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In 1977 Susan got in touch with me (now married but still in Aberdeen) to say that Ruth and Len were moving back to Aberdeen with a young baby and could I befriend her and introduce her to others? It was a perfect request as it turned out that Ruth and I both had young babies born just a day apart and from then on we met regularly for a cup of tea (for me - though Ruth never had tea or coffee) to compare notes, let the youngsters play together and generally chat to sort out the world.
In due course we both went on to have another boy, Ruth ahead of me with Simon, then I had Peter. When Pete was 6 months old we moved to the Black Isle after my husband, Ian, got a promotion to work in Inverness. And just after we had moved Len and Ruth with their growing family asked to come and stay while they prospected the area (and possibly had an interview?) for an opportunity for Len to take charge of St Michael's and All Angels in Abban Street. What they saw suited them and shortly after they moved to Inverness into the vast rectory at St Michael's. There Ruth and I continued where we had left off, meeting regularly to chat and to let our growing families play - Ruth's third, Mary, in 1980 and mine Sarah in 1981.
During this time Ruth demonstrated some of the talents that she developed in the ensuing years into setting up her dressmaking and then ecclesiastical businesses - namely that she could knock up clothes for the children in no time at all. Probably her most important talent was to be able to work focused and fast but she was also extremely artistic.
This meeting up on a regular basis must have gone on until the children went to school - at least the eldest ones - after which it was difficult to find a time to meet that fitted in with school hours. But then we ourselves branched out into jobs and did not have the time to sit around chatting as we did then.
But we still met every now and again, Ruth telling me about her job as a technician in the science department of Inverness High School. She also took up spinning (wool) which I had been doing for years.
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