As you may remember that horrible night when our Twitter feed read "One of our Upbeats is missing" not the first time the first time the Upbeats have had me in tears, but as a parent now grandparent I cannot imagine anything so frightening as a missing child.
As we all know James was found, cold but safe and spent Christmas at home. Just to let James and his family know he was in our thoughts then as he is now Charltonlife sent him a small Christmas gift.
Please see attached picture.
Comments
I've included the email that I wrote to her before Christmas ..............
Hi Jackie,
I like most Chalton fans on the Charltonlife forum have become ardent followers of James and all of the Charlton Upbeats and love to see them doing well so at whatever they are doing. The night of James disappearance must have been horrible for you and your family and we all did what we could from our respective computers retweeting and posting on Facebook and thankfully James came home safe. We just wanted to send James a small token of our love and to let you know that we were thinking of James and your family both then and now. Thank you for accepting the gift on James behalf, we would like to wish you, James and all your family a very Happy Christmas and fantastic New Year.
Love from all at CharltonLife
xxx
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I have only just read this mail, so sorry, life has been manic, such lovely words, bless you allx
The lads will always have a special place in our hearts.
We are so blessed to have the Charlton Upbeats running , they absolutely love it. We have very little out there for our children that is run all year around, and some travel from as far as Tonbridge, Romford,Peckham, Shirley, Croydon, and they rarely miss a Saturday. The staff are fantastic, they know how they all tick! It would be lovely to thank them as they are the unsung heroes!
Many thanks again for everything, I still having got over James going missing for so long, I am so grateful to the lovely lad who was also 19 who stopped in his car and raised the alarm. As you know it was a cold foggy night, it was only for social media that the person stopped. We visited the young man and brought him gifts, he only lives in West Wickham, how lucky was we he checked his Twitter or what ever it's called.
James has a heart condition and doesn't cope with the cold, he uses-sign language to me, he said freezing, scared and worried, so he won't forget that too quickly.
Happy, Healthly New Year to you all.
I think it sums up how much being part of the Upbeats means to those involved, Life isn't just about surviving but fulfilment and challenge. I think the Upbeats is one of the most important schemes going anywhere for that reason and the concept needs to grow within football as much as it can. I'd love to see when weather/pitch conditions allow an Upbeats match at half time. I think how special it would be to these lads playing in front of a cheering crowd.
Well done, Ray - it's plain to see what it meant to James.
Limited Edition – Triple framed ‘1998 Play-Off Final Heroes’ picture (with background)
http://novoprint.co.uk/shop/charlton-athletic/charlton-play-off-heroes-limited-edition-framed-picture-colour-background/
It was down to the awareness gaining traction that James was found, and given his communication difficulties and the cold last night, this could have been extremely serious. Thank god that never happened.