My friend Colin and I met, like two middle class ladies sometimes do , for lunch and a mooch around Ness Gardens .
The place was more or less deserted
I bought a white agapanthus from the shop
Epiphany
What’s the pleural of epiphany?
Whatever the answer maybe, I think I’ve had a succession of “small” epiphanies since my birthday and beyond.
When I really think of it, when life changed after lockdown was the real start of it all.
When I say epiphanies, what I really mean is ideas and thoughts which have flickered like Christmas Tree fairy lights in and out of my consciousness until they figure more importantly than not in everyday life.
Many of these became clearer after my brief break in Findhorn and the age old red letter day of reaching my 60th birthday.
The overall sense of these flickering lights is that I’m now embarking on that final decade(s) of my life and it’s now time for proper change.
My father died in his early sixties, my brother at 58 and I’m very aware of my mortality in real terms
Now I’m fully aware that since my husband left me, I have built a new life and career for myself from more or less nothing. I am financially more stable than I’ve been for years , I have saved my home and have made a passable social life for myself through and despite covid but things haven’t been quite enough for me.
There has to be more.
There IS more
Pushing myself mentally and academically is one new start and is an important one for me.
Letting go of nursing is another.
And finally letting go of the old ghosts of my marriage is the final and most vital bit of the jigsaw.
He has gone, and I know why.
The next decade has to change totally.
Mentally, physically and socially and for the first time , in a very very long time in my life
I’m ready for more change.
Like I said , this could be my last decade
And only I am in the driving seat
A Town Like Alice
Filmed obviously in 1956 ( continuity forgot to period dress the cast) this little remembered movie of the famous Shute novel proved to be a little hidden gem this morning. Set in Malaya during the war it centres around the plight of a group of English women and children forced to March across the country in search of a prisoner of war camp which will house them.
Marie Lohr as Mrs Dudley Frost
Renee Houston as Ebbey
Virginia McKenna plays the groups pragmatic leader is supported ably by a whole gaggle of British character actors such as Jean Anderson, Marie Lohr, Renee Houston and Nora Nicholson.who play the typical cross section of colonial types later poached by the the series Tenko.
It’s a cracking movie, which steals only part of the novel which really concentrates on the love affair between McKenna’s character and a bravura Australian squaddie Peter Finch who is eventually crucified by a sadistic Japanese Captain Yanyata.
I really enjoyed it and was kind of sad when it finished before midday.
Since then , I’ve just mooched. The dogs are listless and bored in the heat and there are jobs that need doing but I don’t feel like starting anything
I’m making a list of them
Salad with pomegranate seeds and mango for tea
Choir later
Late Dog Walk
Dorothy swam in a river in Dyserth this evening in an effort to keep cool.
It was almost dark when she dived in with eyes closed
Mary stayed by my side , pursing her lips.
I haven’t been so proud since I attended my ex husbands doctorate graduation
She swam like a baby hippo, head held high, sharp doggy paddle, big smile on her face
And it totally made my week, if not my month when she struck out from the bank like a professional.
I never knew the daft old girl could do water like an otter
But she did and like a new dad , it made my day.
And I cried silly tears as she eventually made for shore.
Smiling like a loon
She’s now snoring loudly dripping the blue trendy sofa in water
Chatty Cathy
Bluebell tells be its 95 degrees in old money
Which is too hot by anyone’s money
Constance
It’s been almost 30 degrees here yesterday and just too hot for bulldogs outside.
This will be a “ Chatty Cathy” kind of blog today.
I took the dogs for an early walk and that will be it until tonight after dusk.
For those that remember Constance ( my first rescue bulldog) they may recall that she died walking on only a mildly warm day. She was an old dog, who had health issues , but the heat could well have been a factor in her death and I will never take that chance again, never
I couldn’t get off to sleep so found a Valium tablet left over from my husband’s nervous flyer days in the medicine box and slept the sleep of the dead until it was ready for work. I took magnum ice creams in for day and night staff when I came on duty as a bit of a morale booster and as the hospice has no air con in the patient areas we have set up fans throughout the building corridors which now has a cooling rush of breeze about them.
I am reminded of the convent in Black Narcissus
It’s all very comfortable if a little breezy.
I was due to collect Roger tomorrow , but it is a long drive to Alfreton and I just knew his breeder would cancel because of the heat . I’ve provisionally rearranged for the 1st of August. She describes him as “ Smart but cuddly”
Now I have five days off……part time status is hitting home just a little.
Whooooo hooooo
I’ve enrolled in the counselling course which starts in September and have sent all the paperwork off as well as the fees so that’s another box ticked.
The rest of the week has been organised with my typical and no doubt irritating detail
Choir returns tomorrow , Wednesday it’s Ness Gardens for a mooch and lunch with a friend and Thursday Ive got tickets to the filmed version of Jodie Comer’s hit play Prima Facie
Friday my sister and I are going to the Grovensor Park Open Air Theatre to see Little Women which will be frothy fun all told.
Check Out
I get very exasperated at supermarket check outs
I always have.
Women tend to wind me up the most, as it is common for them not to have their payment cards ready when the cashier states the cost of a shop.
We then have to suffer the whole rigmarole of the where’s my handbag ? face.
The unzipping of the bag, the fishing for the purse and the shuffling for the cards go next and before we can proceed the whole procedure has to bet into reverse before they can start loading bags into trolleys.
I try to look away before any of the dithering starts
But it’s like a car crash,
You can’t look away.
Yesterday, I was stood behind an older couple ( 65 perhaps) where she verbalised to her henpecked hubby where every item was to be placed and in which bag. To be honest I only noticed when I caught the cashier’s gaze, who was desperately trying not to smile and conspiratorially we watched the drama unfold until the husband finally offered the wrong bag up for filling and his wife slapped the bag away with her hand
In a fit of pique, the husband waved his arms above his head and stormed off snapping “You cow” leaving the wife to do the where’s my handbag? thing as well as proclaiming I don’t know what’s that all about.
I didn’t look at the cashier until the woman was walking away and we then both burst into giggles
“ I’m very tired “ the cashier said in way of explanation. “ But that poor man”
We giggled some more.
I tell you this small tale on the back of a now deleted post by Rachel Philips who shared a funny and well written post about how singletons can inflate health worries to Diva- esque levels when they are alone in the house without the constraints and common sense sense of a companion.
The cashier was the only person I had spoken to all day.
And therefore the joke, the shared humanity of the altercation
Was even more important and significant.
The scene between us, a wonderfully timed conspiratorial bit of fun.
Butterflies
My sister called yesterday to bash the garden into shape.
We discussed the total absence of honey bees and butterflies on the buddliea bushes in the garden which have just burst into bloom.
I checked each of the three bushes in turn.
Not one pollinator could be seen.
Their absence has worried me for days now.
Perhaps it’s because today seems warmer, a precursor to the proclaimed horror temperature due on Monday, but this afternoon the bees were back in good numbers and the butterflies, noticeable in ones and twos rather than the dozens I was used to last year.
The back garden buddliea
I cooked stir fry vegetables and mixed them with udon noodles and hot Korean sauce for supper.
I’m back on nights tonight.
A Pretty Shitty Love
I am glad and thankful that I have no hang ups about going to the theatre on my own.
Tonight, I grabbed a cheap 10£ ticket for Theatre Clwyd ‘s production of A Pretty Shitty Love by Katherine Chandler and again I was stunned by an innovative, provocative and intensely moving piece of Theatre.
A two handed piece set in working South Wales we are introduced to a cheerful but damaged Hayley ( Danielle Bird) abandoned by an alcoholic father as a child and desperate for love. The object of her affection is the taciturn and damaged soul Carl ( Daniel Hawksworth) the product of a drug induced death mother as a teen. The couple’s tragic love affair is cleverly portrayed in and around a Perspex set full of photos and words from Hayley’s prison letters to Carl and although the physical violence of the abuse between perpetrator and victim is only alluded to the true horror of the violence is underlined by one, clever but truly horrid scene when Hayley s left for dead and buried on a Sandy beach.
Domestic Violence has been depicted many times in stage and screen as we all know but this production, which depicts a true story, brings a new terrible light to an age old abuse problem.
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