Leaving The Plume - 2

I remember going to see the head, Alan Bilby, to tell him I was leaving. When he asked me why, I said it was because we wanted the chance to do something completely different, that an opportunity had arisen and we were grabbing it; and so I could find more time to write.

The Plume had a large staff - this was taken on a training day in summer 1995, and I am seven in from the left on the back row, dressed, as always, in my suit - and I knew almost everyone in the picture; I had worked closely for years with many of them. Running our own business would be a huge break from the institutionalised life that we had lived for some 30 years. One of the things we were looking forward to was making our own decisions and acting on them - without the need for committee decisions.

The local paper, the Maldon & Burnham Standard, did an article the contents of which, amazingly, were largely correct.

However, it was the reaction of the students which most moved me. I had many cards from students both in the Sixth Form and those I was teaching or had taught. The Sixth Formers had great fun, including taking over my last assembly with them to give me a 'This is Your Life' presentation. I remember, at the end of it, asking them to sit quietly and listen. Outside there was all the muddled noise of a busy small town. In Kilchoan, I explained, every sound is discrete; I want to be able to listen to the silence.