One small step for Stanley.....

I don’t know if this counts as a coincidence (the theme of this month’s posts) but when I finally ventured outside this morning - after two days of wind, rain and wintery autumn greyness – I discovered the thermometer lying on the floor looking battered.

Normally it hangs on the outside wall; today it lies upside down among the soggy leaves permanently recording an extremely optimistic 40 degrees Celsius.

Assuming however that this does not constitute a coincidence, purely a logical sequence to climatic events, I need to look elsewhere.

Vicky, who has been leaving comments on this blog and seems to see coincidences everywhere, informs me that November the 10th is the 138th anniversary of Stanley bumping into Livingstone somewhere in Africa, sometime ago.

(I must have miscounted, I could have sworn it was more like the 136th, but you know how time flies when you’re enjoying yourself.)

Furthermore, Vicky informs me that she saw her next-door neighbour recently and that his name is also Stanley.
Now THAT is a coincidence!

I met Stanley once, though obviously neither the African lost and found officer, nor Vicky’s neighbour, but Stanley Kewalsky ( I THINK that is how he spells his name…..well it’s how I spell his name).

And I have a photo of Stanley jumping over a barrier separating him from Freedom and the Berlin Wall - indirectly the subject of yesterday’s post!

Blimey, what a coincidence!

I’ll go and have a look to see if I can find it.

Wow, another coincidence – I thought it might be in one of the many photo albums straining the bookshelves and I was dreading that it might be in the bottomless box of photos currently residing underneath the bed that need to be stuck in those albums – but the first one I pick up and open (they are not labelled) and bingo there he is!

I’ll scan it now and add it to the blog.

Hang on.



There.

I think you’ll agree with me that Stanley is blessed with some very long legs and I am glad to report that he was not shot seconds after this snap was snapped.

Now wouldn’t it be a great coincidence if the photo had been taken on the 6th November?

Judging by Stanley’s attire it probably wasn’t.

I knew Stanley first as a technician who was working with Krissie but later I shared a stage with him when we both appeared in a production of Jack and the Beanstalk in an upstairs pub theatre in London.

I am afraid to report that it was not my best moment on stage, despite having the lead role (I was Jack, NOT the beanstalk-ok?) but I have a lovely memory of Stanley and I choreographing a song and dance routine to “The Twelve days of Christmas”.

And that’s a HUGE coincidence because the French (where I am writing from) traditionally eat Oysters at Christmas and Stanley Kewalski is an anagram of……….

Santa Likey Welks!

p.s. I hope to do better in future posts.