{"id":19011,"date":"2012-10-19T15:56:26","date_gmt":"2012-10-19T14:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/?p=19011"},"modified":"2012-10-19T15:56:26","modified_gmt":"2012-10-19T14:56:26","slug":"margaret-punter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/?p=19011","title":{"rendered":"Margaret Punter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cousin George<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s raining! George said it would rain once he was on the plane. Clever clogs! George is my cousin \u2013 an American.
\nI met him, the first time, twenty-odd years ago. He was a sergeant in the \u2018Undefeated United States Army\u2019. He was so good looking in that uniform; happy, confident, centre of attention, super-fit. He was in his early twenties and we, my sisters and I, were in our early teens. So he was just what the doctor ordered to cheer up the long school hols. He turned his whole stay into a whirlwind of laughter and \u2018English tea\u2019. He teased us all mercilessly. Our sides ached . . . and our legs.
\nGeorge ran every morning and we were all woken in good time to join him. I can still hear that stupid song he insisted on singing. What a spectacle we must have made as we jogged, in time, around the streets and through the park. I went twice, but that was enough. Then his stay was over. He left for Germany, promising to keep in touch, but over the years . . .
\nSuddenly one Sunday afternoon, there was a call \u2018Good Afternoon Mam! Is that Margaret? Well hello again, this is Cousin George!\u2019 And he burst into our lives again a week later.
\nMore English Tea, lunches, visits to museums, running on the beach, card games, quizzes and barbecues. He told us all about his family and we introduced him to ours. The kids fell in love with him and in step behind him as he jogged along to that same old tune \u20181, 2, 3, 4 . . . 1, 2, 3, 4!!\u2019
\nHe was still good-looking, maybe a few pounds heavier, laughing and joking. He kept reminding us he had brought the good weather with him and with a big smile he’d add \u2018You are welcome!\u2019 And he certainly had \u2013 it was a glorious fortnight. Another American whirlwind experience and then he was gone. I sat in the kitchen with a second cuppa watching the rain.
\nGeorge had left a printed card with all his contact details on it. I wonder if I could manage that e-mail business that George talked about.
\nHe said it was so easy to keep in touch . . .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cousin George It’s raining! George said it would rain once he was on the plane. Clever clogs! George is my cousin \u2013 an American. I met him, the first time, twenty-odd years ago. He was a sergeant in the \u2018Undefeated United States Army\u2019. He… Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[177],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19011"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19011"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19011\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19013,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19011\/revisions\/19013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bohemiavillage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}