Keele Diary #20

I am wrapping up my final full day at Keele. Tomorrow I'll pop in for a few hours in the morning, will deal with some paperwork and lose ends, and will head toward what should be a trying day of jumping from train to train to train to bus in order to get to my hotel near Heathrow.

It's been a wonderful 24 hours. A dear college friend, an American expat now living down in Cornwall, came up. She stayed at new friends' she had met through her sister in law and they kindly came and picked me up yesterday evening. They are, in the local parlance, posh, with a gorgeous house in Crewe, just a few miles from Keele. They overfed us and plied us with good wine (and port, and scotch . . . much of it with, need I say it, amazing cheese) and wonderful conversation. More importantly, I was able to catch up with Gillian. Then today she came to campus with her two children. It was great having them here because I did some things on campus I had not yet tried, including playing a cutthroat game of hide and seek in the stunning nature reserve behind massive, imposing, impressive Keele Hall. There was tree climbing and grass throwing (I was the big victim of the newly mowed projectiles) and running and silliness and tree climbing. There was a late English breakfast. And there was lots of reconnecting with an old friend I get to see too infrequently.

Now I am simply trying to get as much done as possible before giving in o the inevitable reality that time has run short here at Keele. I am saying my gradual goodbyes and am lamenting tasks left unfinished, goals left unmet, opportunities squandered, but also celebrating tangible production in the form of newly printed pages and newly saved files and freshly minted experiences. Tonight I'll watch Manchester United take on Barcelona for the Euro Cup Finals. I will pack. I will sleep in Keele for the last time, at least on this trip. And I will awake with London awaiting my arrival.