Today, I had a very unusual and rather thought provoking occurrence at work. Our building is open to the public, and it doesn't have a specific reception, so very often people who are thoroughly lost turn up at our offices looking for directions. Today, an elderly couple in their late 60s, early 70s, turned up. They had travelled for three days - all the way from Australia - to find their daughter. She hadn't been in contact with them for ten years, and they'd managed to trace her to the university. They'd spoken with several members of HR, and had tracked down where she had possibly recently worked, so they were pretty sure she wasn't dead. The couple were exhausted, and very lost. I directed them as best I could. The whole episode made me uncomfortable and a little melancholy; they'd be tracing her from Australia as far as they could, so they'd booked a flight and come over to continue the work. They literally got into Edinburgh last night, had stayed at a nearby hotel, and had come straight to the uni first thing this morning. They seemed very excited at the prospect of finally finding her. And they were so elderly! It was as if they were trying to find her before they died. And the lady had fallen last night, and badly twisted her ankle, so she could barely walk - but they didn't have time to go and get it checked, or let her rest up. Now of course, I don't know the whole story; the daughter may have excellent reasons for not wanting to speak to them. Perhaps they did something terrible, so that she cut them out of her life; I know from experience that parents can do horrible things to their children (not my parents, I hasten to add), things that entirely justify their children never speaking to them again. But even so, it left me with an unsettled feeling for the rest of the day, and the desire to hug three very specific people.
On a lighter note, I also have a bunch of pictures to share. P and I went for a walk round Blackford Pond, where I was able to play with my zoom lens. It was a beautiful sunny spring day, with many baby waterfowl in evidence - and even a bunny - despite the teeming hordes of yelling small children and yummy mummies pushing buggies and conversing about where Jemima will go to school. There was one pair of mothers I did admire though: they'd somehow managed to persuade their three-or-four year olds that pushing buggies is the best thing ever. So the kids were happily pushing their own buggies round the pond (and racing each other) while the mothers sauntered behind, unencumbered by buggy. A very cunning plan, I thought. One of the mothers thought so too; she saw me looking, and shared a conspiratorial grin.
Anyway, on to the wildlife. Herein are photos of fuzzyness (ducklings) and fluffyness (cootlets), a bunny, and some rather comical ducks.
