There’s more to life than work . . .

Meet the family

Before her retirement in August 2008, my wife Myra was a secondary school teacher, whose subject specialities were French and German, and who had been working (full-time except for the final year) in the Learning Support department at St Columba’s RC High School, Dunfermline. Myra is hoping for a retirement that is as long as that of her parents: her mother died aged 95½ in 2004; her father died in 2008 only six weeks short of 104!

Suzy is a former pupil of Dollar Academy and a graduate of Aberdeen University, where she read English. Married to Ben Hunt since August 2011, and now living in Essex, she has been a freelance shorthand writer, with previous court experience at the Old Bailey, but is now looking for a new career.

Suzy is now back singing with the London Bach Choir, having taken a study break, during which she gained a distinction in her Master’s in Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College.

Ceri also survived Dollar and Aberdeen, where she read Psychology, and stayed North to take her Ph.D in 2005. She completed her second doctorate in 2009, and is now a qualified clinical psychologist. After a short posting at the Royal Hospital for Neuro-disability in Putney, she is now back in Aberdeen at the Royal Cornhill Hospital, only ten minutes walk away from the home she shares with Jim Urquhart.

Stephen moved with us to Scotland aged under 4, but has retained his English accent, apart from the occasional word! He graduated from Nottingham University in 2008 with a 1st-class M.Eng in Civil Engineering, and then spent a year living in London, searching for the right first job that would launch his career … in anything but Civil Engineering! After training to be a maths teacher at Southampton University, Stephen now teaches at the Lilian Baylis Technology School in Kennington.

Tarr is a fairly uncommon surname, except in Devon, the name originating in North Devon/West Somerset (as in Tarr Steps on Exmoor). Myra’s girls have the Cornish surname Trevethan, which is rather rarer though apparently “common enough to ensure free hire of the social club hall at your reunion party” according to a previous incarnation of the www.yournotme.com web site.

Church

As you might expect, fellowship with like-minded Christians is important to us. Myra worships and is part of the music team at St Margaret’s Scottish Episcopal Church, Rosyth, which is in a local ecumenical partnership (LEP) with Rosyth Methodist Church, and linked to Holy Trinity, Dunfermline, within the Diocese of St Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane.

Martin was Financial Administrator at Viewfield Baptist Church, Dunfermline for ten years but, since retiring in June 2009, is now only running the Men’s Breakfast. However, always a “High Church Baptist”(!) he’s been sucked more and more into the Episcopal scene and is responsible for three church web sites and just finished a two-year stint as the editor of the LEP newsletter.

Music

We both enjoy singing, and join forces in the St Margaret’s choir. Myra sings with the Dunfermline Choral Union and the Woodmill Singers, Martin has sung since 1991 with the Scottish Chamber Choir, and regularly appears with the Dunfermline Gilbert & Sullivan Society.

Last updated 30 November 2011