That comment was the proverbial "Red Rag" to a very bullish woman, in the best sense of the word. She took up the challenge, tossed the ideas associated with it around a bit, and was then, for many years, instrumental in the UK in the building of some of the first resident-in-the-community houses. Homes built for people like Martin that need a little more help than most. Houses where, in receipt of that extra help, people with a range of learning challenges are nevertheless able to live full, active and independent lives.

Martin himself needed a little more help than these houses can offer, so he lives in a more sheltered community with half a dozen other friends - but this weekend, he was visiting his mother and then came to stay with us overnight. We had a delightful few hours in the garden - listening to a concert in the grounds of the Castle over the hedge and eating a picnic snack.

As you can see in the second photograph, Martin also helped me to sort out and name a whole basket full of animals that I had acquired earlier in the day, (for use in my therapy work at a later date). We lined them up, we named them and counted them, "dived" them back into the basket on the floor, made the crocodile eat the penguin, made the elephant go "Rumpeta Rumpeta all down the road", and the lion roar at everyone. We sang "Little Donkey" to the donkey (with an extra loud chorus of "BETH-lehem, BETH-lehem") and the Crocodile song from Peter Pan to the crocodile. We both had such wonderful fun.

Martin brings simple abundance to my life each time he visits. He laughs at my jokes, and smiles from ear to ear at the briefest of interactions with me (particularly interactions involving nice things to eat or drink!). His enjoyment of the simple things in life points like a beacon to what unsophisticated pleasures are available to us all - if only we take the time to look about us and see them.