Presidency - 3 months in

I have been President of Shepperton Aurora Rotary for 3 months already now, and things are settling into a pattern. Unfortunately it isn’t the pattern I was anticipating.

New President with DG Frank West - my chain's bigger than his

Take our visit to the Walled Garden in July, when we had an excellent talk about the Millennium embroidery, followed by a cream tea.  Whilst I made it quite clear at the outset that I was the President of the Rotary Club, I was made to sit with everybody else, and when the time came for me to make a speech, I was told there was no time, as another group was due in.  Obviously I was too dignified to make a fuss, but I felt disappointed for everybody else there who were prevented from listening to a short 20 minute talk about my plans to develop the role of President of Shepperton Aurora.

Cream tea at The Walled Garden, Sunbury

Things started to look up a week or so later with our annual boules match against Shepperton and Sunbury club, at The Bell in Old Charlton Road. I was delighted to lead our team to a famous victory for the first time in 3 years.  When I say ‘lead’ I mean I was first to play a game. Altogether, I played two games, and although I didn’t win either of them, I’m sure my contribution was crucial in tiring out our opponents for the remaining games. I was of course magnanimous in victory, and the next day I went to the bookies to try and put a bet on us completing a double over our mother club by winning the forthcoming Beetle Drive. The bookies were obviously worried about this and refused to take the bet. As things turned out, I was glad they didn’t. Shepperton & Sunbury trounced us and took home the coveted picture of beetles.

Success - I receive the boules trophy from Geoff

Revenge is sweet - Eric and Geoff win back the beetle drive trophy

Speaking of betting, a few days later the Club enjoyed an outing to Kempton Park, to watch an evening race meeting. I had devised a fool-proof gambling system that I was sure would reap substantial rewards. When we arrived, some of us sat outside one of the bars in the sunshine to enjoy a drink, and it was pleasant sitting there looking down at the racegoers arriving as they passed below us. A few people in the bar seemed to give me quizzical looks, as if they had seen me somewhere before, but couldn’t remember where. I supposed that I would have to get used to this now that I was one of the foremost citizens in Shepperton. It was only as we were leaving that I noticed we had been in a bar reserved for owners and trainers. That probably explained why people couldn’t work out who I was. With regard to the fool-proof gambling system, let’s just say it needs a little tweaking, and leave it there.

Studying the form at Kempton

At the end of July, we had another outing, this time to see Guys and Dolls at Woking’s New VictoriaTheatre. For some reason I was the one left to organise the visit, and I duly arranged a block booking of 16 tickets. What I seemed to overlook was that we had a party of 17. I managed to get out of this potentially awkward situation thanks to a very helpful lady in the ticket office, who found us an additional seat, enabling us all to sit together. Sue (the 17^th member) was surprisingly understanding about the whole thing, thank goodness.

As I write this, we have just completed one of our main events of the year, the Prestige Lecture, which was a huge success. At last I felt that I was moving in the right circles as I shared the amazing Halliford School stage with Lord Digby Jones of Birmingham Kb. He proved to be one of the best speakers we have ever had and everybody seemed to thoroughly enjoy his views on ‘The UK in a post-Brexit World’. My only complaint is that he spoke so long, and so eloquently, that I didn’t have any time at all to deliver my speech about Brexit. In the few minutes left, sandwiched between Lord Jones and the raffle, all I had time for was a few thank you’s and see you all next year. To make matters worse, I was the only person on stage without a microphone. I don’t normally subscribe to conspiracy theories, but it has occurred to me that maybe Lord Jones was worried that I would upstage him. Makes you think, doesn’t it?

I share a joke with my new friend Lord Digby Jones

Sharing stage  with Deputy Mayor Vivienne Leighton with Consort and DG Frank West with Consort

I can’t finish without mentioning the Sunbury Manor Garden Project, a joint venture with our mother club to create a garden at Sunbury Manor school to be enjoyed by Special Needs pupils. The steering committee felt that the work would be completed in a couple of days, and I went along on the first of these days for a Presidential visit. I had envisaged spending a few minutes inspecting the site, offering a few words of encouragement to the volunteers and leave them energised and motivated to carry on the good work. I hadn’t expected to be told to clear the site of rubbish, and then wheelbarrow two tons of sand onto the site to level it. My suit got quite dirty whilst doing this, but I shouldn’t have expected any sympathy from my colleagues, as none was forthcoming.

Wheelchair - accessible mat is in position

The only consolation I could draw from the situation was that Geoff Williams, President of Shepperton & Sunbury club had been similarly pressed into working on the site when he was probably expecting to look in briefly before heading off home again. At least it’s not just me.  In my next blog, I sincerely hope I will be able to report that the Garden Project is completed.  At the time of writing we have just completed our 12^th day of work on the 2-day project. 

Hard at work - Geoff, Andrew and Ken