10-10 Michael

Peter’s oldest child, Michael was born April 6th, 1974. And believe it or not, his cousin Angie was born about the same time in the same hospital.
When Michael and Verity were young children, there was a marriage break-up, and I spent a lot of time over at Peter's house as he played the role of father and mother. One night when I was sitting with them for dinner, Peter chopped up Michael's pears, then Verity's pears, and son-of-a-gun, he started to cut up my pears.
That is when I started to collect bits and pieces of stuff and put them in what I called “magic boxes” to give to Michael and Verity. I did a lot of travelling and collected souvenirs from hotels everywhere. All good stuff for the magic boxes, which were boxes that used to hold bottles of scotch. Michael and Verity loved them, but Peter hated the mess they made and quietly threw everything into the garbage as soon as the novelty wore off.
In the photo of Michael at what seems to be age nine, we had all gone off to the Science Centre. And if it wasn't the Science Centre, it would be the zoo. Those weekends were wonderful memories of Michael and Verity growing up.
Michael was a quasi-founder of the Learning Institute for Small and Medium Enterprises which became Vubiz Ltd. Every non-techy entrepreneur today needs a cyber-nephew. It was with Michael that I determined in 1998 that online learning could be a viable venture.
And what a happy family time at the wedding of Michael and Deanne. That photo is a keeper.
Soon they had their first child, wee Devon, and I love the picture of Devon as a baby with their dog Popcorn.
Young Devon is one of the most expressive children I have ever known, obviously taking after Deanne. At age three, participating in wedding, he looks seriously impressive.
Michael sent us two priceless photos. The first one shows Michael cutting the grass as a teenager with his younger brother, John Mason, or JB as we like to call him, pushing a toy lawnmower. JB is the child of Peter and Polly. Michael is eleven years older.
And in a similar wonderful photo, we have Michael cutting the grass again but with his own boy Devon with a toy lawnmower. No magic box is as magical as these two photos.