Reading Brenda’s most recent letter sends my thoughts in all kinds of different directions.

One of the many legacies for which I am grateful is a keen appreciation for landscape. So often I’ve heard people say that they get used to a view – wonderful or awful – and virtually stop seeing it. That is not in the realms of possibility for me. In The Valley (the Buccament Valley, often referred to by people outside our family as the Punnett Valley, but never, ever by us; we mostly just called it The Valley), we always celebrated the magnificent setting in which we conducted our lives. That awareness of surroundings remains a vital part of my sense of wellbeing, and though I have not lived in The Valley for 35 years, it remains an essential part of who I am.

As Brenda said, we grew up at Twenty Hill… a property that Daddy bought from Uncle Langley, I believe. I think it must have been a part of Peniston Estate, which Uncle Langley ‘bought’ from his father as Daddy did Queensbury; Uncle Jack, Cane Grove; and Uncle Duncan, Pembroke – all estates in The Valley which had belonged to our grandfather, John Langley Punnett (1881 - 1950).

Twenty Hill was about 10 acres and the fairly primitive house was built by Daddy on the flattened top of a hill within The Valley, with 360 degrees of marvelous aspect. Over time you will no doubt hear more from us about the magic of Twenty Hill. We stayed there until Daddy’s mother died and he inherited her home, Hope House (on about 17 acres), in 1970. We moved to a larger, more finished house with electricity; but not even the thrill of flicking a switch to get bright light was enough to make up for the loss of our much loved childhood home. For decades we hankered for it, imagined re-purchasing it, and I know that it was only about 5 years ago that I accepted, in a dream, that Twenty Hill would never again be mine. But I can still feel the cool thrum of water in the external pipes that we clambered on to sneak in the window of my parents’ bathroom, the exhilaration of swinging way over the side of the hill off the cedar tree, the independence of climbing high up in the almond tree near to the End Room, my bedroom, with a book in hand and our whole world below me. I carry it all deep within me, beyond memory.

And the beat goes on! 

One love,
Lisbie x