Ioannis' house

A poignant aspect of this journey. Today is our cat Billy's birthday and I am not there to sing him the birthday song. He won't even know but I still miss the ritual and making a fuss of him.
But more seriously, there is a melancholy aspect to revisiting old chapters of your life. Thirty years on, Ioannis is no more and his old house lies empty and forlorn, the paint peeling and a window left open to let the weather in. It looks like there's no one left to care for it.
The house is full of memories for me. Summers when I arrived with a rucksack and a guitar off the ferry and looking for somewhere cheap to stay. A charming unpretentious and slightly shabby multiple occupancy guest house with mostly sympathetic visitors, lots of music making, stories, photography, humour and fooling about.
Plumbing was one of the house's eccentricities. The house was old and the flush lavatory had been built as an afterthought in the garden. The wastewater from the kitchen sink ran down into the toilet bowl in the back garden below and then on to the sewer. The wonderful thing about this arrangement was that when a new guest arrived and needed to test the plumbing facilities, you could wait until they seated themselves on the throne down below, rig the speaker of an old boom box up next to the kitchen sink and give it a blast of Bob Marley. Down below, suitably amplified by the pipes, the sound would echo out of the thunder box, much to the surprise of the unsuspecting visitor.
I am not by nature all that much of a drinker but one summer I had too much Metaxa and we ended up playing tag. Not a brilliant idea when you are legless. I fell off a wall and injured an elbow. This unfortunate incident led to my arm swelling up massively, an onset of fever, and a visit from the young island doctor, Giorgos. This proved to be the beginning of a warm friendship.
Now the house stands empty and the music and laughter exists only in my memory. Hanne Lene and I came here because this is the place where we met, 29 years ago tomorrow. It is both moving and a little sad to stand looking at these peeling walls...but I am glad we came, joining up the dots between past and present.