THE VIEW FROM MY WINDOW: Rhona Baillie, Charity CEO
Are you sitting comfortably?
I am sitting at my kitchen table at dusk, looking onto the most beautiful and inspiring view. I am surrounded by natural materials, huge expanses of glass, stone and wood in familiar shapes that signify home. This is a place for my family and friends to gather to eat, share stories and laugh. I feel a great sense of peace here and I love to light candles and chill out.
What’s the view like?
I love the light and the dark silhouettes of the trees as the sun slowly disappears over the horizon. Our little resident robin hops about, dodging the squirrels, while the blackbird sings its last song of the day. I get a final glimpse of sheep and lambs in the fields surrounding Strathaven before the twinkling lights of the farmhouses appear. This view is beautiful, no matter what time of day or season of the year.
Favourite place nearby?
The country roads. I pull on my wellies and walk for miles, it’s the perfect antidote to the noise and traffic of the city. The only sound is the gentle droning of microlight engines as they come into land at the nearby airfield. In the evening I love going to Rissons restaurant, it’s in an old sandstone house in Strathaven. Friday nights there are special with fantastic home-cooked fare accompanied by a robust glass of red.
The view is across Strathaven Park and in the distance I can see the beautiful church spire on the common green. The hospitality is just to my taste, unobtrusive and full of warmth.
Perfect night in?
When the weather is good in summer it has to be dinner at our kitchen table with my husband Jim and some friends, followed by three or four hours, well into the night, sitting round the fire pit in the garden, wrapped in blankets, with Barry playing the guitar and the dog sitting on my knee.
It’s total bliss. Alternatively, La Fuente De La Higuera, in Rhonda, a beautiful centuries-old renovated olive mill, nestled in olive groves, drinking limoncello by the fire.
Last thing you bought for your home?
A Scottish slate cake stand to hold cupcakes, for girls’ nights in.
If I didn’t live here I’d want to live in ...
Soller in the Tramontana mountains, Majorca, or maybe Rovinj in Croatia, or the old town Budapest. I love to travel. But that’s for later. My passion is for Glasgow and its people. New experiences will follow after my team and I complete a project to give the people of Glasgow a new hospice in Bellahouston Park.
Rhona Baillie is chief executive of The Prince & Princess of Wales Hospice, Glasgow. It recently launched Buy a Brick, the latest phase of the £21 million Brick by Brick Appeal to build a new home for Glasgow’s Hospice in Bellahouston Park. To donate, visit www.ppwh.org.uk/donate or text BRICK to 70660 to donate £5.
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