LEAVING HOME

My elder son, who is 20, is leaving home. He is moving to Copenhagen, and starting at the Business School there in August.

Today my wife and I helped him move all his things. We filled a trailer, and drove over the bridge to the big city. He has a room in a fifth floor apartment quite close to the centre, which he "inherited" from his cousin, who used to live there. We lugged everything up five flights of stairs, and met his landlord (a very nice teacher), who gave him his set of keys. Then we went off to Ikea, bought him a bed, bed linen, pillow and clothes horse; and then made everything cosy for him to move in. He won't formally move until mid-August, so he came back to Fünen with us. But the die is cast.

He has been away from home before, not least to spend four months doing national service during the spring. But this time it is different. His course will be for five years, and he will be living in the middle of a capital city, with his own place and with all of its myriad attractions. From now on, it is more likely that we will visit him than the other way round.

It is an exciting time, and I can feel that excitement on his behalf. Since that will be good for him, it can only be good for me. But there was a tinge of sadness as well; an era is ending.

Walter Blotscher