VE day and my mother

Few of us are old enough to remember VE Day, but my mother did; she was 21 a few days before it happened.  At the time she was working for the glamorous American magazine Time Life, and was sent out into Piccadilly Circus to report.  By accident, the Picture Post took her photo, watching a group of dancers, a picture which is often reproduced; she is the young woman in the white shoes.

Sadly, for me, she didn’t quite live to see today, athough there was no doubt her time had come.  However, she always said that her astonishingly positive, glass half full, find the best in people, make the most of life and cope with whatever it throws at you approach was born of gratitude for surviving the war. It was an approach that carried right through to her nursing home this year, and has long inspired my own attitude to life.

RIP

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