Coffee, Art and Parks

 It’s hot here but I can do everything at my own pace saw Picasso’s Gernica at Museo Nacional Reina Sofia then after coffee spent the day around the Parque del Buen Retiro.

The concert tonight is a mismatch getting there  via the metro, so I am going my taxi and will return via tube.

I haven’t felt hungry but I had some wonderful tasting ( but terrible looking) Patatas Bravas in a cafe overlooking the Alfonso XII monument a late tea, and several chouros for breakfast

Spritzer

 My driver was adorable. Big as a bear and with a lisp to die for, he couldn’t speak English much we but chatted away like old friends without really understanding what the other was saying .

Madrid has no beach but the people are warm was the gist of his lecture

The woman opposite wanted it so bad

My hotel is near Atocha which feels like soho in London and my room has two balconies! 

 I’m writing this in a bar overlooking a fountained square with a large Aperol Spritzer 

And all is well

Linen Pants

Just changing planes in Barcelona for Madrid 

I’ve got my linen pants on and look like demis roussos

Constellations

 The hospice has kindly let me off on Thursdays so I can see my own clients. I saw my first client for the second time this morning and had my usual self debrief over a coffee in the car afterwards, with the window open and with rain on my face.

There is a beach at Abergele, where I park up. Apparently it’s a notorious doggers beach but during the day, thank the lord there is not a heaving buttock to be spied .

So I made my mental notes and relaxed.

Last night Chic Eleanor and I went to see Constellations at Theatre Clwyd. 

This reboot of Nick Payne’s 2012 play is a love story where physicist Marieanne ( Gwenllian Higginson) meets Bee keeper Roland( Aled Pugh) and they  act out brief repeated scenes from a whole series of possible relationship scenarios, with the outcome changed each time.

It’s a rather wonderful piece , that generates its own rhythm  and in one moment the actors lapse into Welsh, which is an nod to the performance in a week or so’s time which will set entirely in Welsh .

The cottage felt cold and unloved when I got home. So I went straight out again, walked the dogs and stopped by the shop to buy logs and some cheerful Ice cream. The cheap vanilla stuff, you used to love as a kid.

On my return the log burner was soon lit and as I ate the ice cream ( so slowly so it turned slightly frothy) I packed my bag for Madrid 

Mucho Gusto

https://www.grupotalia.org/

It’s been a busy day culminating in a cracking theatre production at Theatre Clwyd. I’ll report on that tomorrow. I’ve had supervision and explored some old memories from my psychiatric days which surprised me. And I’ve booked a car and driver from Madrid airport to my hotel for peanuts. Remember it’s my first jaunt abroad alone since my aborted trip to Rome , and I’m mindful that led to a thwarted visit to A&E

Am I nervous at travelling alone ? 

I am …..but I feel it needs to be done

You ve Got A Look Of Eva Braun

My laburnum has flowered.

In fact it’s bloomed. 

I went to visit it this morning 

It’s sturdy and straight and looks very well and healthy 

I’m pleased 

I’ve tried to change my GP practice today too.

I make no beans that I have a poor relationship with my doctor, but I didn’t want that fact broadcasted around a doctor’s waiting room.so in hushed tones I tried to discuss this with the surgery reception I want to join. 

It was like pulling teeth with two of the staff acting as the stereotypes so much discussed on longline mumsnet and the like.

I was reminded of one of the last put downs on Victoria wood’s Canteen Sketch and could quite easily have countered the unhelpful passive aggressive apathy I received with a pithy “ Youve got a look of Eva Braun?”

 It’s Nu’s birthday today.

I usually send her flowers from Bloom & Wild but she’s away.

I’m in the middle of plan B, which getting her a theatre ticket, like me she loves most mainstream stuff  but unlike me loathes musicals

It’s left me with a few choices.

I called in to The Velvet Voiced Linda and her hubby Nick for coffee too. They laugh long and hard 

And I like that .

I haven’t done a lot today, but it feels as though I have

Monday Jobs

Janet has come to do the garden so I did shopping and had a shower. Janet tried to teach Roger how to jump into her arms but he couldn’t quite grasp the concept.

No more work for over 8 days.

It’s our birthday on the 1st and the family, eight of us, are going out for a meal to La Richetta  Usually I play the martyr and work, but not this year, it serves no one to do so, and so I’ve booked the weekend off, planning a jaunt to Liverpool with friends on the Friday and movie and a Japanese lunch on the Sunday. 

All about My Mother is the film, it’s considered an old classic now 

It’s a cracker

Mrs Trellis and Blue stopped to say hello. 

She’s planning to enter veg in the show 

Olla

 There is a memorial for old Trevor this afternoon in the memorial Hall. It would have been his 100th birthday. His family has organised the event 

I will go if I manage to sleep for a few hours this morning . Night shifts don’t half cut into what you can and cannot do, and the older I get the less my reserves cope.

All the judges have confirmed that they will be attending the Flower Show  this year. We have some lovely  judges all told. Debbie was a stalwart of the Prestatyn Flower Show and knows her onions. She is diligent and helpful and joins in with the fun. She also looks the part, often wearing summer frocks and a cheerful straw hat for the judging day. 

Mrs Cooke is another good egg. She marks the cookery ( what else) and if she can’t make it her daughter ( another mini me  qualified judge) jumps into the breech. 

Meirion Jones from the village has accepted the tough remit of Flower Judge for the second year. His garden is the unarguable beauty in Trelawnyd and has to be seen to be believed, but he hides his talents under a Bushel and I had to do some crawling to get him to agree to come.

I’ve recruited Eirlys from the Marion and jo ( she of the three legged whippet fame) to act as judges chaperones. Village Leader Ian usually goes around with the cookery judge so he can lick her spoons.

And so dear reader before I can sneak off to bed , you can see that I’ve won an award from the lisping Spanish Choir and has been recognised as one of their top fans

Canta con todo tu cortazon

Authenticity

 For me, the overall positive experience of developing my awareness of self , it to feel authentic. Nearly 62 years on this planet has allowed a myriad of bad habits, and unproductive , useless behaviours to cloud what I am and how I see myself, and others. 

Things are complicated, they are bound to be.

And being authentic is hard

I’m better at saying no without trying to justify and people please

I’m better at being kind, where kindness is what I want from others

And I’m better in allowing  myself to revisit a hurt but not to pick that feeling up raw with both hands as I once would have done.

Yesterday was a case in point . An email from my ex husband , some background information I needed to know on my nephew’s upcoming visit. Usually something like this would elicit a whole set of feelings and behaviours and would have me spiralling away down rabbit holes of being grateful for contact, that needy victim, so to speak . 

The email , was just an email, and I could smile at that fact and be kind to myself that seeing his words in print could still remind me that I love him.

Another person, elsewhere,  was rude to me and I called that out, politely and, in my mind appropriately and when the reply wasn’t exactly what I wanted, I walked away without feeling bad or angry in any way.

It’s all a work in progress.

We all are

Am I authentic? ….Blah! 

Well if I sit here and allow myself to gallop over old turf I’m not

I’m on nights tonight and I’m going to open the cottage windows wide to the sun and give the place a bloody good clean.

Friday night

 The lisping choir does it again. Love the look on Silvia’s face

Long day at work today 

The blackbird mother has left her nest by the front door

Which is sad

A Gift From Mrs Smith From Herefordshire

It’s a small world 

Mrs Smith from rural Herefordshire was in London last week. 

In between French Fancies at Fortnum’s and a quick look at the tweeds at Burlington Arcade she ventured down the South Bank to peruse the books and fell in love with this ladybird book on the Honey bee

Inside carefully written in pencil was my name , written as a child would write it 

Strange as it may seem….

I did write it

I was around seven years old 

 

Starting

 The Welsh poppies are in full bloom beside the Church gates.

I noticed them as I drove to my counselling placement centre which is located in Abergele? 

I had my first client which was lovely, a bit stressful due to an anxiety dream last night which surprised me. This had my client drunk and irrational.

Thank goodness it was only a dream..

My first meeting went ok.

This afternoon I’m going for  supper with Alistair a friend from Chester, I met him on those lonely Fridays of the Big Gay Quiz in covid lockdown

Those days seem a long way away now.

Llanasa

 A couple of miles northeast of Trelawnyd is located the pretty village of Llanasa. Smaller and quieter than our village, it has grown from a rural settlement dominated by two large farms and a large private house ( Gyrn Castle) into a collection of designer houses owned by people with money. Some aspects of the old community does survive however as the village still has its church and congregation and a robust WI based in the old schoolhouse.

Last night’s talk took place in the village, and I knew several of the ladies there, including animal helper Pat and Cameron’s mum.The talk by Helen Papworth was about her book The Butterfly and the Bee, which discusses the relationship between HM Stanley and his wife Dorothy. 

It was a good listen.

Afterwards.I drove around the village and noted how much had changed since I was a boy. 

http://www.llanasa.wales/

Llanasa circa 1971 “my”farm right foreground

                  Rona 

In the early 1970s Llanasa was my Girls Own adventure go to. In tow with my sister Janet I would don wellies and a thick school coat and we would brave the Welsh winters to groom and ride and care for my sister’s benign old mare Rona. 

I loved those times, not only for the companionship in a somewhat lonely childhood but for those little farming adventures that could be had. Of climbing the hay bales in search of was was probably rotten hens eggs, exploring the old sheds and barns or playing with the Labrador puppy, tied up next to the back door. 

If the snow was too harsh the old lady of the farm used to beckon us in, so we could drink a cup of sweet camp coffee with evaporated milk in order to get warm, after which we would take Rona into her green little stable ( now a house) where I could smell the mix of snow and straw and manure and pony breath and  where my own breath couldn’t quite prevent the chillblains on my hands sodden by iced woollen gloves.

Garden

Between May and June, the garden fills with gentle colour. The aquilegia, because of their tiny flowers , almost hint at the pinks, and purples and indeed blacks rather block fill the greens of the roses, ferns and Ivy.

The ceanothus blue shines from the back of the garden and the sculptural alliums have popped up overnight, a couple of weeks earlier than usual.

The garden truly looks cottage like, which is satisfying 

I’m soon off to see Meirion Jones , the final judge in this years flower Show to see if he’s free in August. The cookery and vegetable judges I've already booked and I’m awaiting confirmation from my choir after asking Jamie ( sans his 1940s RAF Moustache) if they would sing in the afternoon.

Fingers crossed

Tonight Helen Papworth from the village is giving a talk on Henry Morton Stanley , in Llanasa village hall, which I’m off to. Mrs Trellis left a snickers bar on the kitchen wall yesterday, it was wrapped in a paper napkin with ducks on it.

 

Let the Sunshine, Aquarius - Hair

The lisping Spanish Choir !

2 weeks and I see them in the flesh 

International Nurses Day

 

To celebrate International Nurses day my hospice ward is holding a nurse baking competition tomorrow. Not to be outdone the night staff brought in our entires and decorated them before day staff arrived.

My chocolate Swiss roll was classically understated given the somewhat amateur competition  

Without access to ovens and with little time, we just wanted to join in, as one of the sisters had gone beyond things and had fashioned a lovely cake and prizes for the day. Her hard work in providing a little light in what has been a difficult time moved our little team on nights, seeing that most of the nurses hadn’t gotten round to joining in , hence the amateur cake decorating and high spirits.

Storm

 Roger woke me up around 4.30pm, he pawed at the duvet. The skies were black and the mood of the weather had suddenly changed. We went downstairs and I cooked a jacket potato with beans and we sat in the kitchen , ( me in my underpants) as the storm rolled in from the South.

It was, what I describe, as one of those Hollywood storms , full of constant rolls of thunder and occasional lightening. Roger sat behind the kitchen door, with his head peeping around the opening, and allowed himself a tiny bark at each clash of thunder. 

The storm was a good one with the thunder rolling against the basin of hills that surround Trelawnyd.

It was loud and dramatic, as storms should be , and I moved my chair into the doorway to watch.

The electricity went off, then flickered back on, then off again.

Mary quietly walked up and sat on my knee, and I remembered a recent meeting with the grieving son of a patient who just needed some physical contact in his pain. 

He allowed himself a handshake which I prolonged a couple of seconds longer than normal

The storm was over by five fifteen with Roger bravely walking the flooded patio on tip toe afterwards.

Mary remained knee sitting as after a break, the rain started to fall again.

Northern Lights

I’m on night shifts over the weekend. But it’s glorious today, so I've made brunch to sit outside in the sun.

A salmon, mango,motzerella, avocado and basil baguette with coffee from my Italian Mocca.

Bloody lovely. 

I had forgotten the northern lights last night but was reminded by a friend who texted me a “ go outside now” message and I laid down in the front garden with the Welsh to watch the light show .

More pink than I expected

 I had a dream that my grandmother arrived at the cottage.I spied her through the window and she was standing beneath the honeysuckle in a cream coat with cream buttons and a cream hat, but for some reason I didn’t let her in. She fished inside her handbag then left

Most Haunted

 My friend Ruth needed some frivolity so I bought us some tickets to a stage show of the tv “ reality” show Most Haunted .

It was dreadful and we walked out at half time. The show is a sort-of-serious ghost hunt with a cheerful and not untalented ex Blue Peter presenter Yvette Fielding  at the helm, unfortunately, Fielding’s husband and co presenter took the whole evening down a few notches to the level of a group of workmen swearing in the corner of Wetherspoons and although I like a good swear with the best of them, it was all too basic and cheap theatre for my liking .

Not My Doing

 Villager Leader Ian has requested that

The 2024 Flower and Produce Show 

reintroduces the 

International Novelty Vegetable /fruit Class

All you have to do is photograph your

Novelty veg/fruit and send the photo to me along side your address to

jgsheffield@hotmail.com

All entries need to be in by August 20th

There will be prizes for first and second place