That’s it, It’s all over, Go Home.

Unfortunately, when writing something like this, there is (if you’re lucky) no great drama at the finale. There are no villains to be caught, and no plot twists to be revealed. No final chases, no explosions. The road trip ends, and everyone gets to go home happily, to contemplate the deeper meaning of the twist of fluff at the centre of their navel. I’m sure that by doing this we brought a little extra brightness to a lot of peoples lives, as well as a fair amount to our own (although we may also have miffed a couple of border guards in the process). I’m really glad that with three days notice I was given the opportunity to go and do this.

I wasn’t immediately going to agree to go. You get quite a bit of opportunity to do charity work when you juggle, and unfortunately it doesn’t always make sense to do it for a number of reasons. Firstly, if people with money are only willing to give to charity because a juggler throws things around, something is seriously wrong with the world. Although having said that, given that some people won’t give to charity unless inexperienced people jump out of airplanes with a parachute that may or may not open, I think it’s fair to say that something is seriously wrong with the world. That’s probably  just the way it is, and we work with it, but still …Secondly, although you could always do this kind of thing for the love of it, that would mean having to do something you don’t love, or in some cases, don’t even like, to make money, which although I know a lot of people do, seems kind of insane to me. Although I’m often the first to claim that sanity is over rated, there are limits. Thirdly, you’d be amazed at what some people try to pass off as ‘for charity’. Quite often, just the fact that they want to jump out of an airplane, but I digress…

…actually, to digress further, we did consider starting a charity to help people who had injured themselves jumping out of airplanes for charity …

This was just one of those cases where it seemed right to do it. I’m exceptionally glad that when given the opportunity to do this, albeit with three days notice, I agreed. For a start, when I was a bit bored it stopped my sanity from tapping on the table, and secondly, I got to see a part of the world which I’m not sure I’d have ever found another reason to go to. I met a lot of wonderful people, I saw a lot of smiles, and some beautiful places, and I now know the joke about the two Dutch nuns.

One More Time …

All that said, we were now both very tired and seriously looking forward to getting home. As we drove off the ferry, and then started on our way out of Dover, the road we were on headed into a hole in the hillside.

Jonathan said quietly, as if it may be a distinct possibility …“I really hope this isn’t the Channel Tunnel”.

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