It was a bitter-sweet moment - we were glad to have her, but sad for what it meant for Mom and Dad - his deteriorating health meant that he couldn't really drive again in the way that he used to. Mom helped by saying that they were glad she (Rosabella) was going somewhere that she would be used, and that they hadn't wanted to sell her to a stranger.
She didn't know she was The Rosabella by the way, and neither did anyone else. We've never felt the urge to name a vehicle before. This felt just right, and it tied in with a song we'd been singing at our gigs that winter.
She needed a bit of surgery to get her through MOT in February 2009, and the rain still comes in a little - she is getting on a bit though, so we can excuse her being a bit leaky!
The Rosabella arrives, Jan 09
January 2010
Sadly, T's father passed away just before Christmas 2009. He had built The Rosabella and there were plenty of references to 'The Van', as it was called before we took it over, in the eulogies that T and his brothers delivered at the funeral.
It makes it even more poignant now, when we find some little user-friendly wrinkle that he invented, and we hope we can do The Rosabella justice - if we have a fraction of the fun that T's parents had with her we're going to be very lucky people.
Derek Hedges, 1931-2009
No comments:
Post a Comment