchester. We’d done our time in St Albans and it was loosing its appeal. It’s full of 4×4/people carrier driving stay at home mums and wankers in Saabs and Jeeps who are more interested in material things than actual real life. St Albans is a very good advertisement about all that is wrong in this country at the moment.
Colchester is nearly as affluent in parts as St Albans but the residents have a much better outlook on life. There is an even balance of people and everyone seems genuinely willing to help one another.
Colchester is also much more beautiful than St Albans and even though I sometimes feel the commute is a little longer it’s more than worth it.
There is a huge wealth of parks and woodlands and most notably for us is the small protected wood to the rear of our house and the oak meadow and meadowland literally opposite our front door.
During my commute on Thursday evening I had time to notice it was particularly spring like. It was warm. Sunny. And there was a beautiful February sunset to accompany my journey.
Once you get past Chelmsford things get very rural and its lovely to see fields of green packed with rambling like stock, weirs, brooks and cute villages scattered around the landscape.
I have to pinch myself when I realise we have been residents of Colchester for nearly 10 months already and I love our new home more and more every day.
Richard, Brandy and I have settled in so well and it really does feel like home. Rather than someone’s house which we rented and occupied.
Of course we’re now past the initial move in phase and are considering how to upgrade the house to suit our tastes and requirements.
This starts with a visit from an Interior Designer on Saturday and includes plans for freshening up the hall and adding feature walls to the living room and our bedroom.
We have already made some changes as I have reported in the past and recent editions include our new security system. A system which caused us by some happy accident to discover our front door is made of steel and not of wood as we thought. Imagine our surprise when we tried to drill into it and the drill bit buckled!
We still have lots of friends to come and stay and some who have been many times already but it pleases me (us) that everyone is so taken-aback by what we have acquired.
Richard and I work damn hard and it’s nice to see the fruits of our labour baring ripe morsels.
Long may it continue and long may we have lots of pleasure in finding new and exciting (as well as familiar and routine) things to do in Colchester, Essex, Suffolk and beyond.
Anyone who criticises Essex and it’s people need to move away from the mindless media stereotypes and come in further from London. You will be pleasantly surprised.
Keith Tomlinson Photography 