Epilogue

The time has come for a confession, I believe. There never was a real 'Kim Philby', other than the British spy/Russian mole who was our fictional character's namesake. Jon, Evil Pete and myself (Julian) took it on ourselves to create this charater as a front to provide a continuous chronicler of our climbing expeditions, and as a line of defence in throwing the authorities off our scent. We also reckoned that the effort required to keep the diary would be too much for one of us to bear, although at the end of the day I was responsible for the majority of the entries. I should point out, however, that the rest of the 'characters' in the narrative are all real.

This confession leads me on to the following announcement - there will be no more regular diary entries for the night climbing journal. Events have conspired to make its continued existance too much of a chore for me. Evil Pete had recently gained a girlfriend in Jesus College, so we never see him anymore. This is good news for him, but mildly perplexing for the rest of us. Worse news is that the stresses of university life have taken their toll on Jon's well-being, and as a result he has degraded for the year. Oh, and Que Sera Sarah and I have split up (I guess it was inevitable), which means that the core night climbers appear to be scattered to the four winds. All things must, eventually, come to an end.

But there are a few lights on the horizon, so do not despair. I have high hopes of teaming up with some like-minded others (hint to the MDC & OSF!), for which appendix entries or even a new journal may be written. So perhaps this epilogue should be seen as an open portal through to the future, rather than a door closed on the past. Only time will tell.

Here endeth the confession.

Julian
Selwyn College
October 1999