Cards

The Christmas Cards have filled the living room, kitchen window and the baby blue bookcase in the living room.

This pleases me. 

I’m shallow enough to think this is a good thing.

Cards posted with care and attention mean more now I’m older.

I’m the second to last on the postman’s delivery route and he never gets by much before 3pm...so today I’ve left him some mince pies in a Christmas themed plastic food box.

Working tonight

Tier 4

This afternoon,  I’m waiting for the post to arrive like a child would.

I’ve cleaned the back patio of the slime and the leaves, a product of rain every day for a month, and have walked the girls several miles .

Another nothing , lockdown day.

Dr Zhivago is on the tv

I had forgotten just how beautiful Omar Sharif was.

The Best Time

 

On a day I was due to catch up with my best mate Nu

A video catch up with Jane and Mike , old friends from Sheffield 

Made up for things

And for going on two hours all we did is laugh and laugh and laugh

I love you guys x

Soot

 

I’ve spent a dirty morning sweeping the chimney.

Last night, I suffered the peril of relying on a wood burner too much

A blocked flue and a very sooty cottage.

So I swept the fire and then ambled around, mucky, to deliver Christmas gifts to Trendy Carol, Animal helper Pat, Mandy and Sailor John and to Jo ( the young mum and Street Warden who kindly dropped a load of dog food off for me when I was isolating )

Other villagers were outdoing the same thing, including Cameron out walking his pugs. 

Cameron is a strapping young man in his 20s

Now when did that happen?

Wales is now in lockdown 4 and the Christmas Cards have filled the living room walls already.

A Final Sausage

 

The Welsh lockdown starts at midnight

Lucky I’ve already done a big shop this week.

I made a small turkey lasagne for supper tonight, and as I was doing so I found several left over cocktail sausages hidden away on the fridge shelf. 

I gave the dogs the sausages with their tea and kept one aside

I know I’m a bit of a show girl but I thought it apt that I tearfully planted it with Winnie’s ashes that had already been scattered on the flower beds

She would have loved that

Tired Thoughts

Almost finished nights, just waiting for day staff to stagger on duty, all blearily eyed.

I am now off for three whole days!

I have just been sharing with my colleagues how Eba, my old cleaning lady in Sheffield , used to mutter “ dirty boys......dirty boys” under her breath when she was scrubbing our bathroom 

( I have no idea where that nugget of memory came from, but I have to accept it was just a product of over tiredness) 

It got everyone laughing anyhow.

The village is collecting homemade Christmas decorations in order to decorate the village green on Wednesday. I will join in before Next week’s night shifts.

Animal helper Pat dropped off a Bara Brith covered in silver foil yesterday, and Rosemary and German Bernard from the far side of the village did the same with bottles of jam and chutney.

I’m having a walk later this morning with friends including Chic Eleanor. 

We’ve planned a proper coffee on Colwyn Bay Beach.

Eleanor predicted the amble will be “ glorious” 

My Sunday trip to see Nu is definitely off .....😭

I haven’t seen her for nearly a year.

The vet called, Winnie’s ashes were there to be collected.

I thought this odd as I had not originally requested any , but I collected them anyway.

When I got home, I found that my sister had left a planter and some primula plants for her so in the rain I sprinkled the old girl around the front garden 

As Albert watched wide eyed from under the holly bush near the front door

baba Yetu

 It’s just two years since I joined the choir

But we have not sung properly together for going on ten months now.

I am missing it so.

When the choir “ got” a song, and when I say “ got” I mean when we nailed it, Jamie our 1940’s  RAF moustached choir master would often encourage us to to leave the circle in which we sing to experience the harmonies from another perspective .  

“ Walk around and listen” he would say and although I often find physical movement within choir embarrassing , when I finally did so, I was always amazed by how beautiful we could sound

Just thirty people , most of us with no experience in music.

All singing quite beautifully together

I’m finding Tuesday zoom choir meetings somewhat difficult. Singing alone in the kitchen, to a prerecorded track isn’t the same as choir and again my natural ability to become easily embarrassed can take over from the raw confidence singing within a group can give you.

I miss the solidarity of being part of a whole.

I miss the psychological boost of endorphins when my natural shyness starts to disappear in melody

Does that make sense?

I miss those voices around me. 

I miss being enveloped in the magic of the noise we can make

I miss those acoustics of the village hall that makes us sound so much better than we are

This song, Baba Yetu is the Lord’s Prayer in Swahili 

I would love for us to sing it when we meet up, again, properly.

A Thought

What day is it?

Who knows 

This video  really pleased me 

 Why do you think that is so?

Answers on a postcard