Paul asked if I ever get bored during the day and I answered no, because my mind is always bubbling away with some nonsense. Yesterday I started the long job of cutting back the virginia creepers down the passageway. This passageway between us and the pub belongs to us it delineates our space, though to be honest we would be happy if the pub owned it. Actually it was much darker when I first went in, but I have cut myself a window of sunshine.....
Opening the gate, I was greeted by a long black tunnel, the creeper had bent the farm wire netting over and latched itself onto the roof of the pub. Winter time and the whole fence is empty of leaf except for the ivys which are staying.
As I chopped I looked into Harriet's and Lucy's kitchen, and thought what a spick and span place it was with all the white crockery. It is not the cooking kitchen which produces great plates of food, something both Paul and I can't get through but it does it job of feeding the rather large appetites of the people round here. The girls run it efficiently, and it wise to remember that next door a small inner 'village' lives.
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| Sun Inn 1927 |
The pub is owned by two older people who live in a small modern house attached to the pub, the land backs onto the river and along their small portion hidden out of sight is about four statics, holiday homes mostly. Their territory has Nelson on one side with his ragbag of birds, sheep and a couple of goats and who lives in a caravan. The other side is J and R's land, J is very territorial.
The owners of the pub keep themselves to their own matters, and yet they are part of the community of course.
The death of their grandson meant that he was laid to rest in the graveyard, very near the side window of our house. There is something beautiful about how the family and friends look after the grave. Practically every other day people will come and bring flowers, arrange what is there and sit quietly with him. We have a blind on that window which is pulled down, though Lucy will spy shadows on the blind and bark furiously.
Talking of Lucy, we have just returned from our walk down to the green. It is 8 o-clock and the Gospel children are off to catch their bus, Geoff and his wife live in the chapel, he is taking his grandson off to college as well and we wave. Geoff mows the green and the footpath to the pub.
Joe is trying to get money so that we can grid the surface of the pathway with a rubber membrane. He is tackling the local council but things move slowly, as always. Village life is more disconnected than it was a century ago, us 'suburbians' have appeared as has new housing, there is no village hall and the church has all but closed down. But people settle into place, social changes go on around us, this is history walking slowly forward.
Your creeper covered tunnel looks as though it might harbor a variety of spiders and such to fall down one's neck while working! In town I sometimes walk up from a lower parking lot to the bank or other businesses on the 'square'. there is a narrow passage between two old building, roofed over and I notice that someone feeds stray cats there.
ReplyDeleteAs to being bored--its a state of mind I've never entertained!
I did have a bath afterwards, no spiders but plenty of dead leaf in my hair. Think we are alike Sharon, always something to do, and sometimes too tired to do it. Weaving at the moment on my 16 inch loom, there is one mistake (as usual) but I never worry!
DeleteSounds very much like the make up of our village Thelma. I no longer live in it, but am only a mile away and still go to events there - and my son now lives there. I remember my dear farmer counting once how many folk there were left in the village that were actually born there (he was one of course) and I think it came to about a dozen.
ReplyDeleteWhenever I look at the photos of families that once lived in the village, you realise it was almost impossible for people to move anyway. Now, we move without thinking, dislocating ourselves from places of birth, which way is the best?
DeleteI admire your sense of history and how you observe it. It is clear that history means more to you than it does to most people. As for the passageway between your house and the pub, have you ever thought about turning it into a bowling alley? You could have skittles set up at one end. With Paul you would surely have hours of fun trying to knock them down. The game of skittles goes back to 3300BC - so - very historical!
ReplyDeleteThe passage has been filled with rubble stone, not conducive to skittles. Yes I love history, the way it changes and shifts. Also the way technology is here but already passing us, as we look forward to a robotic future.
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