And I've never seen a year that didn't look better looking back, so here's to the new year in the hope that it will bring that elusive buyer to "Riverbend".
Strangely, on the last day of the old year the phone rang and a voice - not a 'moneyed' voice - said,
"I'm calling about youse place."
"Yes, what can I tell you?"
"'ow big's the land?"
"Over seven acres."
"Right, hmm, yeah, looks big. 'owmuchisit?"
"Around two million."
"...(silence)...."
"Hello ... Hello ..."
"...(silence)..."
I think he just hung up.
Friends and guests who come to "Riverbend" ask me, "Why do you want to leave this beautiful place?" and assure me, "You live in Paradise!", but even Paradise can be tiring and what they don't know is that, while in all my years of roaming I managed once or twice to stay in a place for 21 months, I never stayed anywhere as long as I have at "Riverbend": 21 years! Never!
I remember this song from the late 60s by the band Herman's Hermits: "Rise and shine, sleepy Joe, There are places to go" and "Nowґs the time, donґt you know, To get into a new kind of dream".
My new kind of dream has been for some time to go overseas again and the year when I turn septuagenarian may well be the time to do it. There's still so much more to see and do apart from renovating kitchens and repairing ride-on mowers and taking out the garbage and watching welfare cheats waving in a funny way with only their middle finger stuck up in the air.
When the end comes, I don't want to be in my slippers. I want to still have my boots on; not gum boots either, but hiking boots, well worn and dirty! Rise and shine, sleepy Joe, there are places to go!
So here's to the new year in a new place - in fact, some 18,307 new places which is the number of islands in the Indonesian archipelago!
