An underwriter asks "Why?"

About a month ago a mortgage underwriter asked why we were moving so far away from where we are now to live in such a large house. "Oh, I know this one" I said to my very patient mortgage broking friend Stuart, "It's because we can".

We got the mortgage offer eventually, despite my amusing and witty response to this and a number of other pointless and tedious questions from people who clearly aren't paid to dream. (I will grudgingly concede that my proposed "how exciting are your plans" approach to underwriting would perhaps be unsustainable for the long term, but wouldn't the world be a better place while it lasted?).

I remember my grandfather sitting in his armchair in the nursing home towards the end of his life. He was very frail by now and his voice was weak as he leant towards me and whispered "don't get old Ollie". I intend to take this advice at face value and to stay as young as I can for as long as possible. In my head I've always assumed that the part of my life when the children can fend for themselves (is that the bit people call retirement?) will be spent somewhere in the Highlands. Fishing and growing vegetables, although not at the same time.


But we're not at that point yet, in fact we're not even half way through our working lives so isn't this a bit premature? Well it turns out that all my wife Wendy needs to keep her happy and, almost as importantly, to keep her bringing home the bacon, is an internet connection and a nearby airport. Guildford has these but so do lots of other places. So you look at a map of Britain for towns near airports. You chuck out anywhere that looks a bit full already. Or that might have a lot of concrete or tories. You dismiss places that might make the kids grow up with a funny accent or where they might get laughed at for their inability to breathe through their ears. And then you start factoring in things like "it has a beach and a swimming pool". And that, friends, is how we ended up thinking that Nairn might be a good idea.

An added bonus is that having grown up an hour or so away from there it's almost an area I know well but not well enough for me to be imposing my place on the rest of the family. If that makes sense. It might not. This is our journey forwards, not my nostalgic journey back in time.

So last March we went there to stay for a few days and explore a bit more - to try Nairn on for size. Looking back, this short film of the kids playing over on the West beach is probably a recording of the moment we decided to move.

We tried it, we liked it and now we're about to live there. If you were at our leaving drinks last night then thank you for coming and I meant what I almost certainly said about coming to visit us - there's plenty of room!