The Offer Of A Lifetime

Dontcha just hate it. I had a phone call this morning from the French West Indies. A French Artist friend of mine, Martine Coton, called to repeat the job offer I had three years ago. That is to run an Art Gallery / shop in Guadaloupe. It seems she is so busy running her own Art gallery, she hasn't time to paint the pictures to replenish the stocks. So she wants me to take over the Art gallery so she can sit on the palm fringed beaches painting her exotic pictures.
Why me? Because I speak English and although it's the French West Indies they are getting shit loads of American tourists. There's more to it than just speaking English, she know I have a passion for Art and I'm a business man, which is what she needs.
Oh God! Can you see me living in the tropics? Sipping beer on the beach? Taking money off Americans? Taking photos of exotic sunsets and selling them. When I could be living here, in the cold and damp, scratching a living selling paper bags for vacuum cleaners. (amongst other things).
Yes I can too.
But then reality rears it's ugly head. I have responsibilities here. I run the family business and if I take off, half my family is out of work. My children need me here. (until they are established themselves). So reluctantly I had to decline the offer for the second time.
But it's a great dream, living the life as an ex patriate, never having to wear a suit again, (not that I wear suits now), never having to endure another black dog winter, living a simple life under the palm trees.
Well that would cover six months of the year the other six months would be in France running the second gallery in Pont Aven. Pont Aven is the French equivalent of St Ives in cornwall a mecca for art lovers.
So it'd be April to September in France then October until March in the West Indies.
They say as you get older you gain baggage. Well I've got a shit load. I guess over the next few years I've got to shed all this baggage and start again. Become a free spirit. Sometimes I think the life I have is a millstone round my neck.
Meanwhile there's fun to be had taking photos of bands.

Rock on Dudes

PS Todays photo was taken on a dull dreary day with the wind cutting through me. It's heavily cropped. But I loved the sight of all those birds just toughing it out on the telephone lines. I need a longer lens.