Going Gently

Bartomeu and Santa Tecia

Sitges wouldn't be Sitges if it wasn't for the Church of Saint Bartomeu and Santa Tecia.
I had a walk around it this morning and it's cool Baroque interior was a relief from the 32 degree heat outside.
It's been nice to amble. I've bought some books from a stall near the beach and some sort of chickpea dip, bread and grapes for lunch.
I was given a cruising friendly nod and smile by a big Scandinavian bear at breakfast
These are nice things to experience when sitting alone.

I am very mindful that a year ago, I was in Sitges but in a very different frame of mind.
It was a hard slog of a holiday where I was trying so hard to keep the grief of a broken relationship
under some sort of control and just walking around a place I knew so well as a couple was painfully melancholic .

Now I feel lighter.
Not whole again ( that will come when I start work and sort out the logistics of sorting a home out)
But certainly lighter.
It's been a tough year.
A crappy job, George and William, ill health, financial shocks, an emotional jacuzzi the size of one of Elton John's. strops , all have battered me down just as I pulled up one bra strap after another but with friends, family, bloggers, a touch of my grandmother's fortitude and a sense of humour which has slowly returned to its sarcastic best,
I do feel hopeful
Hopeful that the shit is, for the most part behind me

I am thinking all this as I sit in Church
Do gays have a patron Saint?
I wonder....anyhow I can hear the screams of the swifts as they circle us overhead and I remembered what I wrote about them last year when I visited

" ......it was sort of nice to sit by the Church in the setting sun and watch a thousand swifts soar around it's bell towers like a giant swarm of friendly bees."

I still like the analogy

Home

The green crocs have arrived
Within 3 minutes all is relaxation

Shedding

Apparently there is a "new" phenomenon around called shedding
This is where someone sees something that needs doing in their community and, well, just does it!
This sort of thing has been going on for years.....indeed village elder Islwyn, some ten years ago now , took it on himself to refashion, organise and upgrade the entirety of the new graveyard....a Herculean task in itself, and one he completed more or less single handed and in all weather.

Today, I had the nicer part of Shedding, as the weather is fine and the breeze on the village green just right in offsetting the humidity, I got stuck in with clearing weeds from the lavender path.
I noted a while ago that Bridget, (who runs the youth club ) had been planting out pots and borders on the green herself and as the weeds over the lavender had seriously got on my tits, I invested a hour to do something about them.
Not that I got much done.
Islwyn turned up with more stories in him than four editions of Aesop's fables, and Jason, bored with his sore hand came over for a chat .
I told him I would photograph him looking glum but he moved over to the benches so I could photograph him looking heroically into the middle distance.

That Fat Bastard!

In Wales we have an excellent " GP Out Of Hours " facility.
When your own doctor 's surgery is closed then your ring the number, get triaged by a nurse advisor and if appropriate given an appointment with an out-of-hours GP based at the local A&E
I rang the system at 7pm. Was given an appointment at 8pm . I was seen at 8.01 and was home with my antibiotics by 8.20
I know I am a good historian . I had already tested my urine and knew I had the start of an infection.
I also told the doctor what antibiotic suited me best.
But still the service is a good one.
The only down side is the fact that the out-of-hours waiting room is shared with the minor injury department of A&E .
Tonight the average waiting time for that department is a whopping 7 hours!
I sat down in that shared waiting room for not even a minute until I was called in to see the doctor.
and it was too much for one poor soul who slapped his thigh in frustration
" Fucking hell that fat bastard has only just come in and he's been seen straight away!!!!!! "

Ps. Speaking of health Jason is now home and hopefully improving.
I saw him today . He was greatly moved by his global best wishes

The Tea Caddy

I have worked shifts every holiday I have been given since the autumn and by doing so have paid for a short holiday outright. Every month I have squirrelled away some cash into the plain Regency tea caddy which sits on the mantle and today I will swap that cash for Euros, my spending money.
For the very first time in many years I am not delving into overdraft or credit card to pay for something of note!
I can only afford five days abroad, but that will be more than enough as I am returning to Sitges in Spain, a place I know and love and feel instantly comfortable with.
My Next holiday will be somewhere new, somewhere more challenging
This holiday its the comfort of what is known.
I go on Thursday!
and I am so looking forward to be able to sit quietly, with my eyes closed and my mind uncluttered, feeling the Mediterranean Sun on my face.

Bad Dog

The attack was photographed

It's a testament to any small community when news gets around like wildfire.
This is , of course, helped by social media , and in Trelawnyd's case, it's own on line discussion board.
Towards the later evening of the carnival the affable Despot Jason was Savaged by a dog which was on one of those extendable leads.
The dog meant business and several small children were in the potential line of fire.
It was " lucky" therefore that Jason bore the brunt of the attack.
The injury to his hand is a serious one, I've seen it so I know And he's presently in England awaiting skin grafts.
The police have been involved.
Jason and his family are popular in the village.
You don't often know just how much until something happens like this
Going Gently and everyone here, sends their love and best wishes

Pride month 🌈

Pride Month is coming to an end with all of the panache of a quality drag queen with too much sass
I am sorry to have never attended a Pride march as yet
Next year will be my year.
I don't really blog about what it is like to be gay.
I just am gay…….the fact is incidental and probably the least interesting thing about me

Am I proud to be gay?
hummmmmmm…….I am proud of being associated with all those men and woman that battled for equal rights at the 1969 Stonewall Riots.
I am proud to be living in a country that is enlightened enough to pass a law stating gay men and women can marry legally
and I am proud enough, tough enough and ugly enough to be able to hold my head up high and say I am a gay man in company that may not accept the fact with alacrity

Having said this, apart from some low level homophobic remarks thrown out by two Neanderthal British Gas workers at a Christmas do many years ago, I have never really been on the receiving end of any bigoted behaviour.
This fact, I know, is a rarity.

Once many years ago now I found out that I was subject to some gossip at work where the staff of an adjacent ward were over heard discussing my "sexual" life by a patient. The patient, as it turned out was a bit of a psychopath and promptly wheeled his wheelchair to my office in order to "taunt me" with the information he had just heard.
Buoyed up with indignation and supported by my sister's uniform I cornered all of the staff as they were giving handover and asked them to their faces if there was anything they wanted to know about me.
Of course heads were hung and denials given but the following warning shot of the prospect of official disciplinary action had its effect.
No one ever troubled me again where the subject of my sexuality was concerned.

I will leave you with the story of my very first meeting with Auntie Gladys.
She was in her mid eighties back then and was selling her Flower Show raffle tickets around the village and its surrounds.
The Jungle telegraph had alerted to most that there was a new Gay couple in the village

I bought a strip off her
" Does your friend want any tickets too?" she asked , her eyes twinkling and I was half amused by the term "friend" a word which was often bandied around by people too shy or too uncomfortable to call a spade a spade
Only Gladys was not uncomfortable, she was just searching for the right word to use
"He is my partner and not a friend and yes he will have some tickets from you" I told her kindly
Gladys laughed
"I was going to call him your boyfriend " she said "but you are both far too old to be called that!!!"

At 96, on the day of our marriage, the old girl walked all the way down from her house on High Street to present me with a wedding gift over the kitchen wall and when I remarked that I never thought I would see the day that two men would be allowed to Marry each other
she clapped her frail hands together and laughed her musical Welsh laugh
"How marvellous" she cried

yes....how bloody marvellous!