The Boy "Well there's two florists in Loughton"
Hopefully that's not a sign that the last five year's education has been wasted. The Boy is a great lover of music - he has quite a talent, and picked up playing the guitar very easily....I'd like to think that it was because he was exposed to recorded music from the earliest days, and live music from when he was knee high to a grasshoppper. Of course we all have off days...
For this week's gallery I chose this shot. Taken just before he started at his then new school five years ago. He was moving from a very right-on school in Finsbury Park, where poverty hung around every corner and there were notices in the school playground telling parents it was harmful to take their children out of school to Bangladesh for three months, to a posh Public School - interestingly it manages to churn out some very well rounded kids without the elitist attitudes of many of its ilk. Perhaps it's because some parents sacrifice a lot to be able to pay the fees for Bancrofts.
He's standing on the balcony of the flat we lived in on Borough High Street. The poor lad had a very long commute because our plans to move close to the school had taken longer than expected. We finally moved in October, and he was then able to walk in five minutes.
Yesterday, he returned to school after the long break as a Fifth former. It's one of the few year's that has a name that most people would recognise - he's been a Third (first year), Remove (second), Lower Fourth and Upper Fourth. I still don't understand the modern way of doing it...is he Year 11?
Fifth form seems to be the beginning of the end...a year of GCSEs, two of 'A' Levels and then away to University. If I remember rightly, the year is accompanied by feelings of being grown up, but without the wisdom and maturity to be gained in the sixth form.
He's looking forward to it. I'm sure it will be another successful year. I hope.
