The letter came this morning; plopped right down onto my doormat.  I didn't pick it up right away.  I knew what it was and a rather large part of me didn't actually want to know what it said.  I spent most of the morning polishing the bath and jiff-cleaning the banisters.  Keeping myself occupied seemed to be the only option, and definitely the best distraction.  And anyway, I happen to quite like hoovering.   I made myself a cup of tea with an extra spoonful of coffee granules - then tipped it away and made one with sugar instead.  I went into the hall, picked up the letter and carried it to the kitchen table.  Leaving it there I rummaged around for a few biscuits, drank my tea then put the kettle back on again.  Moving slowly towards the table, mind racing, hands shaking, I gingerly reach out... and then jump six foot as the phone rings, and I just know it will be my mother asking if the letter has arrived yet.  I don't tell her it has.  She will insist on me opening it there and then so she can find out at the same time.  She has an insatiable curiousity for letters, my mum.  Even if it is not addressed to her she just has to know what it says.  Hanging up I hear the kettle boil and the merry shouting of children from the school down the road.  It must be ‘play-time'.  I make a third cup of tea and give the cat some more food.  The cat, never being one to turn away from ‘seconds', happily goes to her bowl. 

Pushing aside my mug, I brush the crumbs away from the placemat in front of me and pull the letter over.  Its franked, not stamped.  I always prefer stamps; they feel more personal some how.  To make it worse, my name and address is printed on one of those white sticky labels that you buy by the hundred.  At least the envelope is white and not brown.  I try to open it carefully, so as not to tear it, but I am foiled by the super-strength glue.  I give in and tear it across the top.  Anyway, it's much more satisfying when you get to rip it.  I pull out the two sheets of paper inside, they are stapled together.  The front one is a standard letter dated 3^rd June - that's yesterday.  Postal service seems to be doing its job rather well then!  I can clearly see what the second sheet has on it through the first, but I try not to look.  If I acknowledge it, then I will know the answer before I read it for myself.  And I have to read it.  I need to see it there in black and white before I can let myself believe it. 

The letter is signed L. Johnson, Executive P.A.  Sounds official, but she's probably only a glorified secretary.  Then again, she might not be a miss.  She might even be a mister!  The part of my mind that is trying to wander - trying to prolong this moment - keeps being dragged by its scruff back to those two pieces of paper in my hands.  Those two sheets of paper that have come to mean the world.  Hmm, the letter heading is a bit plain, just blue with a small unidentifiable logo - a circle and a squiggly thing.  It doesn't really stick in your memory.  But the contents... now there is something that will surely stick.  I take a deep breath and read and then re-read.  As I am reading again, for the sixth time I think, I start to feel sick in my stomach.  The emotions are coming in waves and are making me feel warm and light headed.  I put the letter down.  Smiling ridiculously at the cat (who sits there washing a very inappropriate place for the occasion) I begin to slide my chair back and then stop.  Looking back down at the letter and the attached map the first seeds of doubt and insecurity take hold.  I shake my head at myself.  I have been through all this.  To get this far should surely banish all anxiety.  But they don't so I get up and phone my mother.  She is suitably pleased, well in tears actually.  She cries how proud she is of me and how she always knew I could do this, until I begin to feel a little better about it.  I think mums are good for your self-esteem.  Suddenly smiling again I tell her I have more calls to make and proceed to call everyone in my phone book.  Except one.  But they wouldn't be interested anyway.  Ignoring the un-used number I put the phone back on the hook and take up the map.  It's quite a long way away.  As I contemplate getting on the train with all my belongings and the cat (no mean feat!) The phone rings again.  The caller I.D. flashes the number I deliberately didn't call.  I say hello and then nothing. What else can I say?  I pause with the phone cradled between my shoulder and my ear and bend down to stroke the cat, now rubbing around my ankles.  Eventually the voice speaks.  I am being congratulated, but it doesn't feel like it much.  I get a reluctant offer of a ride down there as well - I am honoured.  I decline politely then hang up.  Talking out loud to the cat I tell her we have got this far by ourselves and we shall jolly well get the rest of the way by ourselves too.  Right puss?  She doesn't think much of that and stalks off, tail in the air.  Determined now I take one last look at the letter.  There it is, in black and white.  I did it.  I am on my way.