Speechless

Yesterday was the first time in my life that I was truly struck dumb.

At about 11.30 am the door bell rang, I opened the door to see a baby in her pram abandoned in front of the flat door. My mind went into a whirl trying to identify possible reasons for a baby to be left in front of the door, the only logical conclusion was it had been left outside the wrong flat, and the mother had gone to get something from a car.

But . . . . but there was something very familiar about the baby. Then I heard some giggling from around the corner by the lifts. My daughter and son-in-law poped their heads around the corner.

You might ask why I didn’t recognise my own granddaughter. My excuse/reason:

We had only seen her soon after she was born and that was four months ago when she was only one month old. Believe me there is a big difference between a one month and a five month baby. Also we had spoken to them the day before and they had said they would phone on Friday on my wife’s birthday. I should add that they do not live in the UK, so we only get to see each other once or twice a year.

So to see the three of them before me, rally struck me speechless.

Subsequently we found out, my wife and I were the only members of the family who didn’t know about the visit. The flights had been booked five weeks ago, and all the family sworn, on the penalty of retribution, to secrecy.

What a brilliant surprise and no better birthday present than a visit of your first grandchild.