Florence: the not name of my imaginary third child

Ah Florence.

I arrived with magical illusions for this city; the long lost name for my daughter, pipped at the post with Matisse for my first, and then Elspeth second time around. My third daughter will definitely be called Florence, I vowed… until I had a 2 and 3 year old and renewed that vow in the form of a totally different one to never have more children.

An intense amount of evaluation led me to forfeit our business class train fares to Florence and take a day trip to Burano island with Imogen instead. And then catch the train at dusk by myself with a mountain of luggage and two really exhausted kids, one on my lap because there weren’t enough seats on the train let alone any in business class.