Will it last?

When I look back on it, all these years later, it’s hard to comprehend how I could go from feeling deeply, unhappily bereft, to a place of love and renewed happiness in such a short time. But would it last?

Many times, from inside and outside of our relationship, people have pondered, “what makes this work?” To all intents and purposes, we are so different. Where faith and spirituality are important to me, Steve holds onto a scientific curiosity with the world. Where I love to socialise with large groups of people and draw energy from a party, these things are more draining for the introvert in Steve. And where my response to most conversations is, “And how do you feel about that?”, emotional currency was not top of Steve’s repertoire. Logic ruled.

And yet…it seemed to be working. Despite all of that and more reasons beside.

We found each other so intrinsically fascinating, so ‘other’. Never would our brains tackle an issue from the same angle! But there was a comfortableness in time spent together. And the more we talked, the more we discovered that we had in common. There were many parallels in our upbringing and our life experiences. But most of all, we shared common values. Integrity bound us together: we always knew we could and would speak the absolute truth to each other. There have been no lies and no deceit.

There has been plenty of travelling and plenty of friendships; friendships formed, renewed or strengthened.

That first summer together was so meaningful. When I discovered that Steve had never really visited London, I picked up the phone to my fabulous Colombian friend, Catalina, who was teaching in London and living with her husband in Lewisham. They were happy to host us so that I could show Steve the sights of the Capital – we had a fantastic few days being tourists.

Then I rang and booked a night at St John’s. Steve had expressed immediate interest in seeing where I’d studied. For varied reasons, Cambridge is an important part of my story. I had first visited aged 8 when my second sister, Libby, was studying architecture there. Ten years later I followed in her footsteps, but reading Languages. For both of us, it seemed a privilege to study there; to walk daily through these ancient, symmetrical courtyards, courtesy of a full grant. On the Bridge of Sighs with Steve, I explained how 18-year-old me would pinch myself crossing the bridge to go and fetch my post each day. It was a dream. But I was never quite sure I was meant to be there, partially due to the ethereal beauty of the place and partially because it was SO hard. I struggled and lost confidence many times (the constant sense of not being good enough). But, as so often in my life, the people around me during those 3 Johnian years carried me through (along with the knowledge that Libby had come through the other side!) And I was delighted to be able to show Steve around (I’ve almost enjoyed Cambridge more since I left than I did at the time.) In addition, I was entirely single through university, so it felt pleasantly novel to walk down The Backs, beside the Cam, hand in hand with a man…

From Cambridge we travelled north. It already felt significant to go and meet our families and see the places we are from. Steve had met most of my family at the housewarming and Mum had been down to visit too. In fact Steve had to come and bale us out when we got lost on a walk in the Cotswolds! He then impressed Mum by cooking us a 3-course meal…the man knew how to dazzle the one who would be his mother-in-law. We’d also taken my baby niece to Warwick Castle together…for such a tall man, he was amazing with little ones; even shy ones would quickly be smiling and laughing at Steve.

In Ripon, the Yorkshire Dales, we stayed with my fourth sister, Helen, who lives close to Fountains Abbey, which is a perfect spot for a walk together. At reception we had a choice: to buy tickets for the day, or to take out a year’s membership. It just seemed like the logical thing to do, as we were heading up to Northumberland from here – many more historic houses and castles to explore. But afterwards I did wonder, was this merely pragmatic (just a tight northern bloke saving a few pounds) or were we already saying we would still be day tripping together in 2005?!

When we headed to Northumberland, to what had been the world’s largest coal mining village, a warm welcome awaited us. But at the same time, I was slightly at a loss. I hadn’t realised how strong the dialect was in Steve’s home town. I was used to Steve’s soft accent but he had been away nearly as long as he had lived there. ‘Gan’ was ‘go’. ‘Wor’ was ‘our’. ‘Me’ was ‘my’. ‘How’s ya fettle marra?’…what was I meant to reply? I didn’t want to seem rude. I am a northerner too. And a linguist to boot. This inability to communicate was embarrassing! Now I am aware that there are English: Geordie dictionaries and that Ashingtonian is a different dialect again – books can explain about the unique culture and language here – I could not.

But there was no misunderstanding the generous hospitality of Steve’s Mam and Dad. It was as if they had never expected their son to bring home a young lady…after all, their friends had been grandparents for many years and many were already great-grandparents.

Despite the fact that conversation was a little stilted at first, the Harrison family seemed very happy that I had arrived in their lives. I hoped to have many more opportunities to get to know them better…