Dear Margaret

         Dear Margaret,

I just thought I’d drop you a line to remind you about Cleo’s driver’s exam. She’s very excited and could do with a bit of encouragement. I’m honestly not sure how I feel about her driving. It seems only just now she was finding her feet, cruising between dining chairs and now she’s talking about having her own car. Den just laughs and says be thankful it’s not a motorbike. I suppose that’s something.

Meanwhile, Julian seems to be enjoying Durham, has a lot of friends and has joined, I think, every club on offer. Rowing, boxing, tennis, golf. I’m not sure where he finds the time to actually study medicine!

Otherwise, we’re fine. Den fell getting out of the car in March and his knee has been worrying him ever since. Of course he won’t go to the doctor. I said it might be a fracture but Den is Den and so.

I also wanted to mention that we are all holding you responsible, personally, for the current climate crisis the planet is facing. You’ve always driven when you could have walked. You’ve had endless long-haul holidays (who goes to Chicago twice?!?), you’ve eaten a lot of out-of-season fruit and you’ve never recycled.

I know this might seem trivial to you, Maggie, but you have destroyed the fragile ecosystems of Planet Earth and I just thought it was worth mentioning that we all strongly disapprove. If I could go back in time, I’d find you in your crib and bash your skull in, you mindless cunt.

Hopefully, we might get down to Teignmouth towards the end of the summer. Den’s been quoting an Airstream renovation in Newton Abbott so we might be heading down towards you at some point. We should go to that place you mentioned where the maitre d’ does karaoke. That sounded fun.

               Love to Chris and the twins.

                                                Pat xxx