Pasta On The Wall

A bag of out of date pasta lies on the kitchen garden wall.
The post it states it for my hens.
I haven't had hens since last Easter, so someone in the village is behind the times.
I had a meeting up with the head honcho of the village Womens' Institute the other day about planning something about celebrating the history of the village. Inititives such as the making of community tapestry depicting village life past and present were discussed - all ideas which sounds exciting and innovative
Monday I have another meeting with a members of the new community association in order to pass on my expertise in running the flower show. The association hope to resurrect the Show albeit in a different form, so I am happy to share my knowledge, but I won't be running things again....I feel in limbo, the divorce is slow and my future here is uncertain
Limbo is a horrible state to be in
You are Neither fish or fowl
Once deep, grounded roots seem uncertain and fragile and the responsibility for little lives, albeit ones with paws and not feet, at times seems overwhelming.
I'm still waiting to hear about the lease on the field too.....and I want to move forward with the new allotments idea..
....divorce limbo
But I am smiling and gliding 
I've just walked the dogs in the village sunshine and everything looks mighty fine. Mrs Trellis was practicing piano in her living room window. And Stan was pottering around his neat little garden.
It's almost lambing time, and the honeysuckle over the front door is suddenly budding green for the new year. Mr H stopped to tell me his new Welsh Terrier puppy is doing well, he bought him after seeing Mary's bouncy trot , we hope to introduce them soon.
Mandy was chipper on her way back from the shop with some milk, her mum is much better than she was and trendy Carol has just driven by, sporting one of her new spring creations...

In a few minutes I'm off to meet an old friend in Chester.
An old friend from my York nursing days.
The pasta is still on the kitchen wall......

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Watch this, it will take your breath away

Gypsy Queen

Gay theatre is a bit of a rarity in North Wales so I jumped at the chance to see Rob Ward's acclaimed two hander play Gypsy Queen. 
Set in the fiercely hetero and predominantly catholic boxing clubs of Liverpool, the play tells of the love story between two young boxers who play in rival clubs.
It's funny, sharply observed and at times rather moving, which is a feat in itself as the two actors Rob Ward and Ryan Clayton play all eight characters in the play.
And of course the script is peppered with so much scouse wit, which provides much warmth and pathos in the piece.
I loved it and had a small tear in my eye at the hopeful and rather loving ending

Keeping my End Up

I didn't doze for long.

I had forgotten that Gorgeous Dave had rescheduled our badminton match for 7 pm last night, so with some trepidation, a new pair of tracksuit bottoms and my newly made but  forgotten strawberry smoothie sat in the fridge I met him at a local school gymnasium .

It was a gym that held some bittersweet memories for me as it was a place of much ritualistic humiliation in my 1970s secondary school PE days.

GD was suitably attired in his immaculate yet relaxed sports wear accompanied by a set of winnie sized muscular thighs to die for.

I waddled out with holes in my trainers and noted that there was a dribble of cottage pie down my T shirt.
Not a great sporting look

But the challenge was on! 

Thank goodness for muscle memory, for even though I am just under twenty years older than GD and literally twice as heavy I kept my end up fairly well!
And I enjoyed it.
And at least GD had the good grace to sweat just a little 

Having said this ........

I had to rock back and forth several times in bed this morning in order to get my aching old arse off the mattress.........

Just off to a morning Sams shift. Tonight I'm off to see a gay themed boxing play with a friend

Nights

Sometimes I think I need to do something different. 

Nursing is a hard game when you do night shifts.

They scupper your reserves and body clock to buggery.

But it's all I know. 

I've been a nurse since I was twenty years old. 

Now I'm getting divorced , I now need to work well into my sixties and so I need to see if there is anything I can do that's a little easier on the old carcass 

Any ideas gratefully received 

I'll leave you to a few late postcard entries. 

I'm off to have a doze

Your Go-to Place

A couple of mornings a week I drive 16 miles to a stretch of Promenade that borders a man made beach. It's become my go-to place .
A place to go to - in order to feel better
This morning we sat in a line on the low wall.
Coffee in hand
Me, Winnie and George.
Mary is on my knee.
All looking out at the sea

Where is your go-to place.

The Walking Dead

The Walking Dead  continues and I'm still following and still enjoying.
It's a bit weird that Daryl  is centre stage now after 8 years in support
I'm still watching!

Mr Chivers In Bed Seven

The class of 1983 with our tutor Mr Brint

Paula -Top row right, Mike Far right.

I am on the far left

It was in the late autumn of 1984 when Mike, Paula and I started our general nursing placement at the Royal Infirmary in Chester.
As second year psychiatric nurses not that long out of our teens, we were so out of our comfort zone as the trim general nurses bustled around with more purpose and vigour than we were used to. But , for the most part our colleagues were kind and the task orientated care  fairly easy to pick up.

The ward was a surgical one, with a busy turn over. But there was one patient that remained a sort of constant during our time there and that was Mr Chivers.
Mr Chivers had been a solid large man when young. He had, as far as we could make out, experienced several large surgeries on his bowel and bladder and had a daily hour long slot made for him in an afternoon where the most experienced of the staff nurses would change his dressings.
He now weighed the same as a ten year old girl.
He was single and had no family, but was a chatterer by nature, so it wouldn't have surprised anyone that we psychiatric nurses gravitated towards him
Like puppies do to a smiling face.
And so when I helped roll Mr Chivers for his dressings that smelled like rotting fish to be changed, he quizzed me about my family roots in Liverpool and we talked about his wartime experience in York with his best friend Knobby.
Before his teatime morphine kicked in to his system, he would hold Paula's tiny hand so firmly until her empathy tears were wiped away along with his and every morning he allowed Mike to shave him alongside the scouse banter Mike was well known for even though he was perfectly able to do it himself.
Mr Chivers was our go to man. He waved to us on arrival and on our departure with a skinny yellow hand and his locker drawer was constantly filled with liquorice allsorts which could be plundered by us in between observation rounds, post op checks and urine bottle washing.
He read the Radio Times and planned our tv watching for the evening and he held up his crossed fingers when one of us were taken aside for an assessment on our aseptic technique
.
The ward sister was , I think, well aware of our relationship with the old man but had bigger things to concern herself with. She did , however make a point of saying rather too curtly that "Mr Chivers would not make Christmas" in handover once after Paula had joked about taking him out Christmas shopping.

It was soon after this when Paula and I came on duty at 7.15am, we stopped at the nurses station
looking at an empty bed 7. The mattress was scrubbed clean with antiseptic and the locker was emptied of liquorice and pyjamas.
Mr Chivers had died around 6 am.
he had been alone as it was medication time.

Paula cried her way through handover with a blotchy face
I kept my eyes to the floor
and the ward sister, looking weary even at that early time called out "Nurse Bestwick, Mr Gray a moment please!" as the nurses filed from her office.
She was not unkind
"You psychi nurses really need to harden up a little" she told us carefully handing Paula a tissue
"This is about the patient and not all about you"
Paula and I must have looked a little bemused by her words so she explained
"Mr Chivers got a great deal of pleasure looking after the three of you these last few weeks. that's what helped him through. You made him feel useful and needed."
Then it all made sense.
The stories during a smelly unpleasant dressing change was a distraction for my benefit.
The unneeded wet shave and the hand holding.
Things designed to comfort  us and...not him......

"Now wash your face and get back on the floor" the sister instructed us her thoughts already on another 100 things to do.
and we both left her office a little older and a just a little wiser.

Eve

I feel a London trip coming on