Remembering Auntie Glad

 This video of a ninety year old Italian Nonna, excitingly opening her birthday gifts took me back to auntie Glad. Some years ago now I was visited by a fellow blogger Hippo, whose life was saved by his blog connections. Living in a real African backwater, he sustained a simple garden injury to his thigh when cutting a hedge.

The injury quickly went necrotic and septic and knowing my experience in the field he sent me a photo, I told him plainly that he would be dead in days if he didn’t refer himself to a specialist hospital, and so with the  Great British reserve only known by ex servicemen , he wrapped the injury in cling film and drove a hundred miles to an airport which eventually took him to London. 

Presenting himself to the ER he had hours of life left, but the wonders of the nhs saved his life and many weeks later he was sat in my front room, paying his respects amid bulldogs and terriers and Albert the cat. 

We went to Auntie Glad’s for tea and scones and she met us warmly in her blue tabard which was dusted with scone flour. 

Gladys was in her 90s and not quite understand who Hippo was she still afforded him a cheerful Welsh welcome .

I was amused that when we ate our scones and drank our tea she disappeared for a few minutes only reappearing in her best frock , a string of pearls and a splodge of bright red lipstick on her lips 

Now that’s class

Fruit bowl and table

Nearly twelve years ago Mary decided to sit in the fruit bowl 

Today Roger decided to sit on the coffee table 

In almost exactly the same position 

 

A Chameleon On The Fridge

 It’s 5 pm and the ice cream van has arrived in the village. I’ve not noticed it in years gone by but this one plays the zimmer theme from The Third Man which feels strange, especially as there is still a distinct chill in the air. 

I’ve just finished two night shifts, and didn’t sleep much today, so it’s pottering time , with a slow pace , soup cooking, clothes washing, fire lighting and radio 4. 

I’m mildly annoyed because my second best counselling jumper now has tomato stains down the front.

The man that delivered the fridge never bothered about such things

Oh I’ve bought a new fridge . My Ikea fridge freezer has died and isn’t repairable and shocked at the cost of a replacement, complete with fitting has meant I have bought a small table top fridge to more suit my needs.

My handsome chameleon is sat on it . The old fridge is now an ideal storage cupboard

Jesus John , I’ve got absolutely no news, except that not many fuckers have a stuffed reptile on their fridge

Tonight , I’m revisiting the last two episodes of The Other Bennett Sister and apart from the lovely will-they-won’t - they relationship of Tom and Mary , I adored how the daughter/ surrogate Mother relationship worked out between Mary and her Aunt Gardner ( the sympathetic and generous  Indira Varma ) quite lovely

Touch

When I am at work, I touch people constantly. 

I wash and I turn people in bed hourly and will sometimes take my latex glove off to comfort someone, certainly to stroke a brow or tidy a hair which is out of place .

I hear my old tutor from my psychiatric nursing days at these times….

“Being stroked by a gloved hand can be painful and unnatural “ Leslie Brint would say

There are social rules when it comes to touch too,

Some people abhor it. 

Others crave it

You have to read people effectively and quickly

Safe “ zones” for touch are innately understood by most

But not always.

Watch out for cues

Huggers often give them 

People in grief often regress to childhood states

When touch can heal most things

I don’t hug when I’m counselling. 

It’s my strict rule. 

But I do always shake hands with my clients.

It’s formal but warm

I like handshakes.

I’m off to work, shortly

With Roger on my knee as we sit at the kitchen table

He’s like me, when it comes to hugs

But he can ask for them where I seldom do

I’m glad he can

Eyebrows

I’m 64 in June

And I’ve just realised that I have eyebrows like 

Virgil Tracy

And could not have fitted through 

Thunderbird 2’s 

Ceiling slide

 

A Cry On The Way To Counselling

 I start with the Madrid Metropolitan Orchestra with some of my lisping choir  doing an amazing version of Gloria Gloria  ……followed by this amazing nurse’s poem from the Vietnam war

But today’s highlight was a radio four production Life Changing where psychiatrist Sian Williams interviewed teenager Rozhan , an illegal immigrant from Iran who with her mother and younger sister braved death many times to flee persecution in the Middle East where her Muslim mother changed religion to Christianity . 

The account of how she took charge of a sick baby at fourteen in a sinking dinghy off Dover , and how the 26 people on board all held hands as they thought death was approaching made me stop Bluebell in order to shed a tear before my counselling day .

I defy anyone, including the most rabid of racists not to be moved by this tale of heroism 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002tprr

Gritted Teeth

 Weaver is trying her best to integrate

But like Mary Bennett in social situations, 

She just can’t get it! 

Rigid with awkwardness she pushed herself to her obvious limit last night and over perhaps 40 minutes crept her way to the centre of the living room from her usual ninth step on the staircase. 

It was a painful watch, and I held my breath for much of the ordeal, but she finally did it ! 

Speaking of painful watches, I sat through The Downfall of Huw Edwards last night

Awful 

John Wynne and Graham The Sheep

Chapel house or ty wynne ( Wynne House) where the remains of John Wynne are buried

According to Bangor Professor Robert Jenkins the industrial pioneer John Wynne (1650-1714) was instrumental in the development of Trelawnyd , formally known as Newmarket. He had a vision of developing the hamlet into a market town proper. He built houses, established a weekly market and established the Nonconformist chapel in 1701 as well as building a grammar school at "plas yn dre".
His wish to develop Newmarket into a large market town ultimately came to nothing, but Wynne was responsible for the village's growth and its population did top over 600 residents.
John Wynne died n 1714 and his remains was buried against the wall of the Chapel which still exists in Chapel street.
Now all this gives a little background to the "ghostly" goings on at Ty Wynne, which is the house situated right next door to the chapel and John Wynne's burial place. The present owner always thought that their house was haunted by a strong male character. Indeed the lady of the house always made a point of saying "goodnight" to the ghost before she went to bed. They always presumed that the "ghost" was that of John Wynne
In the early 1970s Ty Wynne featured in a somewhat creepy tale. Local small holder Graham “ the sheep”Jones was just leaving the memorial hall one wintry and rainy night.. He had been playing snooker and as he got on his bicycle he saw a figure of a man standing in the gateway of Ty Wynne.
The man was wearing an old fashioned long coat and hat, and seemed to acknowledge Graham before he cycled for home.
Literally a minute later Graham approached his home along London road and was astonished and frightened to see the same man standing alone outside his own home!
Graham wisely stopped and returned for the morale support from his friends back in the hall and by the time he returned mob handed the "man" had vanished
Could the figure be that of Trelawnyd's founder John Wynne?
Who knows?

This tale of Trelawnyd has a bittersweet taste as Graham died over the weekend