It's aye pulling ye back

Who belongs to Glasgow?

I left Glasgow at 24 years old with an HND in photography, a rucksack I’d lugged around Europe, and a one-way ticket to London. My Sony Walkman and Everything But The Girl’s Amplified Heart for company. It was 1995 and the UK was within the clutches of an 18-year run of Conservative governments — John Major was Prime Minister.

My mum helped me down to Buchanan bus station with my luggage. We said goodbye, my mum in tears, me with a ten-hour journey to King’s Cross ahead. The first of many runs along the longest, cheapest route south. I would take this trip so many times it became unbearable and until I had enough money for an alternative. 

After 30 years living in London, Bath and Bristol, I’m going home to Glasgow. But now there’re four of us, plus a house full of possessions. I always thought I would return someday. We waited until our eldest finished A levels and I had managed to get the whole family onboard. As the cost of living bites harder, it makes my dream seem increasingly practical. No place stands the same. Change is inevitable. Will Glasgow still be the same place that I left?

After two months of house hunting, I get the train from Bristol to Glasgow. I stay overnight at my mum’s, view three houses the next day, before getting the train back to England. The following morning, we put in an offer on a flat in the Southside, by afternoon it’s accepted. It’s happening. I’m the only one of us to have seen the flat, my partner and two kids won’t see it until moving day.

In the days leading up to the move, as we say our goodbyes, a friend asks me what I’m most looking forward to about moving back home. I don’t need to think about it. “Feeling understood, feeling that people get me, they know who I am and understand what I’m about. And that I’m valued.” 

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