30th April 2022

 

A day in the life of.........

I was happy yesterday, no reason, but my heart danced for a while with Paul.  Things just panned out, decided not to worry about every thing but sadly Joanne, my spinning wheel has again got stuck at a particular point.

I received an email from my half-brother, I had written to him to say about the DNA test, and he came back saying from the moment that he saw a photo of me I was  so like his mother  he knew that we were siblings and welcomed his niece, my daughter. 

Went off to Lidl to get a few things. Friday is fish and chips night but I have given up on the treat, so new potatoes and fine beans were on the list.  Stood behind a great shopping trolley of goods and wished I had left my stuff in the basket so I could have moved but decided I had nothing better to do than stand and watch.  When it came to an end, £200 of stuff, there was the little comedy of the customer using the 'app' on his phone to pay.  The young asistant was helpful, pointing to that 'little squiggle' in the left hand corner.  I had arrived with cash, and my mind mulled was there enough gold in the Bank of England to cover cash sales nowadays.  You can tell I shall never go down the crypto currency way, nor the app on the phone! I'm just about 'contactless' as far as cards are concerned

For tea I cooked the beans, and then fried some onions, throwing in some tomatoes to mush down and then the beans.  This was always how my grandfather cooked them, I realised many years ago that his cooking was continental but had never put two and two together.

Earlier in the day I had watched videos about the flooding in Hebden in 2015, how the people had pulled together with lots of outsiders coming to help.  The Asian community and Sikhs provided hot meals during the time of the clean-up.. Sometimes the nonsense of London based news does not really catch the actions of normal people day by day.

Another video was 'Fruity Knitting', a monthly look at knitting designers from around the world.  The family who present this video, remind me of the sadness in families.  It was at first produced by Australian husband and wife.  Then he died in very sad circumstances, and the wife then presented with her beautiful daughter.  For the last three months she has been presenting from her sister's house in Australia.  Different ways of life with the added bonus of landscape and interesting designers to meet and listen to.  I can hardly call them home made videos because in the end there is a lot of money invested in equipment. 

Ellie Griffiths keeps me company whilst I knit, 'The Dying Fall' at the moment, I have almost listened to and read all of her books in the Ruth Gallowaway series.

28th April 2022

Is it not marvellous when science confirms a fact.  This time DNA has confirmed that my mother identified on 'My Heritage' is my real mother, by linking my daughter to a half brother of mine who got in touch with me last year.

The DNA test was Xmas present to my daughter from her daughters, but she left it untouched till a few weeks ago when it was sent off.  It came back with the news that 48% of her identity was English, and the rest North-West European, giving credence to the Belgium heritage of my grandfather.

There is a dash of Norwegian, Irish and Scottish, with an emphasis on Staffordshire in England.  Home to of course Colclough pottery, Colclough being the maiden name of my mother.  How things slot so easily into place.  As we poured over the results this morning other evidence of the people in my life were pounced on.  Mostly to do with my second stepmother and half brother.  So the explorations go on.

A trip to Todmorden Makery last night, with my daughter carrying the spinning wheel, and my problems were resolved by a good Samaritan who hammered it out precisely with a drill bit.

The Makery is there for repairs, whether bicycles or clothes and tools lent out.  It is full of sewing machines and tools and looks an interesting place to explore.  The gardeners of Tod will be out on Sunday to tidy up the many beds of vegetables and flowers in the town.  I went to a meeting on Saturday at the college regarding the 'upcycling' of the town.  They have won a 17 million pound grant, they asked for 22  million pounds but it is still a substantial amount.  Now watch the arguments break out! 

When we walked back from the college yesterday evening, we passed boxes filled with kale, spinach and someone had started to put out broad bean plants.  We didn't pick though I was tempted by spinach but it is interesting to see how 'Incredible Edible Todmorden' has developed from this 2013 video........

Town Improvement document

27th April 2022

Wednesday morning and I am once more on the alert for a knock at the door.  This time a passport delivered by TNT.  Waiting for parcels seem to be the new thing now that everyone orders from the internet.  There is a slow change in the use of wrapping paper much more cardboard and paper less plastic but even so there is always plenty to recycle.  Doorstep photographed and now you are legally in charge of delivered parcel.  It gives jobs, hopefully paid well but I doubt that.  I see P&O's ferry ship got stuck going over to Ireland, of course it isn't anything to do with poorly paid new crew to run the ship, talk about being caught with one's trousers down!

Then there is Elon Musk off to buy Twitter for his own purposes, 'Freedom of Speech', I won't swear but although I don't participate on Twitter I deactivated my account yesterday.  There is a lot of nonsense talked about free speech, people seem to forget that we live with each other and are part of a social group in which we must act together not apart.

And then there is Ukraine, harrowing sadness, though it should not be forgotten that there are other wars that exist around the world.  Do we accept that war is a function of civilisation, or that it is primitive tribalism taking over? I have read elsewhere, and I don't know if it is true, that Putin is a sick man does his coming mortality scare him into madness?

But back to day to day affairs, like asking how did dragons come into existence?* blogger has been playing around with our comments and spelling aid (much missed blogger), but it seems we are all adjusting to the new format.

The eavedropping female called Alexa has also been given her marching orders as she was unable to convince us satisfactorily that she wasn't listening to us.

*Was it the griffon on the Roman flag?

Another statue toppled, remember the Saddam one being pulled down by the crowd?

Kyiv dismantles ‘Friendship of the Peoples’ statue erected in 1982 to symbolise ties between Ukraine and Russia. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

Jumble of Rocks

Brimham Rocks, what can you say about these weirdly shaped enormous rocks that balance on each other?  You can read the geological history here and learn how the land formed in Yorkshire when two continental plates collided and then how the weather milled the stones down into these strange formations.  But weather, ice and sand have left us with this marvellous playground for children today.  We arrived fairly early before the carparks filled up and wandered down the paths to the little cafe below Brimham House.

Well the children called my family played at Titanic on the rocks, though Andrew got a fright when a particularly strong gust got him, yes the weather was cold and windy though the sun shone.  The rocks of course fit into anthropomorphic shapes as you look at them and it is indeed a very strange landscape.  You can get a glimpse from Rhiannon of  Modern Antiquarian fame in her role as an excellent folklorist.  She used to work in Bath Library at the weekends and often found me little bits of history that only a true librarian can find in those literate papers that lurk unseen in the back rooms or on the net..  The link is here.  

Being of a certain age I did not scrabble around on the rocks but kept to the paths, though I did once climb to a viewpoint and look at the landscape all around, not knowing at the time that these rocks once formed a range as high as the Himalayas.

Thanks must go to my family for arranging this outing and to Andrew for his driving and upmarket skills at arrangment of paid car parks beforehand.  I shall never come to terms with apps on phone that show that you have paid for tickets on trains, buses and outings, the world moves too quickly for me.

Also my daughter arranged a picnic for when we got to Bolton Abbey, where we sat by the river on an old patchwork quilt, wasn't sure if it was one of mine because I recognised some of the materials.  Quiche and sausage rolls, tomatoes, olives and grapes to the sound of rippling water by the River Wharfe which is a wide shallow river falling over stones.  There was blackheaded gulls patrolling up and down and little wagtails dipping their ways over the stones.  

At this stage too much fresh air had got to me so while everyone went a walk down to the abbey I stayed in the car and chatted on the phone to my son.

So all in all a perfect day arranged by Karen and Andrew and I have been introduced to perhaps another wonder of the world......

My tag at the end:  For those who do not understand technology of the time, just wait for people to go abroad and work it out from there!

24th April 2022 - The Nicor or approaching forgiveness

 Some time to kill before we start on the day.  Last night I was awake for about three hours brooding away as one does.  Tasker's tale of Belgium set me off funnily enough, for over the last few months and with the help of 'My Heritage'  I have realised that my grandfather came from Belgium, because we could only find him in Belgian birth files, though his death certificate was in the English records.  Perhaps this is why I feel completely that we should be part of Europe.

I had a different upbringing to most children, three stepmothers does not give one a sense of security or coming to terms with forgiveness as I have grown old.  Or perhaps, it doesn't really matter anyway this looking back.

But there was a secrecy in the family, and I say family because though I was born illegitimate I was adopted by my paternal grandfather.  In the time of the second World War he lived in Belgium with his wife Catherine, whose name is on my adoption.  Sadly she must have died when I was about two and I was looked after by a series of housekeepers.

But that is to start the story at the wrong place.  For when the Germans invaded Belgium, they both fled their home in the new car just bought with a mattress on top of the car, and Catherine smuggling her little dog in her fur coat to the coast where they boarded a boat and landed in England, where my grandfather went on to work as an engineer.  He was clever, had 6 languages to fall back on and was soon working for Villiers a big motorbike factory in Wolverhampton.

So what happened to their Belgium home?  Well it fell into the hands of a  collaborator, and it wasn't to several years later when this man was brought before a judge that these properties must have been released  to their rightful owners.  At this stage, Catherine was dead and I was about 8 years old and I was taken over to Brussels to claim it as for some reason the property would come to me.  Fear not readers, it never did but the monies from it were swallowed up in a small factory called Nicor  (A great water dwelling monster)

My memories of Brussels are fleet, I remember going to this rather elegant house which had a small lake in front and being rowed round by the agent.  I also remember walking along a canal path and meeting some people, and to this day I swear they used large dogs to pull the barges.  Other images, sitting in a lawyers offices in a leather chair and weirdly my grandfather driving me down a 'red light' district with the females on show in the windows, bet Tasker never had that experience!

The realisation that my grandfather was a refugee, just like the people pouring over the borders from Ukraine has slowly only just entered my consciousness.  Today there are literally hundreds of thousand people wandering the world as refugees, and their lives will follow similar or different patterns.  The horror story that we will be shipping people to Rwanda will play out.  To be quite honest such cruelty is turning people's stomach and I pray that it will not happen.

As we try to take in the Ukranian refugees in this country, obstacles still remain, banks won't give them accounts if they do not have a residential address.  Luckily they are not sent on wild goose chases after visas as they did in Calais.

There is a great movement of people in the world, not only war of course, the climate has also added to the chaos,  and economic betterment as well.  Whatever the answer is it must be found quickly.

One of the things that has always intrigued me was why was the factory that was started as Nicor was so named by my father.  The only reason is I think is because he loved the sea and always had a boat.  The Nicor has an interesting story as well. This story comes from a website about old wells, now sadly defunct. But the word Nicor unites both my father and myself, if nothing else did, in a love of monsters and stories.  His name by the way was Reg, the first son of my grandfather.

Nykerpole : here be dragons

Nykerpole is a very obscure well. Indeed, it is now not a well at all, but a mediaeval place-name, recorded first in 1272, indicating a well now lost, at Mildenhall near Marlborough. Nevertheless, I include Nykerpole here because, like Puckwell, the place-name recalls a legendary well-dwelling creature.
Mildenhall (pronounced Mine-all) was Roman Cunetio. Two Roman shaft-wells have been found in the area, one of which contained a Saxon burial, the remains of a female skeleton with a knife, pins, buckles and beads. Black Field is the site of the Roman settlement, and Roman ghosts have been seen here (Wiltshire 1984, pp. 25-6). Nickamoor Field lies just west of Black Field beside the River Kennet. A place name of the sixteenth century, Nicapooles Croft, may refer to this very field, or to another associated with it. Centuries have passed, and we will probably never know the exact location of Nykerpole, the nicor-pool of Anglo-Saxon times which gave its name to Nicapooles Croft and Nickamoor Field (Gover 1939, p. 499). The nicor was a great water-dwelling monster of the dragonish or sea-serpent type: two nicras are described in Beowulf, the Anglo-Saxon epic poem of the early eighth century. Nowadays the nicor lingers most notably in the Knucker Holes of Sussex, great deep pools of water in whose bottomless depths lurked the Knucker itself (Simpson 1973, pp. 37-42). But it is clear that, centuries ago, Wiltshire too had its Knucker which perhaps, like its Sussex cousins, would come crawling up out of its pool to terrorise the people of the gentle Kennet valley.
Location: Nicamoor Field is at SU 214 694, Sheet 1186. Footpaths run either side of the River Kennet. 

22nd April 2022 - Earth Day

 Or has Carl Sagan would say......................

Type a word in my search space and you will come up again and again with Hesperis Matronalis, or Dame's Violet or even Rocket  in my blog.I just welcome it at this time of year and yesterday walking along the canal, I spied it growing against a steel fence, not a very good photo, it is hard to capture the essence of a flower in bright sun, probably that is why the bluebell rules so well in the shaded wood. Quoting myself.....

 Dame's Violet, Hesperis Matronalis - Sweet Rocket.  I had been reading a book about our village and the author had mentioned phlox down by the river. My mind said surely not and then realised he had meant the delightful Dames Violet, which I had seen near the crab apple tree and old gate, growing amongst the nettles.  I have been in love with this flower for years but reading the Wiki entry on it, and apparently it is a terrible weed in America and Canada, not so in this country I think but an escapee from the garden a few centuries ago.  Anyway I still love its frail whiteness and scent, though you can get a lavender coloured one to.

So to my walk along the canal towards Hebden Bridge, about a mile I think, though it is 4 miles the whole way.  We have a walker in the family by the way, Andrew must walk every day and so this coming Sunday we are off up to Brimham Rocks.  Let us hope I can keep up with the family!  I  definitely mooch on a walk there is no definite goal at the end only the looking at plants, trees, and scenery.

This last photo is a favourite, the noise of angry cackling as the geese find themselves on the wrong side of the fence from the canal cannot be given.  There are many nests tucked away on the banks of the canal.  As the birds flock to the water so do the barges, though many are uninhabited!

21st April 2022

 Positive News:  Sir David Attenborough as been awarded a 'gong' Champion of the Earth by the UN which he deserves.  As he says there is some good by taking action to fight for the natural environment.

"Fifty years ago, whales were on the very edge of extinction worldwide. Then people got together and now there are more whales in the sea than any living human being has ever seen," he suggested."

Optimism or pessimism chooses the way you look at life. I watched Richard Madley and co interview one of the protesters who belong I believe to the Extinction group.  On the surface he was sympathetic to her but then he brought up the subject of what she was wearing and how that had been produced by the use of oil.  He laboured the point  a ridiculous length of time.  But then it did stop her from talking about saving the planet.  But then that is what the media does, destroy the argument with trivia.

John Crace of Guardian fame calls Johnson 'The Suspect' well as usual to distract our attention from his sins the suspect is flying off to India to negotiate a deal, hopefully it won't mean outgoing goods  leaving from Dover - that queue never gets smaller.

'Go Fresh' update:  I have now cooked two meals in the range.  The first was an oven cooked risotto.  I cooked it in a frying pan on top and it wasn't bad.  I substituted wine instead of cider vinegar, and it made three meals for myself, stuffed two peppers and the remaining bit into the soup.  Can't teach me anything about using up leftovers!  Last night I cooked another spicy dish, a sort of vegetarian curry with Paneer cheese and a puff pastry topping, loved by all but again I did not participate, approximately half was left, which will go for my daughter's lunch today.  The portions are huge and definitely enough for two people stretches into enough for four people easily. 

My spinning wheel is still jammed Andrew and family tried yesterday to pull the offending pin out but no luck.  Think of taking it to the Todmorden Makery over the weekend.

Another lovely day beckons and maybe rather than worry about my spinning wheel I should go for a walk.

The Sentience Bill for animals 2022

Nonscriptus - Bluebells in Blake's Wood 2015

The woods bring forth their flowers in spring and we are as always stung by the brilliance of the emerging carpets of wind anemones and bluebells.  So once again I did try to capture their beauty in video, but I think I need another lifetime to grasp the simple mechanics of taking videos!  I wrote in 2020 about them as well, probably I have written every year but Blake's Wood in Essex left to its own devices produced an abundance of stuff.  Sweet chestnuts, mushrooms and many wild flowers.

Why Hyland Garden? for the bird song of course.

18th April 2022

 A quiet Easter Sunday, we went to Hebden Bridge on the bus to visit Lillie working at the cafe.  Hebden was packed, it always is being a tourist hotspot.  There was a lively market mostly selling food, dogs galore, and motorbikes roaring into town.  Also of course the local talent singing their hearts out.  The cafes were packed, the sun shone, people eating outside.  Poor Lillie flying up and down the stairs from the kitchen with heaped plates of food on her arm, listening with grave attention as to what sauces people wanted looked as though she had done it all her life.

Not much open in the way of shops, but Karen's favourite charity shop was open and so we pottered around in there.  I have zero need to acquire much more, so I just browse, whilst the ever eagle eye of my daughter sorts for the expensive labels.  You would be surprised how much a charity shop makes in a good area.

I forgot the lady standing with her  protest stall for the Palestinian people.  A subject so, so sensitive in this country because we are not allowed to call Israel to judgment over their treatment of the Palestinian issue. When will discussion be free and easy and not plagued about being politically correct should we venture into territories that are hamstrung by political dictate.

No plants for sale in the market so I have sent off for some, not that I like doing that because of all the packaging they arrive with but I miss fresh herbs. Also bought lavender plants, I love their soft grey and the way the bees browse.  

It reminds me of Paul, when we stayed in the little 'Teacher's Cottage' in Avebury in the depths of winter.  On the first night I had bought a chicken to roast, and had spied earlier on rosemary in the front garden.  I asked him to go and get some and he came back with lavender spikes, his excuse he could not see in the dark.

You will see in the photos the grey of the houses, which tends to pull the soul down as far as I am concerned.  Some balance precariously on the steep slopes but as the bus takes you through the valley, the rock of the hills breaks through and you realise there is solid ground everywhere.

A Good Easter to you all and Blessings.

 My daughter came home last evening with two great bags of 'Go Fresh' food, she had inherited it from someone who had just gone off to London.  It was quite a load of goodies, and one of the recipes was unloaded to cook.  Spiced beef and potato wedges was chosen, I did not participate, not well lately.  So three large potatoes, packet of beef, spices, sour cream and cheese unwrapped and the meal prepared. The verdict was that it tasted bland.  I'm not sure about this gathering together of the ingredients of a meal is particularly good news and I doubt if we will ever go down this road in this household, but a change.

Two Grandchildren are staying in London, Ben who has two jobs, one working at Conran and the other as an intern on styling, had flown to Paris in the week.  He works for people who style the many and varied pop stars, and he had flown to get a costume from Balenciagia for Duo Lipa's forthcoming tour of our troubled isle.  This is a world I do not occupy but they are completely bound up in.  Matilda is also following a fashion course, but more on the art and journalism side.

Her favourite occupation is sitting in the library watching the art students go by, I expect it is like the 60s', flamboyant and out of this world, the young do like to 'peacock' dress.  She wants two children eventually, a rich husband to bring them up with and then she is going to live in  Paris.  She can but dream!

My mind on the other hand has just grasped a small fact on F/B that Trevethy Quoit (long barrow in Cornwall) had a significant platform of greenstone leading from the cromlech into the field.  A similar pathway was also found leading from one of the Hurler stone circles, but this time it was quartz stone. I have just found a short video clip of our friend Roy on this particular dig, don't know if it will work but here it is.  It recalls for me happy days working on a dig and the sun shining, and being part of a team working away scratching in the soil waiting for exciting things to be revealed ;)

Musing

 Well I am not normally ahead of the game but today I am.  I have been listening to 'The Children of Ash and Elm.  A History of the Vikings' by Neil Price.  Last night unable to sleep I listened to a podcast about an upcoming film called 'The Northman' out on the 22nd April in which Price was the archaeological consultant.  That is the link if you want to go there but be warned it is savage and bloody, and I for one would not watch it. 

Neil Price's book is an excellent detailed piece of writing, the film will obviously centre on the cruelty and blood sacrifice.  As he said we only see but one facet of these lively people, or at least concentrate on the violence they wreaked on our coastlines and in the monasteries.

The scenery is supposed to be beautiful, some of it in Iceland but others around our own jagged coastline, the Orkney Islands being part of it.  What I love about these wild rugged times is the faith in their own storytelling that sustained them.  You will occasionally come across reused stones in our churches from that time, as their paganism hit the budding of Christianity in this country.  Especially round York which at one time was the centre of their world in England.

By contrast, watching the soothing  video of Colette at 'Beltaine Cottage' as she wanders round her garden delighting in the burgeoning spring, and I am left wondering how vegetation growth springs back to life given the right circumstances I suppose it always will. 

Though I know of course it is the movement of our planet as it whirls round to greet the sun once more. The birds sing, the bees leave their winter nests, light once more descends and shines on our own patch of heaven.

15th April 2022

 I have taken putting my spinning wheel together one notch down.  I made myself ill when it first arrived. A fraction a day is now my motto.  So the legs are evenly square,  that took some time and yesterday I fitted the wheel to the frame, though had to take it off once more to fit something I had forgotten about.  Lillie arrived home from Manchester all keen to do something as well but luckily she went off to spend the night with friend in a caravan.  They are supposed to keep an eye on pregnant sheep, the father has broken his ribs.  When I questioned whether she could deliver lambs, she calmly informed me that she had dissected something at school - yikes.

At 15 Lillie is working hard for her exams, otherwise she seems to be the backbone of the scouts group.  At the weekend she works Saturday in a cafe at Hebden Bridge, but has just been offered a job supervising 'The Wall' her handling of the little Beavers (baby scouts) having got her the job, which is very well paid.  They grow so quickly!

I think in the current recent news the only emotion I can find is despair at how our country allows such a rotten government to exist.  I don't even want to fight anymore.  Sending immigrants off to Rwanda to a fate unknown is frighteningly reminiscient of those terrible scenes in the Holocaust, when people were loaded onto the trains.  This time it will be planes, will we watch these harrowing scenes with blank minds indifferent to suffering.  We are all equal under the skin and our Western world, which is slowly unravelling anyway will take another step down the slope.  So be it, unless we fight.

13th April 2022

I wasn't going to write today.  Spent a lot of the day trying to figure out how to put my spinning wheel together. It. Is. Difficult.  Nuff said. 

But what cheered me up was the dancers dancing to Jerusalema.   They are dancing to it everywere, it has a fascinating rhythm to it.  I have seen  Garda (Irish) police dancing, doctors and nurses, and many people all over the world stepping out to it.  Probably my favourite are the nuns and the priests/monks in a closed monastic order, redeeming us all with dance.

So stop worrying about petrol and join in the fun.  The song has been around for ages.  The singer is a South African vocalist Nomcebo.  And if you can't dance just think about joyful things and let the beat get to your soul.

The Green of Easter

 I have been meaning to write about an article from 1980 about Paul.  It was written about him and I have always felt it to be my duty to somehow put it on my blog.  Maybe, now we have a computer expert in the family he will advise the best way.

So today I take out a memory of St.Keynes Well by Duloe village in Cornwall.  A photo of some eggs hidden by the well nudged me into acknowledging that Easter is almost upon us and there have been rather interesting spoken word articles on Radio 4.

The well was up a little lane, fed by a stream, and was an oasis of green.  Moss, one of my favourite plants, ferns growing between the cracks of the stones and a general jungle feeling to what is a sacred place, if not to any saint or gods but to the wonderful verdant colour of nature.  All due no doubt to the clean air of Cornwall.

St.Keynes Well;  We only saw two wells.  How many 'saint' wells does Cornwall have? too many to number, and most of these saints have perambulated down from Wales, I expect by sea in little boats. St.Keyne is also to be found in Keynsham in Somerset, here she banishes serpents, having arrived in this town from Wales.  She was a 'pious' virgin, and the daughter of King Brychan, a king who had many children. To find this well which   is not far from the stone circle of Duloe, we travelled down a little lane out of the village of St.Keyne, into one of those beautiful wooded valleys. The well is situated by the side of the road, the water trickling down the bank across the lane into the hollow created.  The entrance stones are green mossed and there were painted eggs hidden in the undergrowth for the celebration of Easter. St.Keyne in Cornwall has another legend to her name, and a wise girl should takes a bottle of the well water to drink at the church before her marriage! 

The plaque next to the well describes the spell which Saint Keyne cast upon the water of the well. The plaque reads: "The legend of Saint Keyne Well. Saint Keyne was a princess who lived about 600 AD. She laid on the waters of this well a spell thus described by Carew in 1602 AD—'The quality that man or wife whom chance or choice attains first of this sacred spring to drink thereby the mastery gains.'"

Robert Southey's poem "The Well of St Keyne" recounts this legend.

Sunday 10th April 2022

Radio 3 with its Sunday programme, where birds or animals may be included, has a very boring cock pheasant's call through its programme, but I am not complaining.  Today's memory that came through on F/B was Wind Anemones, they have such a lovely story as to how they acquired the name.

Its actual name of anemone is borrowed from the Greek legend of Anemone Coronia, because the flowers nod and shake in the wind, and the Greeks called it Daughter of the Wind.

I can remember first coming across them in a walk through a wood up on the Bath downs, their white starryiness (not a proper word, but when I googled it I found it in this blog from 2010 and Sharon (morning's minion) ;)  And then of course David Abram's words.

Celandine, violet and wind anemone

My next buy will be herbs, people grow things round here in the public places but there is not a decent garden centre to be had, and as I hear the chorus from my family what about Gordon Riggs.  It is a massive retail space, according to the blurb, plants do not figure prominently.  We have arrived at the point in this country with flowers and plants brought in from other countries, the gentle art of growing plants for love, thrown out the window, like so many things.... I do exaggerate occasionally though!

Being able to pick fresh herbs is something I miss, true Lidl will supply you with a little pot of something, but it dies after a couple of days, no love there.

It brings to mind scent, marjoram, thyme, mint, and rosemary, not forgetting lavender.  Years ago there was a fashion in pot-pourri, you collected the flowers from the garden, dried them and then put them in a pot with a suitable preservative and an essence of a flower oil.  Truthfully the scent never lasted long and has probably died out, though I always dry flowers to keep in a pretty bowl.  Used to keep the many coloured stones my language students bought for me as a present, you could run your fingers though them, their colours representing the geology of this Earth.

Scented geranium leaves are also another source of grabbing a few moments of a delicious smell, here Sarah Raven's Rose of Attar pelargonium.  The flower is small and unobtrusive not like its showier cousins.

Here and there

I have taken the plunge and ordered myself a new spinning wheel, it is a small traveller.  Perhaps I should not have got rid of my old one, but I did and now have to buy a new one.  It will be exciting taking up spinning again.  For most people perhaps not, but as the wheel spins and the yarn emerges I shall be content.  Looking round for secondhand ones and the first thing you notice is that they have to be collected and can be anywhere in the country, so purchasing new is probably less of a gamble.

There are beautiful colourd tops of wool to spin.  My favourite natural wool is Blue-Leicester wool, a slight crimp and lustre to the wool makes it easy to spin.  A good Merino is soft and  takes dyes easily, I notice there is more Alphaca on the market as well.

One of the things you see is that craft work has become popular in its many forms and shapes.  Here in Tod they have opened a makery at the Community College.  The call for people to reuse and recycle has gone up, soon perhaps we will have washing machines that will last a good long while and are mendable. 

I also notice that Paul Lewis of Moneybox fame has bought out an article of how to keep warm against the high prices of energy.  Heated gloves for goodness sake as you type at your computer, and a Breville Hotcup for your teamaking to save on energy as well.

Then, can't resist this, the downfall of Rishi Sunak as his enormous wealth, including his wife's fortune has come under media display - pay your taxes or else! No soft ride to being prime minister then.

There are terrible things happening in the world, especially in Ukraine at the moment.  But there is a plucky spirit in the people too fight the Russian dragon. At home the problems are small but annoying, long queues of lorries at Dover, ferries that are in a muddle and long queues at Manchester airport.  The price of everything going up, hello Brexit are you helping us? daft question, of course not.

Yesterday I started to make a file of spun work, but my photos are all over the place, and it will take forever.  I notice how I love the colour yellow, the sun catching it and making it glow. Yellow is the colour of spring, daffodils, wild primroses, celandine and cowslips and of course marsh marigolds.  In this 2007 blog I capture their history.

Paul Lewis who is very tearful over what the upcoming rises in living will mean for many people, a casual remark on Twitter sums it up..

As one respondent put it: “It’s a damning indictment of the depths to which this country has sunk when the cheerful guy who provided advice about the best savings, offers and phone deals is now tearfully providing advice on how not to die from cold or malnutrition. Thank you – I wish it wasn’t necessary.”

Heat the body not the home

Thinking of food and lettuce

 

I have grown a lot of lettuce over time, my favourite lettuce from the supermarkets are Little Gem and Iceberg.  But looking at the above remembering those tight little balls of red lettuce (radicchio) grown over winter.  Lambs lettuce plucked alongside a big pot of mixed leaves. The Lollo Rosso of summer with its red fringed leaves, more of an art work than taste.

A few days ago I saw that Tasker was turning his nose up at Belgian chicons/endives, or chicory, a favourite of mine.  Even grown them, like rhubarb you need to force them in the dark.  Grow a particular lettuce through the summer, then dig them up cut the foliage off, just leaving an inch or two of the green, then plant in the cool of Autumn, with a flowerpot over the heads and wait till they grow into that slightly bitter white fleshed delicacy.

Cooking. Just cook to tender, squeeze water out, then wrap in ham with a cheese sauce to cover, then bake in oven.  Alternatively a few leaves in a mixed salad will enliven it. I was looking at a recipe the other day where chicory was halved and fried to a rich deep brown, I think the word would be unctuous.

I had also mentioned trout and gooseberry sauce on Tom Stephenson's blog.  It bought back the memory of the trout we had bought from the Farleigh Hungerford trout farm, the lad would come around knocking at the door and you could buy fresh trout from him.  I notice that 'Watercress Cottage' from whence it came from has been sold for a very large sum and has entered the realms of those upmarket retirement  'cottages'.  Sadly.  Needless to say the river was a chalk stream, fed by springs.

I have also as a child fished for trout in Wales, and even tickled them. Sent off in the summer holidays to a Welsh farm, I would make my way down to the river with the pig in tow.  It was idyllic, probably as children we did not catch much.  But I remember the farmer catching an eel, which jumped about in his haversack on the walk back.  It was cut up but to this day I swear it jumped round in the frying pan.

I spent a lot of time in the summer holidays on two farms, perfectly happy, sometimes with my brother or another time with my pony, my grandfather was far too busy to have us around.  I learnt to eat the chickens I had seen killed, also helped to pluck them of course.  

Farms in those days were lessons in self survival, would you send your children to a large farm where they raised bulls for showing? Watching them be exercised in the yard was a window job.  The boar had its own enclosure yard, which you had to cross to get to the barns.  Sprint across or if he came out head for the barn with the bales of straw. There was always an adventure to be had, rounding up the cows for milking, losing our ponies because the youngest son played cruel tricks on us. Sitting on what I thought was an empty hive because it had gardening tools on it, and as I idly kicked against its side, a whole nest of angry bees came out and fastened themselves to my foot. I fled to the kitchen and the farmer's wife picked them all off and then applied that blue starch? to my leg.

Well PJ is making it back.  The tracking of cuckoos................

Books

My daughter bought home a thick copy, a doorstep of a book, of Robert Tressell's The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist' a few days ago.  As I am listening to it on Audible, I don't need to read it.  But interestingly the foreword and an introduction by Anthony Wedgewood Benn was interesting and not something you get on Audible.

Yesterday she came back with another book by Lady Margaret Blackwood called 'Corrigan'.  A writer from the wealthier class and someone who married Lucien Freud, I am not a great fan of his but I went and found a picture of the painting for you.  Girl in Bed.  Her large blue eyes remind me of Matilda.

So Blackwood has written several books, so I might go and explore her writing.  Her marriages influenced her writing, the third marriage to Robert Lowell, the poet, who inspired her to write  You can see she ate men up greedily for the essence of their creativity.

At the moment I have an Elly Griffiths on the go, the Dr.Ruth Galloway series.  What makes me cross about Griffiths, is that in the several books she has written on the subject of archaeological bones, she always goes back and reiterates (that should be regurgitates) the character of  the people, stories and everything under the sun in her books which makes them rather repetitious.

The last book I have on the go is Naomi Klein 'This Changes Everything' a look at geo-engineering the climate to stop the over heating of the planet.  The moral of the story being of course is if you mess around with nature you provoke unforeseen problems, so creating cloud cover may look good from the inside.  But by the same token the build up of heat outside the cloud will come back doubly so.

Cuckoo is today's word

When April comes my mind always goes back to the cuckoo who made it all the way to Saint Brynach's church in Wales, so here is a very old blog on the stories you can find round saints, churches and stone circles.

It is a somewhat sad yet happy to type into search words, for then photos and writings come up from over 10 years ago, the photos seem a little faded but my enthusiam for life and the world around me chunters through. 

 

I was so pleased to find this photo as well, Lucy jumping for joy as she runs to Paul.  Up on the moors this was her favourite walking place. 

 St. Brynach and Nevern Church

"St.Brynach or Abbot Brynach is another 6th century saint. His church is the little ruined building that overlooks St. Brides Bay, in Cw-yr-Eglwys (Valley of the church) just on the neck of Dinas head and he is famed for talking to angels in the nearby prehistoric hill fort of Carn Ingli (Rock of Angels).
There is another church dedicated to him, above the Gwaun Valley, in Pontfaen, the church has a 'celtic' circular church yard.
Nearby a cromlech on Mynydd Llanawer, a standing stone near Rhos Isaf and seven standing stones in alignment in the Field of the Dead (Parc y Merw at Trewllyn).
Celtic saints have fascinating stories associated with them, and though the point of trogging all through the book of saints is to find out their relationship with megalithic stones, the earlier celtic pagan history can also be found, in the stories attached to the churches and saints.
Well the Nevern Church has a 'bleeding yew' in the churchyard, yew trees of course heark back to the Iron Age, and the pagan religion that worshipped in groves of trees and saw water as sacred, a liminal space in which to enter the otherworld on death. This yew is called 'the bleeding yew' because its trunk oozes a red resin. A monk was hung from the tree and he cast a curse on the people who had hung him that the tree would bleed for evermore because of their wickedness.
Near Nevern is Trellyffant Cromlech ((Toad's Town) apparently a chieftain was buried there who had been eaten by toads.
Breverton lists Pentre Ifan cromlech near here and a stone circle on the Preselis called Waun Mawr. Two more standing stones to the south called Carreg Meibon Owen, and another at Tre-Fach, called Y Garreg Hir.
Another story associated with Brynach is about the cuckoo, and of course birds are very much a part of the druidic celtic religion of the Iron Age, the previous saint Beuno having a curlew in his myths. But to return to the cuckoo, that first call in mid April that we still look forward to was still coming all the way from Africa hundreds of years ago, perhaps it also came at the time when the prehistoric stones were raised and the stone people would here its famous cry on the wind.
But back to the story, Brynach's feast day was the 7th April, and so on this day the cuckoo would fly back on that day perch on the great celtic cross and this would be the signal for the priest to say mass. But one year it was late, and everyone waited patiently for several hours to appear, when it eventually appeared the poor bird was so exhausted after its long flight that it dropped down dead. According to the legend it had battled its way through storms to reach the church because it knew it could not fail its ancestors who had the honour of starting mass on St.Brynach's day."

I have heard the cuckoo in Blake's Wood and (bad video time) tried to capture the sound. But also in the photo above I heard the cuckoo over the moors.  The other favourite bird of mine, amongst many, is the curlew and I note that Saint Beuno had a helpful curlew who brought him back a lost book.