A puff of smoke and she was gone
Not my photo but doesn't she look wonderful!
I always refer to the Flying Scotsman as a she don't know why always have. I work in a well known Solicitors office in Peterborough for my day job as a legal secretary. Our offices are in old Railway sheds on the side of the railway track that have been converted over the years. Today we saw the Flying Scotsman go by from the office windows and she looked magnificent. after her recent lengthy overhaul. It was lovely to see her after all this time and she looked wonderful, big black and strong. This train of all others is the one I remember from my childhood and is probably the one that is most loved of all trains.
One of the first places I remember living was Gunthorpe near Oakham and we lived in one of the Lodge cottages to Gunthorpe Hall, the shooting lodge to the Duke of Rutland's Estate. The cottage garden ran down to the Railway track - and the Flying Scotsman used to do a run here every so often. Being proper trains they always used to leave smut on my mum's white washing from the coal and ash and I can still hear her complaining because she had had to wash it all again. Me of course loved it at that time I was well and truly into the Reverend Audry's books so the trains were a big thing in my early life. My brother was also born at the cottage.
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Apparently we will have a chance to see her again tomorrow morning on the return journey just gone 9:30am.
However there is another link. My Great Granddad was a Tuber/Boilermaker and there is a photo of him with his colleagues standing outside the Flying Scotsman after having worked on her. His job was one of the muckiest as he used to strip out all the tubes from the engine. My Great Granddad was originally from London and moved his young family up from London to work just outside of Lincoln and the family settled in Lincoln itself with my Great Granddad going on to have a couple of more children after moving to Lincoln itself. Settling literally around the corner from where my mother's family lived. Mum knew my Great Granddad first as after retiring from the Railway he went on to work as one of the Keepers at the Usher Gallery on Lindum Hill in Lincoln. Mum remembers him telling them off for sitting on the grass so she knew him before she met my dad. Small world when you think about it.
But then I believe that people come into our lives for a reason and a season and serendipity does have a part to play with who arrives when and where. Otherwise there would be just too many coincidences.
Wonderful though to see the Flying Scotsman again that really made my day as I thought she was due to pass by yesterday and I thought I had missed it, so it made it extra special.
Pattypan
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