When I was young the older people in the family used to refer to the United Kingdom as “The Old Country”. This is where their parents or grandparents had left England, Scotland and Northern Ireland in the mid 1800s, never to return.
This blog is about my year in England, returning to the land of my ancestors, working in a Midland’s school and living in a small semi-detached house next to a graveyard.
From a mixture of hand written notes, diary extracts and emails to friends in Australia I am compiling the definitive record of the year 2004, when I finally fulfilled a lifelong dream of leaving the security of home and embarking on the greatest adventure of my life.
This is my 6th A to Z. Previous titles were:
2017 – Fact or Fiction – Family Stories
I look forward to sharing this year’s A to Z with you and also to reading the blogs of the many other contributors in this wonderful month of writing!
The Curry Apple Orchard 
Looking forward to this anecdote.
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You were quick off the mark Sue. Thanks for the thumbs up.
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Looking forward to keeping you company. Part of the fun of the challenge is reading other People’s blogs too 🙂
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What a fun idea for the challenge, and what a great adventure that must have been!
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I’m looking forward to hearing about your garden, Lisa. It might help me identify some of the plants in mine.
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Good on you Linda.
Its good to put things in some sort of chronological order and to record as much as you can remember.
Cheers,
Ruth
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Ive been meaning to do this for a long time – 17 years!
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I lived abroad from late 1992 to late 1994 and I remember the adventure fondly. I am looking forward to reading about yours.
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As a lover of history I am interested to find out who your 100 year old people are. Well maybe they are no longer with us but it would have been an exciting time to live, for some anyway.
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That must have been an adventure! And makes a great theme for A to Z! 🙂
The Multicolored Diary
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I’m keen to find out more about Tarot cards too.
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Looking forward to this journey. Good luck with the challenge.
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I’m half way through writing posts so this should give me a chance to read yours and learn more about your Trilogy.
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That’s good progress, I’m about a quarter of the way through mine, hoping to have it all done before April starts!
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Great theme! Looking forward to it!
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I’ve been wondering what your theme would be for this year and I am looking forward to reading about your year.
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Hari OM
This will be interesting for us – but all sorts of things for yourself; cathartic? emotional? completion?… reflection always rewards us in some way! YAM xx
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Hello Linda! What a terrific theme! I’m very much looking forward to connecting with you again through the April Challenge. This sounds as if it was quite an adventure and is a topic dear to my heart, having lived most of my life in a country far from the birthplaces of either of my parents. I’m also very interested in how you will be pulling it together.
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It’s strange still feeling a connection to a place the ancestors came from so long ago. I suppose it is because our culture in Australia has been so influenced by the UK, especially when I was growing up.
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Oh wow! It really sounds like the travel of a lifetime.
2004 seems so far away now.
@JazzFeathers
The Old Shelter – Theme Reveal – The Great War
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Yes, finding records from 2004, especially on computers,is no easy task.
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What a wonderful adventure. I can’t wait to read about your experiences living in England.
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Looking forward to reading this. I am in England so I am sure I will relate to your articles.
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I’m pleased to see a fellow travel writer in this A to Z. As travel out of my own country is not possible for some time it will be good to sit back and enjoy yours.
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Thanks Linda. I look forward to yours too.
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Nice to see your blog pop up again. I’ll enjoy reading about your experiences.
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Thanks Eilene, it’s already a busy time responding to everyone but lots of fun.
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Love this theme! I visited England for a month about a decade ago, and have been dying to go back. I’d love to live there for a year! For now I’ll just live vicariously through your posts.
– Allison (https://lightningflashx.blogspot.com/)
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This will be a fun read…look forward to it.
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As students at the University of London we’re really looking forward to your anecdotes! Quite a few of us are not from Britain, so we’re curious about whether your experience of England is similar to ours!
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Well it was some time ago and I was older than you even then so we will see.
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It’s going to be a fun theme! Looking forward to it
My 2021 AtoZ Reveal
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I hope to get some ideas from your blog which will make me get out my sewing machine.
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That’s pretty cool. I always hear “the old country” meaning Italy. But there are a lot of Italians in my area.
J Lenni Dorner~ Co-host of the #AtoZchallenge, Debut Author Interviewer, Reference& Speculative Fiction Author
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Sounds like your A to Z is going to be an exciting mixture. Looking forward to it.
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Great topic. Cant wait to see what you post for each letter. Never been across to the ole country
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Are you doing the A to Z?
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Interesting! My family emigrated from Germany to the US a couple centuries ago. I wonder how I’d survive a year in Germany?
I’ll be doing flash fiction for AtoZ, a theme that worked well for me in the past. Hope to see you around the blogosphere next month!
Doesn’t Speak Klingon
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I look forward to reading your Flash Fiction stories this year. I see you don’t speak Klingon (I was a Trekkie as a teenager many decades ago) but do you speak German? That would help if you were there for a year.
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My partner and I are just coming to the end of 6 months hiding from Covid 19 next door to her sister in Crete and if I had had a little more foresight, I might have made diary of this for A2Z…
Instead I am using the challenge to try and finish a novel over at
https://how-would-you-know.blogspot.com/2021/03/the-big-reveal.html
However I shall look forward to your account with interest!
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I like reading novels on A to Z. I wrote one myself last year but had to keep going as I hadn’t finished when I got to Z.
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An did you ever finish it?
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Yes, I wrote the second part called “Annie’s Secret” on my blog site. It was a fictionalised version of the life of my parents and grandparents.
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A great theme, and I can imagine a very special one to prepare too, going back to the memories of that year. I look forward to learn more about it!
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So looking forward to this!
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Stopping by from the #AtoZChallenge Road Trip! I’ve only read a few of these entries so far, but wow! What an experience. Looking forward to reading the rest.
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Thanks for stopping by. I hope to do more Road Trip when we do our real road trip next week. Busy packing at the moment.
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