Margaret Smith
Audrey was a good friend of mine, a long-distance friend as it turned out. Our friendship was founded in the library of the 450yr old Repton School in Derbyshire over twenty years ago where we were cataloguing the archives. We shared a common interest in history and the English language, and soon we realised we had much more in common, gradually cementing our friendship.Seven years ago we could not help but admire her tenacity and dogged determination when she successfully completed all the US immigration formalities in the course of pursuing her planned relocation from Derbyshire to California – and she was successful. It was always a pleasure to awake and find a perfectly composed email from Audrey. Being a keen gardener, she would sometimes send lovely photographs of her gardening activities – pictures which I found difficult to match, due to the quite different English climate. Her emails would also reflect her enthusiasm for her visits to concert halls and baseball games, and the carefully researched choices for the next film-showing for the ‘Sequoias Cinema Club’ were always passed on to me as recommended viewing.The world is full of interesting and clever people, but only some of them are special as well – Audrey was special and I will miss her.Margaret Smith