Working and living in Ipswich

I am not an Ipswich person. I came to work here in 1990 and to live here in 1998 and my children have spent much of their formative years here as a result. When you come to work in a place and only later live in it, your feelings about it change over time. You see it first as an merely an extension of work. In my case, as a solicitor, I got to know first its courts and some of its offices and public buildings. Later I got to know Christchurch Park quite well as I wandered in there to eat my sandwiches in the summer months. As the children were young, I got to know its swimming pools (Charles Street and Fore Street), its libraries, its schools and more of its parks and sports facilities: but this will forever be my children's Ipswich, not completely mine. And in a sense also it is difficult for any place to be yours if you were not born there or spent your formative years there.

At the same time, I became a business owner and got to know more of the vibrant business community here, the voluntary sector, particularly housing and welfare groups, and the public sector i.e. the Councils and other state agencies, sometimes working with them, sometimes against them! I spent and spend some time socialising and networking on the Waterfront and elsewhere. I also became a parent governor at Northgate School and got involved with one or two charities.

But only latterly, in the last few years, have I had my own individual Ipswich experience. That experience has focused on the communal and cultural diversity of this town and finding things within it that resonant with me: such as, getting involved in art groups, doing projects with schools, working as a volunteer voice (legal and otherwise) at its local radio stations and bringing life right up to date, spending some time this year in meditation at the Ipswich Buddhist Centre. The latter is soon to be moved to a new and larger venue 4 Friars Bridge Road (across the big roundabout from the Willis Faber Building side), grand opening 11th July 2009. The opening of a new quasi-public building is an important staging post in My Ipswich, as it is important for the town itself and its ever expanding diversity of communal culture.