Decisions, Decisions........

my favourite Japanese Acer hidden under the shroud.

space - you need more?

Now that my desktop is back  I can finally get back to boring the pants off you. What fun. Why you keep on reading this drivel is a mystery to me.

For the past several weeks I have been in a state of permanent confusion. 

"What am I going to do, am I leaving, am I staying, what is best?" has been the refrain accompanying my days and sometimes nights. 

Nothing very dreadful has happened, but there are times when it seems that you have to make changes to your life; at the same time it is difficult to come to a decision that is both suitable and sensible.

It started with one of next door's scaffolders. "Lovely house you got here", he said, "must surely be worth a bit." The last time I had the house valued was more than five years ago, since then house prices have risen sharply and it is said that many town dwellers have seen the error of their ways during Covid and want to change to a calmer, greener pace of living. Working from home has made it possible and space and fresh air is now something to aspire to. 

more space, if you want to go exploring 

Space and fresh air I have aplenty, I needed an estate agent (realtor) to put a price on it. A smartly dressed man turned up in a largish gas guzzler with a bundle of glossy, colourful brochures under his arm. The brochures were specialist ones in their range of 'Fine and Country' properties, nothing commonplace and everyday for a property I had described to him on the phone as "with a location to die for". I wasn't even exaggerating, who else can say they live right next to an English Heritage castle ruin with three gates directly into its grounds? Estate agents in the UK have three requirements for properties out of the ordinary: location, location, location. 

'my castle'

The agent came up with an astonishing estimate, three times the price we had paid 23 years ago. The country housing market is in a fix, too many people chasing too few houses; that meant that the agent more or less begged me to put my house on the market NOW. With his firm. Quite innocently I mentioned that I had nowhere to go and that I'd have to dispose of lots of contents first. Oh yes, they'd be able to help all along the way, finding me somewhere to live and auctioning off my goods and surplus chattels. They do indeed have an auction house as part of their set-up, a reputable one (in case you are warning me off).

After quite some time and a long chat I finally managed to get him to the door without committing myself in any way. Since then I've been deliberating along these lines:

First and foremost: I like my house. It's large and so is the garden, but it is also convenient and comfortable. I know the village, my friends live here. I can afford modest help around house and garden and if (not when) I get too infirm to go upstairs I have a shower room downstairs and can turn my study into a bedroom. 

On the other hand, house and garden are too large for one elderly lady. I am a little isolated from the village and nobody ever comes all the way up the drive just on the off chance. Isolation means utter peace and quiet, and endless green space and fresh air around me. And then there's the neighbour and his shroud which is actually damaging a part of my garden for which they may not be willing to compensate me, in spite of having undertaken to do so officially. However, everything passes, as will the shroud.

the shroud along one side of my garden wall.

under it is their barn, their house is further away.

Then there's the money. I'd want to downsize of course, and although I'd have to pay a fair chunk for a new house I might have a (smaller) chunk of cash over. But, is that such a good idea? In the UK interest rates are minimal, inflation is high, property is the only valuable asset to have, unless you are rich, of course. I'm not.

All things considered, I think selling up and leaving my little haven now would be a bit silly. As I said, I like my house. I'll never find another location to equal it. When the time comes I will probably move into a retirement apartment, there is quite a choice in my county town and rather than move twice, once into a smaller house with garden now and later into a retirement apartment when living on my own becomes more difficult would surely use up more energy, nerves, stress as well as cash than is sensible..

the flower bed hidden under the shroud

I may be elderly (OK, I am) but mostly I forget about it. Unless admitting to my elderly status comes in useful, which it does, at times, particularly when I need physical assistance. Many elderly people start the gradual process of reorganising their last years much sooner than me and maybe I am being foolish. But, while I can, I would like to continue enjoying my garden in particular, for a little while longer.

Sorry, Mr. Estate Agent, but not just yet. Maybe next year, maybe never. I am not ready to discard my hand trowel for good.

PS: apart from the shroud picture all others were taken at different seasons.

It's a bit early for such splendour.

The Dreaded Plague and a Very Expensive Haircut

First it was Brexit, then the floods and now Coronavirus.
The various news media have all been obsessed with just one subject at a time and there’s no getting away from it.

I have started to look at my friends with a very gimlet eye and those that I know to be of the hither-and-thither-shuffling persuasion I will not see much of while this whole virus business is going on. I have no problem with people who travel, use distance public transport and have a hectic social life at any other time, but not now. Over 70s are encouraged to remain relatively stationary and as most of us don’t go out to work, a few weeks of fixed aboding shouldn’t be too onerous. I have some extra provisions in, plenty of books, a garden for pottering, birds to watch, music to listen to, fellow bloggers to interact with, and locals whom I can see when the need moves me. I am on steroids for asthma and therefore have a weakened immune system. Deliberately exposing myself to catching the virus would be silly. It’ll be unlucky enough to catch it involuntarily.

So this is me for a bit.


I went for a haircut the other day, a regular 5-weekly event which takes a fairly small outlay and a car journey of no more than 30 minutes total there and back. It was one of the cold and wet specials England goes in for with abundant gusto and I was looking forward to getting back beside the Aga. It’s a very narrow, winding country road which makes it difficult to go fast and I was taking my time, a typically rolling English road made by the rolling English drunkard. Almost back in Valley’s End the disaster happened. I hit a deep pothole, filled with water and therefore invisible, and first the front tyre, then the back tyre, burst. It was an explosive sound and I was momentarily thrown and quite scared. Once I collected my wits I knew I couldn’t stay where I was, anyone coming round the bend would have hit me, so I limped the car a few hundred meters, very slowly, leaning on its right side, until I could safely pull it off the lane. It’s never a bad idea to be close to your particular mechanic, ever since we moved here we’ve used the same chap and it only took him 10 minutes to come and rescue me. He drove me home, then picked up the car. He was back before evening, all four tyres present and correct.

Insurance companies don’t cover pothole damage. This is deemed to be an ‘at-fault’ claim. So, as well as paying an excess, you could lose some of your no-claims bonus, and risk higher premiums in future.

I was interested in the etymology of ‘pothole’  : a depression or hollow in a road surface caused by wear or subsidence. From dialectal pot (“pit, hollow, cavity”) +‎ hole in Middle English.

Some say potholes are so called because of the potters who dug up chunks of clay from the Roman Empire's smooth roadways, more than 3,000 years ago. That explanation is more romantic but possibly less likely than the ordinary etymological one.

On the Home Front

Valley’s End is flooded for the third time in just a few weeks; storm Dennis was worse than last weekend’s Ciara. In my twenty years here I have not seen the bottom field, where I regularly walked my dogs,  as deep under water as this morning. The rain has been incessant and there’s more to come  next week. I am so sorry for my neighbours who live along the river bank and whose cottages and houses are inundated with muddy brown river water from further up the valley in the Welsh hills.

I have stopped slavishly following the news, I just can’t bear it anymore. There is never anything good on offer, just the same endlessly miserable, spiteful, nasty, mean reports and opinion pieces, full of doom and gloom. It is all too depressing. Instead I watch the birds busily devouring everything I put out for them from my kitchen window. I have been wondering: all those tiny creatures like siskins, blue tits, gold finches, nuthatches, what happens to them during storms?
Are they blown off course? Or do they shelter in the hedges during
the worst of the weather? I have whole families of gold finches
(middle picture) landing on my feeders, would they be the same
birds as the ones before the storms? They love sunflower hearts, perhaps they fight for the right to return? As soon as I fill the container the gold finches are back. The others are all happy with peanuts, fat balls and mixed seeds. As their name implies, nuthatches love peanuts best. (the bird with the go-faster eye stripe)














The previous week we had one good day and Paul and I worked in the garden, the first time this year. It was still very cold and the wind had already started, but there was a bit of sunshine and we managed a decent three hours.

I’ve told you about Paul before, he isn’t a patch on old gardener, but I’ve got used to him. He actually volunteered a comment or two while we were having our tea break. Last autumn he was still deep in the clutches of depression, barely able to function. Sometimes he seemed to be falling asleep on his feet. I can’t just turn him off while he is so poorly, I’d feel mean and unkind; I think he is glad that I am still employing him and perhaps that’s why he seemed brighter this year. It is also possible that he has recovered a bit, he has treatments and sees somebody regularly.

This person, who is a kind of health visitor, also helps him in practical ways. Paul has no other income than the money he makes from gardening
and a few artistic things like designing and
creating greetings cards, bird boxes, trugs,
and other woodworkings, large and small.
He is a creative soul and when he feels well
enough he spends time in his workshop.
He lives on an amount that wouldn’t cover my utilities bills, much less food and drink and treats. For years I and another employer have tried to push him into applying for benefit payments but he always insisted that he didn’t want to do this. This health visitor has persuaded him and helped with filling in the relevant forms and I am very hopeful that he will at least receive some financial assistance. I know people who are so good at milking the system that they are doing very nicely, and have done for years, yet someone like Paul, who certainly deserves help, goes without.

As you can see from the picture snowdrops will soon be over but the hellebores are only just coming into their own. Roll on spring.

Happiness Factor? It’s a joke, right?

So there I was, aiming for human interaction resulting in happiness, or at least a semblance of contentment.

Fat chance.

Not that it was all bad. A friend and I went off to see a modern re-imagining of John Gay’s 1728 work "The Beggar's Opera" by Mid Wales Opera Company, a production for small spaces and therefore very intimate. Renamed “Mrs. Peachum’s Guide to Love And Marriage” it is a splendidly bawdy, ballsy take on relationships and the relative virtues of virginity. We enjoyed it and, what’s more, my friend and I didn’t fall out in spite of getting into politics.

Another event was a Spanish Evening set up by a local group. There was tapas, Spanish wine, some haphazard music and three short, separate, talks about the painter Joaquin Sorolla, Spanish food and how the speaker liked to cook it and wine talk. The wine talk was the only professional talk, which means that the whole hall could hear that speaker. The other two never remembered to speak into the microphone, in spite of an audience member begging them to do so. What made it worse for me was that I had chosen to sit at a table towards the back of the hall (ready to scarper?) just in front of the wine table where the volunteer wine server chose to use the time of the talks to rearrange his crates of bottles, picking up each bottle, checking it for dregs and plonking it back into its hole in the crate. He took absolutely no notice of my anguished looks in his direction and clinked on busily. Not the most enjoyable evening all told.

You can simply not rely on people to do as they say. I took a very wheezy chest to my doctor; yes, he examined me, asked a few questions and came up with the idea that my childhood asthma might have returned. And yes, he was going to investigate and consult another doctor. "So, should I make another appointment,” I asked. “O no, I’ll ring you later this afternoon.” That was two weeks ago. Not a peep out of the surgery since then.

Gadgets aren’t a whole lot more reliable, either. The whole area had a power cut. When the power came back on after several hours I mentally congratulated the electricity firm and settled down for a cosy evening. By and by the room cooled down, quite considerably by the time I bestirred myself to check on the boiler. One very dead boiler. This was Friday evening of the coldest weekend this year with frost and freezing fog forecast. I fiddled around and tried to relight it but it just grumbled and coughed at me. I spent some time online trying to find the nearest engineer but gave up and rang the manufacturer's company itself - Worcester-Bosch - who are many miles away but have always seen me right in the past. Many miles away also means an expensive call-out, of course. “Yes, we’ll come, On Monday.” Between Friday evening and Monday morning I wore thermal layers, several pairs of thick socks, my pyjamas under trousers and jumpers - who is going to undress completely in a freezing cold bathroom? - , carried around two small fires, and forgot about personal cleanliness entirely. What on Earth do people do who do not have immediate access to the wherewithal necessary to pay for an emergency like this? I had ice flowers on the windows, for heaven’s sake. The female engineer discovered that the power cut had blown the circuit board. She replaced it, serviced the boiler and made sure that all was back in order before she left.

Next stop a major building job. I had my windows on the South side of the house replaced, all eight of them. I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Beloved would have been livid, several years before we debated if we should swap wooden windows for plastic. “Absolutely not,” was his conclusion. "Wooden widows are so much more attractive.” No they’re not, says I. They require constant repainting, repairing and splicing, none of it cheap. So now I have perfectly fitting, draught excluding, plastic windows on the weather side. I was also pleasantly surprised by the workmen doing the job. They were relatively quiet, cleaned up after themselves and caused minor disruption, allowing me to escape to a different room with each window. Even so, there was a moment when the boss man and I almost fell out. Over Brexit, what else. He was a fervent Leaver who trotted out all the long-discredited lies we were told three years ago. There is no getting through to some. I wished him Good Luck and left the room quickly.  I had learned my lesson from a previous experience, much more painful and embarrassing, which I’ll come to next.

You see, there was this dinner party at a very good friend’s house, the guests being a couple from London, a couple from Valley’s End and me. We have met at this house in previous years, always get on well and usually have a splendid evening, with lots of wine, food, good conversation and a general feeling of goodwill to all assembled. Except this time I related my experiences and feelings about the need to apply for Settled Status after 50 years of living the UK, once Brexit has become reality. O dear. It appeared that the couple from London and the host, with whom they were staying for the weekend, had already had a falling-out the previous evening. So my remark simply stirred the flames all over again. It was most unpleasant for a while, a lot of wine had been consumed and tempers flared, in a quietly genteel way, neither bad language nor insults were employed, but tempers flared. I know that families have fallen out, co-workers have fallen out, friends have fallen out over this wretched business but I never imagined that a genial host and his guests would suddenly, in the middle of a most enjoyable dinner party, stage a mini-war. At the moment the UK is not a friendly place.

So, human interaction is all very well, but it does not necessarily lead to happiness.

"Have A Nice Day Out”,

my friend said. "Enjoy yourself, stop worrying, I’ll look after Millie for the day." The man who arranges such things in Valley’s End had promised a rip-roaring time at the Malvern Theatre for Tom Stoppard’s ‘Rough Crossing’, a play to make us laugh until we peed ourselves.

I took him at his word, booked the trip, paid an exorbitant amount of money up front for coach and ticket and looked forward to the entertainment. Except the nice day out turned into an (almost) unmitigated disaster.

It started as I left in the morning on the way to the bus stop, about 15 minutes walk away from the house. It was blowing a gale, with driving rain. All the way there my umbrella turned itself inside out, every few steps I had to stop and right it. No matter how I held it, into the wind, against the wind, sideways on, the damn thing flapped and creaked and dripped. By the time I got to the bus stop I was drenched, trouser legs sodden from the back of my knees to the hems. Did I say it was also bitterly cold? A little chap walking by on the other side of the road as I was struggling laughed happily. “A bit wet today, isn’t it?” Hahaha. Sadist.

Some of my fellow theatregoers assembled at the bus stop shivered but others were made of sterner stuff. The shelter would normally accommodate six or seven people but a man in a motorised buggy, who had been the sort who feels “entitled” long before he became slightly disabled, assumed that everyone else would gladly leave the shelter to him and stay exposed to the elements. I didn’t, I had been the first to arrive, and I stayed perched on my little seat. Make of that what you will.

The bus arrived and we climbed on board. Luckily, the heating was on and gradually, during the two hour journey, my clothes dried on me. When we got to Malvern the rain had stopped. The mass exodus from the bus duly effected, a large knot of people formed on the pavement, everybody was making arrangements for the hour before lunch and where to have it. Didn’t they have time during the two hour journey to do that? I needed the loo and made for the theatre, shouting to a couple of friends that I would meet them at ‘The Italian’ in an hour’s time, wanting to visit a posh supermarket first to buy some of their famous ‘cook’s ingredients’ to take home to my back-of-beyond-village where such things are only dreamt of, never available.

Of course, I bought too much, now being burdened with an extra load of groceries, my large handbag (purse), my wet umbrella. True, I can’t blame anyone else for this oversight. I am still not a good walker, still limping when I’m tired or when the effort of walking straight and upright gets too much. I no longer use a cane, though. Malvern is a hilly town, I frequently had to stop on the way to the restaurant to catch my breath and straighten up. Gosh, I am an old crock!

The next two hours were a pleasure, I enjoyed my Tagliatelle Bolognese and we all had a couple of glasses of wine, not something we usually do at lunchtime. Everybody got merry, greatly helped by the waiters who flung their ‘per favores’, their ‘pregos’ and ‘grazies’, their ‘signoras’ and signores’ around with wild abandon, who burst into song while sinuously weaving  and undulating between the tables and made much of their giant pepper mills. I bet they were from Roumania really.

Finally it was time to go to the theatre and take our seats, having left coat and groceries at the cloakroom. Stoppard can be a bit of an acquired taste but he has written some really good stuff. Sadly, ‘Rough Crossing’ is far from good, it has the thinnest of plots:

Two famous playwrights, one jealous composer, an unorthodox waiter, and a mistimed lifeboat drill… let the sharp Atlantic winds turn to gales of hysterical laughter as our colourful characters become tantalisingly tangled in a Stoppardian string of absurd events…

If only. The Art Deco set looked splendid and promised much. The moment the actors appeared the promise evaporated and within the first ten minutes several of our coach party were sound asleep. The sound was bad, the dialogue barely distinguishable, the action messy and incomprehensible. The cast (all fairly recognisable TV actors)was lacklustre and seemed tired and bored. We were all disappointed and two of my friends decided they’d had enough and left at the interval, as did several of the others. I had nowhere to go and, in any case, couldn’t face lugging my groceries around, so I stayed to the bitter end. The action perked up for the last ten minutes but by then I’d given up on the play and was simply waiting to be released from captivity. All I wanted was to get on the bus and go home.

But my trials for the day weren’t over. I couldn’t swear to it but I may have, in fact, actually peed myself, even if for quite another reason as the one promised. When I came out of the loo right at the end, before climbing back aboard the coach, I felt a dampish kind of warmth spread over my belly. Yes, the front of my trousers was wet. I had been hovering over the toilet bowl, being loath to sit on the seat which appeared a touch insalubrious. But I had also been sprayed with warm water as I washed my hands afterwards. Enough to cause a damp patch in my trousers? We will never know. Suffice to say that I kept my coat on the whole journey back to Valley’s End and the first thing I did back home was to take a quick shower.

Backsliding

is my default position, it seems.
Not so long ago I promised myself that I would accept every invitation - well, ok, not the ones that primarily benefit others and cause me a lot of effort and mental and physical expenditure for little return - but my good intentions have already fallen by the wayside.  And for nearly three weeks now I’ve paid the price - that is if you believe in ‘just deserts’. Which I don’t. If there were such a thing as just deserts in this world a lot of people would not lead the happy and prosperous and untroubled lives they live.

Back to me and invitations. A big 70s birthday bash came first. The hosts had hired a hall, caterers, musicians, drink, and everything that makes such things successful. The celebrations were to embrace a ceilidh, my first, and a slight source of nervousness. Country dancing and singing? In public? Without being drunk? Maybe not.

Then came an invitation to an 80th birthday bash, again with food and drink, music and lots of people. Again I found a reason why I shouldn’t go.

The last major invitation was to the wedding of a young friend of mine. It was to be a huge do, with a big marquee in her dad’s field, sit down dinner and a dance at night. The event of the year, with ladies in hats and gentlemen in formal suits for the church service. I saw no way out, had had to accept when the invitation first came, several months ago. I no longer have formal dresses and ordinary day clothes would not have been suitable, so I searched the internet for something neither too expensive nor too formal, coming up with exactly nothing. Smart trousers, jacket and a silk shirt would have to do. I was less and less enthusiastic about the whole thing; you know what it’s like when you feel you must make the effort but really and truly would prefer not to? The idea of sitting in a marquee in 30C, dressed up and unable to put your feet up, surrounded by people you don’t know except for the immediate family of the bride who would, naturally, be too busy to attend to you personally, did not appeal.

And then it happened. An actual bona fide excuse for not going to the wedding of the year (locally) fell into my lap. Or rather, I fell into the excuse. Gardener and I were out, I was about to show him a bit that needed his attention, marched there ahead of him under full sail, saw a dog poo in my path, swerved, and landed in the dip between a flower bed and the lawn in my heeled mules and promptly fell flat on my face, luckily avoiding the dog poo. I scrambled up, gardener laughing his head off, my dignity badly dented but otherwise apparently unharmed if somewhat sore. I thought little more of it and continued gardening.

Two days later the first big bruises appeared. Then my leg swelled up, more bruises appeared, the colours deepening into midnight blue. Now, nearly three weeks later, I still suffer. The doctor says I must have ruptured a blood vessel and bled internally. “It will get better eventually”, he said, “your foot will be the last part affected. Don’t worry if it swells up.” Thanks for reassuring me, doctor, I’m awaiting results.  “In the end the blood will be reabsorbed and the discolouration will probably disappear too”.

For a good two weeks I have spent the days sitting in an easy chair with my very painful leg on a footstool covered with cushions, read and watched (whisper it), daytime TV. And been bored out of my skull.

What do you think, is this ‘just and fair punishment' for inventing excuses (well, actually, lying) to my friends in return for their kind invitations?

This and That

This

As I’ve said before, I now accept more or less every invitation extended, in fact I appreciate it when people include me. We always went to every social occasion as a couple, so being invited on my own is flattering and heart warming. I assumed that Beloved was the attraction, and that I simply came as the lesser part of the package.
Not so? Maybe.

However, I tend to gravitate towards widows more than couples in my own invitations. In the olden days I never saw widows as ‘widows’, just as women on their own. There is always a slight feeling of unease when it comes to couples; even the most friendly ones. Is it perhaps that the new widow reminds them that it could happen to them too and they’d rather not face up to the possibility? Is it that we’d rather push the thought away as far as possible? After all, as my son said “it really doesn’t bear thinking about.” Beloved and I thought about it a lot during the last couple of years but it still didn’t feel ‘real’; not until it happened.

Being with other widows is easy. Of course, we talk mainly about the person we lost, and how we lost them. Perhaps we repeat ourselves at each meeting, that doesn’t seem to matter. We go into detail about the final illness, what the doctors said, what the children did or said, how shattered we felt, how grief is all pervading and how hard it is to pick up the threads of life afterwards. We all share that knowledge and understand. Spending time with other widows is easy and healing.


That

The other day I came home after a lovely long and chatty lunch with one of these widows. I was feeling relaxed and, after chewing the fat for several hours, I was ready to sit quietly and put my feet up back home. Before I reached the front door I was stopped in my tracks by a tremendous din outside the gate into the castle grounds. Those of you who pay attention to such matters know that my hedged boundary marches with an open expanse of greensward which is used by dog walkers and tourists visiting the castle. I rushed to the gate, the row really was fearful, with screaming and shouting and high pitched dog yelping. Lorna’s greyhound was attacking a smaller dog as well as Robert, its owner, both of them howling in pain and anger. Lorna was some distance away, but a friend walking with her was nearer my gate; looking down on the fracas I saw the greyhound turn away from Robert and his dog and run back to Lorna. Everybody was shouting by now, me included. As the greyhound reached Lorna she began to beat him with the doubled lead, viciously, with all her strength. Now the greyhound howled too. Seeing the carnage I screeched for Lorna to stop, which was the signal for her friend to screech at me. I couldn’t make out much of what she said but “you don’t know what happened, mind your own business” came across loud and clear. Lorna was still beating her greyhound and I was frantic to make her stop but Lorna’s friend screeched all the louder the more I tried to bring Lorna to her senses. Nobody paid any attention to anybody, all was uproar and noise. Perhaps it’s a good thing that there’s a steep bank between my gate and the path below where all this was happening otherwise I’d have rushed down and beaten Lorna with her own dog lead. And might have been had up for assault and battery myself.

By now Robert had picked himself up, gathered his badly bleeding dog, examined his own thigh which showed a deep bite and, cursing Lorna and swearing to involve the police he went off.  Apparently, this was the second time the greyhound had attacked Robert’s dog. This story was quickly all over Valley’s End, with everybody taking Robert’s side.

Lorna is a mad woman, everybody says so. In the evening she came ringing my doorbell, ostensibly “to apologise for her friend screeching obscenities at me” but really to convince me that she ‘has never beaten a dog before’  - not true acc. to consensus around the village - and that Robert only got bitten because he came between his dog and the greyhound. Some excuse! The greyhound is out of order and needs muzzling and training, not beating. According to Lorna he ‘fully understands that he has done wrong and equally understands that’s why I beat him” .  Did I say she is generally considered to be mad? When I remonstrated with her, pointing out that animals do not reason, she calmly said 'we must agree to disagree’.

The greyhound is still roaming unmuzzled, Robert’s and his dog’s wounds are healing, incurring hefty vet’s bills and some painful treatment for Robert, and the police have indeed been involved. Robert is grateful ‘for all the support he has received in Valley’s End’ and Lorna is licking her wounds, still promising to all who want to listen that she will do everything to keep her dog under control. So far nothing has happened. The next fracas is only just around the corner with everybody saying “what if it's a child being attacked next time?”.

Carnival

held on the meadow

between he castle

on the hill

and the shady river

lined with stately water balsam

is an annual village event.

For some the highlight is the Show,

where villagers vie with each other

for first prize for best blooms, produce, jam and cakes,

artistic efforts like painting and photography 

and WI best decorated shoe boxes or some such,

all exhibited on long trestle tables covered in white paper cloths

in the huge Show Marquee.

The Show tent gets very hot on a summer’s day,

so tea tent, open BBQ and beer tent,

the amenity which attracts the greatest custom among young farmers,

are close by.

And right next to the beer tent is the First Ad station.

Could there be a connection?

These racing bicycles haven’t been used for a long time,

neither has there been a village cobbler making shoes for many years,

but the chainsaw wood carver has only just packed up the tools of his trade,

leaving behind a pile of offcuts which disappeared quickly.

Firewood, anyone?

The general consensus was that

 Carnival was very lucky with the weather this year.

It was a day of glorious sunshine, people came out in great crowds.
Efforts by organisers and an army of volunteer helpers paid off
and healthy profits were made not only by the
Carnival Committee (of course there’s a committee - this is England)
but also local charities.

It’s all tidied away now until next year.

Lonely ?

In need of company? Desperate for a chat?

Get a dog, or, even better, get a dog and come and live in Valley’s End.

This morning I hadn’t even set foot in the road beyond the field and cattle grid when two gentlemen walking along stopped and hailed me. I was pushing a wheelbarrow full of stuff for the rubbish bin down the drive and one of the chaps came and pushed it the last five meters to the gate for me. One of them had been away on holiday, so we hugged a ‘hallo,-lovely-to-see-you-back” hug.  All three of us stopped for a chat and the holiday maker said he had something for us and would come round later.

They went off and I saw Dave leading Badger and Murphy, his two collies, on the other side of the road. I still hadn’t left my own drive. I hailed Dave and he came over. Millie greeted Badger and Murphy and I enquired why I hadn’t seen Dave for three weeks or more. Was he well? Had they been away? Yes, all was fine but “you know how it is. Sometimes we change routines.” Dave is normally someone I meet up with, via dog-walking, twice a week at least. He’s a kind chap, does neighbourly deeds for people in need without making a fuss. He’s helped Kevin in the past, or, as he likes to be called, Kev, the chap for whom the glass is always half empty. The ex-alcoholic who makes sure everybody knows that he is not long for this world. Kevin the wood carver.

Kev is a sad chap, even more so now that he’s lost Sam, his one and only true friend. Sam was very old and has been deteriorating for a while. All praise to Kev for having kept him alive for as long as he did. But now Sam’s gone. I knocked on Kev’s door to tell him how sorry I was and asked what had happened with Sam. “Thank you for calling, but I don’t want to talk about it.” Kev’s eyes are always a bit rheumy, this time they were more watery than ever, but he didn’t actually cry. Kev often used to call on us with Sam; Sam always got a treat. Now I won’t be seeing Kev out again. Some people say that there are plenty of dogs in need of a loving home, perhaps Kev will take on another reject, but maybe not just yet.

Sue and Joe, the retired vicar, weren’t sure they'd have another dog after Jake died, very recently. He was a beauty, a long haired golden retriever with a mind of his own. Jake insisted that he would go for at least one paddle a day, come rain or shine, hell or high water. The latter literally. He plunged in even when the river was running in spate and the water icy cold. Millie and Jake got on very well, both being old and a bit disdainful of these young whippersnappers racing round the field over and over again, yipping madly; then taking a break and pestering the older, more dignified generation, shoving their noses up under their tails and sniffing their bottoms. Most intrusive, no wonder Millie and Jake growled occasionally.

Now, less than two months later, I see Sue with a new golden retriever, Alfie, who’d lost his previous home. Sue and Joe felt their very small house wasn’t complete without a large dog cluttering up the bit of free space they own, and went looking for a living rug to shed his long fur over every surface. Sue and Alfie are a well matched pair already, she smiles all over her benevolent, round, face every time we meet and tells me how well and thoroughly Alfie has already settled into their routine. Alfie already has her sussed. “Every time he sees me handle the roll of blue poo bags he makes for the door. He knows a blue bag means walkies.” Of course he does, dogs aren’t stupid, no matter what cat lovers say. No doubt Alfie will accept Joe as his owner soon enough and Joe too will join the dog walking fraternity again.

Then there’s Robin, the part-time-post-retirement-brewer who works at the local pub but still has time to come out with mad Horace,  the speediest whippet-cum-lurcher-cum-unknown-hairy-creature who can cover the hundred meter field in two-and-a-bit seconds. Robin throws a ball for him with one of those long-handled contraptions, giving him and me plenty of time to chat, while Horace with the black eye patch flies off, stretching out horizontally, feet never touching the ground. There’s Jim-the-tooth with his whippet-lurcher combo, who isn’t quite as fast as Horace but still likes to run for Horace’s ball and nick it if he gets half a chance.

Or there’s the lady with the wild blond hair and her greyhound Archie; she also brings her husband who has suffered a stroke and lost the power of speech. Perhaps that’s why she always talks and talks and talks; I  rarely understand what she’s saying because she mumbles rather, flicks her hair out of her eyes and adjusts the tweed capes she wears, summer and winter, while talking. She’s rather sweet, her husband lumbers awkwardly across the field, grunting at her, encouraging her to help him to the bridge and back to the car long before she’s ready. She and I commiserate with each other about the boring and unpleasant side of being full time carers.

Jane, a large, sightly mannish lady brings Buster, an equally large chocolate labrador. Jane is unmarried and childless, an ex-teacher, who talks to her dogs like she must have talked to her pupils once upon a time, kindly but firm, pretending to be the boss, while all the time they run rings around her.

These are just a few of the regular dog walkers I run across, there are many others and all of them will stop to chat. And I haven’t even mentioned trips to the shop yet. Often Millie gets tied to the railings at the entrance, where she collects a circle of admirers in no time, all of whom first talk to her, then me, until a small knot of people, arriving and leaving, blocks the entrance and makes the traffic slow down where the road meets the narrow pavement.

Valley’s End is a very friendly place. From what I’ve written here it may look as if only dog walkers take the time to exchange pleasantries with each other. That’s far from the case. Even the surgery is a busy hub of social intercourse. But dog walkers are a special breed, and if they have nothing else in common they share the bond of love for man’s best friend.

The Miracle of Spring

Come sweetheart, listen, for I have a thing

Most wonderful to tell you - news of Spring.

Albeit Winter still is in the air,

and the Earth troubled, and the branches bare,

yet down the fields today I saw her pass -

The Spring - her feet went shining through the grass.

She touched the rugged hedgerows - I have seen

her fingerprints, most delicately green.

And she has whispered to the crocus leaves,

And to the garrulous sparrows in the eaves.

Swiftly she passed and shyly, and her fair

Young face was hidden in her cloudy hair.

She would not stay, her season is not yet,

But she has reawakened, and has set

The sap of all the world astir, and rent

Once more the shadows of our discontent.

Triumphant news - a miracle I sing -

The everlasting miracle of Spring.

John Drinkwater

English poet and playwright

1882-1937

. . . .and has rent once more the shadows of our discontent . . . .
Triumphant news indeed. Whose spirits do not lighten on days such as these.

Permutations, Perambulations and Pictures

Millie is throwing me a dirty look from under lowered, speckled-white eyebrows: “Can we Please go out? It’s a lovely day.” 

“Oh, very well then.” She’s right, it’s chilly but the sun is out and I really shouldn’t waste the morning. I’m still very much up and down, given to mood swings, feelings of depression one minute, hopeful the next. A brisk walk in bright sunshine would surely do me good. 

It is indeed a cheery morning. We go up the old track leading out of Valley’s End towards Bishop’s Castle until we get to the crossroads, where we turn right, with our backs to Bicton Hill.

Ever since we’ve first lived here I have called this crossing of two field edge footpaths “Gallows Corner”. I can no longer remember who told me this but today, wanting to find out more about this gruesome, now disappeared, relic of past justice I asked several long time residents and local historians; none of whom had ever heard of it. Mr. Wells remembered the stocks next to the Town Hall, now the village museum, where wrong ‘uns, who had celebrated market day a little too carelessly, were shackled by their legs; I suppose they were lucky not to have been thrown into the lock-up proper from where they wouldn’t even have been able to see the fun, there being no window in the mouldy cell. On the other hand, well-meaning burghers might have pelted them with rotten vegetables?

Having walked along 'The Modems’ (again, I must find out why this track across the hill on the Southern edge of Valley’s End has this name), towards Radnor Hill we climbed the stile conveniently cut into the hedge into the next field.  Radnor Hill is mainly limestone, discovered and quarried by the Romans when they colonised this part of the country in the middle of the first century AD, and even today there are remnants of very early quarries on top of the hill, with several smaller and more recent quarries nearer the base.

Back down in the village, having slithered down a still muddy and steep path, via the old pool which has caused so much controversy and falling out of neighbour with neighbour, and along a small stretch of road past the entrance to the alms houses, we turned left to the allotments and the kissing gate, which leads to a track between two fields.  A kissing gate is a type of gate which allows people to pass through, but not livestock. The normal construction is a half-round, rectangular, or V-shaped enclosure with a hinged gate trapped between its arms. The kissing gate is often the subject of chatter about the origins of its amorous-sounding name. The prosaic answer is that it derives from the fact that the hinged part touches – or ‘kisses’ – both sides of the enclosure rather than being securely latched like a normal gate.

That hasn’t stopped many clinging to a more romantic notion: that the first person to pass through would have to close the gate to the next person, providing an opportune moment to demand a kiss in return for entry. I know which answer I prefer.

Kissing gates are often found at the entrance to church graveyards but there is no evidence that this has any symbolic significance.

Once we are through the gate - I have to hold it open for Millie and she snakes through without demanding a kiss - the field track to 'The Green’ lies ahead. (in spite of its name, ‘The Green’ is our tiny industrial estate consisting of three low and rather attractively built structures - one even has arched windows, like church windows. The industry pursued here is entirely rural, causing neither pollution nor noise.) The lower slope of Radnor Wood  is getting closer.

Three ponies and three sheep live in the paddock  at present. The field on the left has some kind of crop growing, possibly rape. Or perhaps winter wheat? I have no idea why just three sheep, when they are so plentiful everywhere else and are certainly never given any special treatment.

One of the ponies comes to inspect us. I often have an apple in my pocket, perhaps that’s why. Millie and the pony sniff each other but then lose interest. (‘The Green’ industrial estate is visible over the hedge on the other side of the paddock). At the other end of the field edge track we climb a stile and return to the village and the ford across the river.

Snowdrops and daffodils brighten he banks of the river. The waters have receded, although the river ‘was out’ when we had those endless heavy rains earlier this year and at the end of last year;  the levels have sunk, roads are clear and 4x4s can cross the ford again. I wouldn't like to try crossing in my small and ordinary car but then, I don’t have to. Valley’s End has a perfectly good humpback bridge built as recently as anno 1450 and still going strong. Well, with the fairly regular exception of lorries crashing into it, causing the locals no end of amusement while watching desperate drivers trying to extricate themselves without doing too much further damage. Many times drivers who had miscalculated the angle from road to bridge simply shot off, leaving the scene of the crime in as great a hurry as our narrow country lanes would allow. But, no more. Valley’s End has installed a camera! The guilty party will be caught and made to pay! Unfortunately, the parish finances are none too healthy and I am not sure that there was enough money in the kitty for both camera and film.


Millie was right to get me out. I am feeling much better. Tired, of course, after little in the way of exercise for several weeks, but I might take heart and go off again tomorrow.

Blow, blow, thou Winter Wind

Winter floweringViburnum

Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,

Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round.

And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn

Throws up a steamy column, and the cups,

That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each,

So let us welcome peaceful evening in.....   *

Blow, blow, thou winter wind....  **

Indeed the wind blew fiercely and relentlessly for most of the week, and Beloved and I, looking out upon a scene of battle from behind the sheltering window glass, congratulated ourselves on the timely removal of the horse chestnut tree. The stiff and naked limbs of our one remaining giant, a stately, ancient beech tree, swayed heavily in the gusts coming up the valley from the West. So far, the river Clun has risen merely to within an inch of the top of its banks, any more rainfall will see the castle meadow flooded and Millie will have to paddle for her afternoon constitutional.

Inside, it’s been a very quiet week. Fearful of being blown off the road into hedges and ditches I left the car in the garage and made do with the village grocery shop for items like fresh milk and bread. Even that was a struggle, catching a lull in the rainstorms. There will be plenty more such weather, the forecasters say, to do with global warming and man-made climate change. If that is so then I will not be able to keep many appointments during winter, which take me away from the village. As it is, an afternoon meeting of German conversationalists was cancelled because nobody fancied getting trapped on flooded roads. I did, however, have a very pleasant hour long telephone conversation, in German, with a fellow blogger, another German lady living in the UK.We have only just started this contact and are still in the early stages of exchanging life stories.

So, for most days we did what the poet said: we put our feet up, drank tea, wrapped ourselves in cosyness and welcomed peaceful evening in. We had a short, two-hour power cut one night;  there was enough light from the sky for me to go outside through the nearest door, grope my way around the terrace at the back of the house and through another door into the scullery where the torches live. Armed with a torch it was easy to find candles and matches. I was almost disappointed when the lights came back on. We so rarely sit side by side, exchanging quiet thoughts and comfortable silences.



* from  The Task by W. Cowper
** from As You Like It by Shakespeare

Late Bloomers and New Arrivals

Millie and I go for little walks again, mainly around the castle. She is quite happy to revisit her favourite nooks and crannies and avidly reads the news left on every tussock by her friends. In her turn she leaves little messages for them. Like me, she is saying: I’m back!

There are still visitors of the human family kind around too.

After climbing onto the castle mound they take time to admire 

the beautiful scenery of the South Shropshire Hills.

Having had to ignore the garden for almost the whole of spring and summer

I finally found time and energy to have a wander around this month.

Considering it’s November, there are still a lot of treasures to be seen:

drooping fuchsia lanterns

 the silver seed heads of clematis in a rosemary bush

 variegated eleagnus and virginia creeper growing on the house wall

set each other off to perfection

 two varieties of geranium peep out from their foliage

amid fallen leaves

 a mophead hydrangea  

 shiny yellow flowers of hypericum  Hidcote

 and the South African osteospermum

and the next day the fog descended and 

stayed with us for three days.

Millie and I didn’t stay out for very long and to judge by the dearth

of messages left for her, neither did her friends.

Oh Misery !

 First it looked like everything would change,

we’d tax the rich and allow the poor to eat without feeling guilty.

Children climbed trees and parents sat underneath

awaiting the miracle of rebirth.

 Horses grazed peacefully

and riders took a breather.

Then, Oh horror!

It all went down the pan again;

another five years of fat cats getting fatter

and belt tightening for the rest of us. 

They’re lining up to chuck themselves off the cliff!

Oh Misery, Oh Horror.

The images are borrowed and misused - Valley’s End had its Green Man Festival.