This Side of the Pond

I have been living in fear for the last six weeks – terror that everything I know, everything I am, was about to be thrown to the wolves. This story has a happy ending, but it’s going to take us a while to get there.

My torture began just before Christmas, when I sat down with a couple of friends for a festive meal and to swap gifts. As we dined on chicken and garlic potatoes, tinsel sparkling in the background, one of them placed a box in front of each of us.

She’s one of those people for whom being stylish is annoyingly effortless, so the package was perfectly wrapped in tasteful pa...