It Had All Been a Dream!

One of the mixed blessings of living alone - certainly the way I do - is the balance between fitting in all the demands of running the household and satisfying a variety of social commitments and obligations on the one hand, and carving out chunks of time for specific pleasures or necessary 'big jobs' on the other.

Occasionally at work (my voluntary commitment to the hospice warehouse), I come across the odd twin-cassette recording.  These are now quite unusual, having been replaced by talking book CDs and online downloads over the years and, I suppose, must be between twenty and thirty years old ... or more!  Unless the subject is of particular interest, there is no demand for them, and they go for scrap.

I found one the other week; it was a radio broadcast, a dramatisation of a Len Deighton book, called simply 'Bomber'.  Intrigued, I brought it home and converted it to an MP3 file on my computer.  The four sides total over four-and-a-quarter hours of listening, so I imagine that, whenever it was originally broadcast, it would have been as a serial rather than a one-off radio play.

I decided that the ideal time to listen to this would be Boxing Day.  There would be no need to go out at all, no domestic chores that couldn't be deferred and, as it happened, there was a particular job that I wanted to do, which would require a few hours and couldn't really be sub-divided.  What better than to combine the two?

After the limited sleep following the midnight service at church, with the need to be up at a normal time on Christmas Day to ring bells in a similar timescale to a Sunday, it was little surprise that, with the alarm switched off, I was late getting up on Boxing Day.  Once breakfast was over, though, I settled down to the job of filleting the contents of a filing cabinet drawer with 'Bomber' playing in the background.  A brief interval after about three hours to make a snack for lunch was the only break and I really felt at one with the story.

I've never read the book, but it was clearly skilfully written ... or else had been very cleverly dramatised.  It told the story of a Lancaster Bomber's final operation, as part of a 500- or 600-bomber raid on Germany's industrial areas in February, 1943.  It included the intricate personal and professional lives of some of the crew members and others in the squadron and at national level as the target was chosen, the planes prepared, the crews identified and so on.  However, it also explored in the same depth the affairs of the citizens of a small town in Germany, whose lives were about to be curtailed by a disastrous sequence of accidental occurrences.

At times, the excitement was so intense that I had to abandon what was going on on my dining table and just sit mesmerised, until that phase of the action had passed.  As my mother would have said had it been a TV drama in her day, "Don't they play their parts well!"  For all it being sound only, it was as if I were in the plane with them!  At the end, I was glad that my physical task had also been completed, and I was on the point of noting the details of the places involved, in order to research later just how closely, if at all what I'd just heard resembled the actual facts.  I was spared this new challenge, however, as the announcer explained that there was no airfield of that name in England, and the German town that must have been virtually obliterated was also fictitious.

And today ... life is virtually back to normal and I'm wondering what excitements next week will bring!

When the Phone Rings in mid-Anglia

- with thanks and apologies to

Maurice Woods, writer of 'Harbert's News from Dumpton' -

I war sittin' moindin' moi own bisness the other day, hevin'a squint at tha local pearper, when tha phoan went.  Tha woife, she come in all of a lather; she say, "Thass ow Ron Collier.  He want a ward along o' yew."  Now Ron, hi's the editer o' tha pearper what I war a-readin'.  I thawt, whass he got second soight?  "Harbert", he say, "I want yew ter wroite a bit fer tha pearper.  I know yew're suffin ter dew wi' tha learber ..."  I thawt, whass that gotter dew wi' yew? but I din't say nothin an' he went on, "I want you ter wroite a bit abowt tha 'leckshun."

Now, I're writ bits afore fer tha pearper, but nothin' topical-loike, so thet war a bit of a shock.  Afore I gotta chance ter say anythin', he war gorn on agin,  "Moind yew, I doant want nunner yar perlitickal squit.  Jis be informative, fer a chearnge."  Now, I reckon O'm allers informative, but I let that pass, an' all, an' sed O'd dew what I could.

Then I thawt, suffin' 'bowt tha 'leckshun, but nothin' perlitickal ... that sorta cut down what I ken put, dew he i'nt a-gornter print 't.  Thear's nothin much chearnged fr'm tha last toime.  I mean, Lord Twinkle got in agin, loike he allers dew.  We call him lord, but he in't a proper lord y'know.  But he allers act loike he is.  I war there at the cownt, arter all the voatin wor dun, an' he war there as yewshul, along o' 'is woife.  She allers cock har hid back'ards, an' look down har noase as if suffin' nasty ha just crawled underneath 't.  I hint never sin har smoile as long as I're known 'em.  I spoose she must ha' twinkled wunce, dew he woon't ha' marrid har, but yew never see no twinkle about 'r now.

Yew dew see s'm rum soights at tha 'leckshun, thow.  I war settin' owtsoide, loike I allers dew - tellin', thay call't, Oi dunnow whoy - so I're sin 't all down tha years.  Wun ow woman come in, she say, "Ken I bring moi dawg in here?  I doan't wanta leave him owtsoide, dew hi'll cetch cowd.  Thass roight parkey owt there terday."  Then this yung cupple come in, hin't bin marrid long, Oi doan't think.  Little Flossie Kemp, as were.  Oi dunnow whar she got him from, but hi's half as hoigh agin as what she is.  A long streak of nuthin, if ever tha war.  Oi dunnow what he dew fer a livin', noither.  He look as gormless as Oi dunnow what.

Anyway, thay come in, thinkin' more abowt each uther than what thay wore a-dewin' on, an' nearly tripped over tha dawg.  Coos, Missus thing warn't lookin' arter him noither, what wi' puttin har crorse aginst wun o' tha nearmes on tha pearper.  Flossie say ter har man, "Oi doan't know hooter voate for, now O' come here!"  An' that din't look as thow har man war gornta be much help noither.  Anyway, thay got tharsilves untangled fr'm tha dawg an' did thar bizness, an' thay skipped orf loike a cupple o' lambs owt fer a frolick on tha medder, smoilin' an' larfin' wunce the'd dun thar civic dewty.

Now all that voats ha' bin cownted, that doan't look loike tha'll be much chearge at tha top, noither.  We're still got a guvunment what doan't hev a clew whass gorn on at grarss roots, so Oi doan't reckon wi'll be much better orf than we war afore.

Loife's allers a struggle, in't 't?

Farewell, Feisty Lady

"Things go in threes" they say.  I'm beginning to wonder whether that axiom also applies to death.  A few weeks ago, I reported the demise of someone with whom my friendship of many years had declined to an annual Christmas card and the occasional letter.  On Tuesday morning while I was at work, I received a phone call.  The caller said she was someone's sister ... I didn't catch the name and had to ask her to repeat it.  She had just found my Christmas card - accompanied by the ubiquitous 'round robin' newsletter - and was ringing to let me know that her sister had died on Dec. 1st.  This was another friend in the same category as the one mentioned above.

Ada came into my life - or rather I into hers - as the friend of a friend.  She had met another lady, Sheila, who was already my friend, on a tour to Israel and they discovered that they lived not far apart.  Ada owned a small cottage in France and, in the course of conversation, had invited my friend to visit her there later in the year.  Sheila did some research and found that she could get a coach from London's Victoria Coach Station to Brive, only a few kilometres from the cottage, and Ada had offered to collect her from there.  But Sheila didn't like the idea of a long solo coach journey; I don't think she spoke any French, either.  Consequently, I received a phone call, inviting me to a week in France!

Ada (L) and Sheila, at the Orientation
Table overlooking the cottage

The cottage was tiny indeed.  Ada already had another friend staying with her; they shared the only bedroom, while I made myself comfy on the sofa, and Sheila - anxious to experience 'camping' for the first time - utilised my tent on the back lawn.  Over the passage of nearly 30 years, memories become confused, but I recall my enjoyment one evening, playing some kind of word game with Ada, while Sheila was reading a book.  We seemed to share the same sense of humour, as well as a knowledge of the local language and culture.  The week was over all too quickly, and we were driven back to get the return bus home.

I think I only met Ada once after that, when my new wife and I paid her a visit a few years later.  We've always exchanged the annual Christmas greeting, though, and usually a newsletter too.  Ada made regular trips to her second home in France using an 'old faithful' camper-van that she named 'Duchess'.  It was older than any I've owned since, and was in frequent need of engineering attention.  One of Ada's letters that I've just been re-reading told of a hazardous return journey, plagued by garage delays, ill-health and the problems of coordinating medication, insurance cover, accommodation and a brief stay in a French hospital.  A two-week break seems to have lasted a couple of months!

Such experiences seem to have been characteristic of this adventurous spinster.  Some years ago she moved from her home in the east Midlands to a flat in a wardened complex on the south coast, but she would always travel each spring to Nottingham for a choir weekend ... as nothing, of course, compared to the regular trips to France, sometimes with one of her many siblings, often alone!  She finally decided to sell the cottage only three years or so ago, when a fall left her reliant on a wheeled walker frame and thus unable to drive.

RIP

Ada Hollands (1931-2019)

Au Revoir!

Hello, Come on in!

Someone suggested to me the other evening that it must be two years now, since I retired.  When I told him it was actually four years ago this week, he was staggered.  He quickly invoked the now familiar, 'I suppose you're keeping busy?' to which I responded that, after a couple of years during which I had found time heavy on my hands, this was now indeed the case. 

In fact, after decades when the number of places where I could be considered 'part of the scenery' could be counted on one hand, followed by a number of years when I was recognised in many factories, shops and business premises by both uniform and purpose, life has now settled to a mid-range, 'double-handful' of such locations. 

Apart from church activities - bell-ringing in one direction; and worship and a whole lot of other things in the other - the place where I feel most 'at home' is the hospice warehouse.  Here, although it's only a day and a half a week, I can walk through the door, be recognised by any one of a score of possibilities, and am quite happy to take my seat and organise my surroundings to best serve the purpose for which I'm there.

The other half-day of my 'working life' is the Ark drop-in.  Here, too, I can turn up, greet those in charge and get on with my allotted duties with a minimum of fuss.  In these last few weeks, two more situations have been added to that list.  The first (although not chronologically) is the campaign office in St Albans, where I've been helping in the run-up to the General Election. 

Whoever is in charge when I arrive welcomes me and, after I've signed in, can give me something to do, whether it's data entry (even sorting out the awkwardness of finding, yesterday morning, that my mouse needed 'feeding' with a new battery!), or something more physical, like bundling leaflets or (as yesterday) helping to put up Christmas decorations.  Yesterday, at the end of the day, we found ourselves still waiting for a delivery of leaflets that should have been there before lunch!  The camaraderie in those few hours was incredible ... although what I shall walk into on Monday can only be guessed!

That will be the last day of that sequence; I've enjoyed the commuting, driving to a convenient point and then catching one of four possible buses to take me to the city centre.  I have to say that whenever I've waited for the bus it's not been wet, although the morning when two scheduled buses didn't turn up, I was getting pretty cold and despondent!

The other new welcome came this morning as, for only the second time, I helped prepare for the church's Community Cafe, where we are able to offer 'best before' food items (thanks to local supermarkets), and a children's clothing exchange.  Although many of the other helpers are not known to me by name, I have already become an accepted part of the team, and my unfamiliarity with the visual appearance of clothes for a 3-, 6- or 9-month-old infant is acknowledged and worked around quite satisfactorily.

On Thursday, I was one of seven who gathered at a restaurant in the town for a 'Christmas curry evening'.  This was the third such event I've attended (not all at Christmas time, I might add) and, as I left, I realised that I'd enjoyed this much more than on previous occasions.  Again, the welcome factor had kicked in.

Also during this week I submitted my name to be a Counting Agent next Thursday after the polls close.  This will be a second for me, having attended the count for the local elections eighteen months ago, when I was one of the candidates.  It will be interesting to see how the two compare, not least in the matter of time, since this will be at night, whereas the local elections were counted the following morning. 

I don't envisage being up at 6.30 next Friday morning!

Flat White

The sort of coffee I like is without sugar and with a little milk but not too much.  Someone I know is very specific about coffee made for her ... even down to the sequence of assembling the ingredients.  She swears she can tell if it's not made 'her' way.  If someone brings me a mug, I can usually tell by the colour whether I'm going to like it, but I wouldn't have a clue how they made it.  But regular readers will have guessed that I'm not writing this whole blog about coffee.

It's a busy time of year - quite apart from the General Election and all that has brought with it - as church and personal activities lead up to Christmas time.  Last weekend our vicar invited us to a party in the church hall to celebrate one of those 'big' birthdays and there were people there from her past life whom I didn't know and who didn't, of course, know me.  One of these saw my cross and asked me what was my role in the church.  The first thing that came to mind must have been a bit of a surprise to him.  I replied, "At the moment it's a distributor of Christmas cards!"

Three years ago, my friend and I discovered that we'd both delivered cards to the same street in the same day and one of us said to the other "We must be able to do better than this!"  During the following summer I helped for the first time in an election campaign office and discovered how they organised the distribution of election leaflets.  This was a system to cover the thousands of homes in a parliamentary constituency but, I reasoned, it should be possible to devise on a spreadsheet a pocket-sized version for the hundreds of homes in our parish.

As autumn progressed, the system came together and was launched for 2017.  After fine tuning - which is still ongoing - it was launched once more last Sunday.  At the party the previous afternoon, I had arrived in a car laden with lots of boxes containing bundles of cards which I later displayed in the church for collection after Sunday's services.  These were all prepared with the names of people who had allowed themselves to be persuaded in advance to deliver to specific walks covering a road or two, or parts thereof.  This seemed a better idea than the virtual free-for-all that had gone so spectacularly wrong before.

The fine weather today drew me forth to deliver my own small share in the plan.  I had opted for a small estate on the very edge of the town, overlooking the motorway.  Its white-walled and red-tiled houses are typical of our town and although they had always struck me as very welcoming as I'd seen them when driving home after a long day on the road, with their lights twinkling through the leafless trees on a cold evening, I'd never actually been in the road until today.

One of the problems of making deliveries, whether it's parcels, political leaflets or Christmas cards, is flats.  I've lost count of the times I've asked someone to deliver, only to meet the anxious reaction, "There aren't any flats, are there?"  I'm not sure whether it's the image of walking along isolated corridors, the fear of not getting into the building in the first place, or the knock-on admission of 'failure' to get rid of all their cards, but it seems few people want to deliver to flats.  In fact, this year, I put out a notice with the cards, advising people 'If you can't get in, don't worry; it's their loss and not your problem.'

Imagine my surprise then, when I discovered that 65% of those lovely white walled and red-tiled, light-twinkling signs of 'welcome home' were FLATS!  Not only that, but they are examples of the two different types of flats we deliverers are confronted with.  I've made notes, for whoever does that street next year.  nos. 6 to 15 (which, of course, may or may not include no. 13, but that's a topic for another day) are 'numbered access'.  In other words, by the door is a key-pad intercom by which the caller can enter the flat number and speak to the person he's visiting in order to be admitted.  Nos. 26 to 34 have a separate button for each flat (for the same purpose), but also a very useful 'trade button', by which there is access to the hallways and corridors, enabling leaflets and cards to be delivered quite successfully.

With my own instructions followed, and now feeling for myself that 'guilt' of failure, I returned home, with a small packet of undelivered cards to return to church tomorrow, along with a greater understanding of what I'm asking others to do.

Flatlanders

I thought it might be of interest - whatever your political persuasion - to know what goes on in an election campaign.  I can only write about what I have experienced, of course, but there seems to have been a general pattern in the four locations and five campaigns in which I've played a small part.  I don't feel what follows will betray any confidences or 'state secrets'.

A candidate can be their own agent and run their own campaign, but it's usual for these to be three people.  It's the Agent's responsibility to see that all the legal requirements are completed and in the right time frame.  In the larger campaigns that I've helped with, in addition to the semi-professional campaign manager, there is also an office manager or supervisor, who makes sure that the office is open, warm, and has enough pens and elastic bands to run the operation and coffee and cake to sustain all who come and help.  As a plan of campaign is devised and adjusted according to progress made, the detailed requirements filter down to the supervisor who will allocate tasks to the volunteers available.

In my delivery days, I became very familiar with boxes of printed matter.  I still have painful memories of a converted church building in north London, where I delivered fifteen boxes of leaflets to an office on the first floor.  By the second or third trip up the staircase, my asthmatic panting was telling me this wasn't a job I wanted to do again - I recall stubbornly refusing it on a later occasion - and at the end of the task, I sat in the van for quite some while before considering I was in a fit state to drive back.

Imagine my feelings then when, on Thursday afternoon, it was announced that a van had arrived downstairs (this office is also on the first floor) with seventy boxes of leaflets.  All available staff were drawn in to form a chain from street to door, from door to staircase and, with two or three people actually stationed on the stairs, a flow of boxes emerged to where the office manager and I moved them from the landing to a place of temporary storage in the general office.

The task was then to transform these into bundles to be delivered by other volunteers to as many houses as possible across the fourteen wards that make up the constituency.  Someone manned the electronic counter - without which the whole operation would have taken at least three times as long - one wrapped the delivery list around the leaflets, another embraced this with a strong elastic band, while a fourth co-ordinated the storage of bundles in (the original) boxes, duly labelled with the ward name and street codes, and placed this with lots of others on shelves ready for collection.

Bricklaying skills

Before any of this could take place, the boxes had to be opened and emptied, which I found myself doing.  My bricklaying skills were severely tested! At best, there were six in the bundling team; when I arrived yesterday morning I found one lady doing it all by herself.  Amazingly, in the extent of about a working day, the whole task was done and some bundles had already been collected in bulk for one of the outlying wards, where they would be farmed out to local volunteers in the area.

And so we come to my title.  I was just coming to the end of a little tidying up when Daisy, our candidate, arrived.  After a brief word with me and my colleague Ray, who had grown up in Bury St Edmunds, she went into the inner office.  As I mentioned last week, I was at school with her mother, so it was no surprise to discover that she, too, was born in Suffolk.  A few minutes later, a man arrived from the street and asked broadly, 'Is the girl about?'  My colleague ascertained that he meant our candidate, and sought advice from the manager.  The man explained that he was on his way home to Felixstowe and had called in on the off-chance of having a word and, perhaps, getting a picture to inspire his local party when he got back.

Daisy emerged and a short impromptu video was produced, and in conversation she observed, "Isn't it amazing that we've got four Flatlanders here in the office all together!"  It's a term I hadn't heard before, but its meaning is clear.  The three of them came from Suffolk and I from only just over the Norfolk border ... all good solid East Anglian stock, and now all engaged in different ways in the same cause.

Where to go for your Holidays!

Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, of course and, for many, politics is either a complete mystery or is plainly understood as one lying idiot talking against another (rarely is it face to face!).  For anyone holding either of these opinions the mere mention of politics is an incentive to switch off.  For some the switch-off is literal, causing a changed TV channel or a blank screen, while others simply glaze over and think of a sunlit beach or the beauty of nature until it passes.

It's an ideal time just now, if you can stand it, to offer a personal view.  If I'm honest, I can't blame those 'off-switchers' one little bit and, for many years, I was one of their number.  That said (and I'm sure this snatch appeared on this blog some years ago), I've always voted Liberal, and have taken a mild interest in their fortunes (or lack of them) over the past forty-odd years.  I never knew how my parents voted ... I guess Labour, but that is only a guess.  I remember my father once telling me that his father - he died when I was only a year old, so I never knew him - always spoke well of the 'Little Welshman' (i.e. David Lloyd George).

For years my political interest was purely mathematical ... remember that Swingometer on the TV coverage decades ago?  This view peaked when I found I was able to listen to RTE on my radio as I drove around the country, and I followed the Irish General Election in 2007 intently, supporting what I heard by online research about their voting system, a proportional system called the Single Transferable Vote.  There each constituency elects four or five members, ensuring that virtually everyone is represented by someone of their own persuasion ... something I've never experienced in fifty years of adulthood!

Looking back from now, I can't be clear whether it was my recollection about my grandfather, or the Irish system, or simply the devastating cut in the number of Liberal Democrat MPs in the 2015 General Election, about which something clearly had to be done.  Whatever had led to my decision, that last was the actual trigger!  On the day after the election, I enrolled as a member of the Party.  Soon I began to get emails, and later that year I went along to a meeting where a local branch was being created.  There were many new faces, and among them a couple of people I knew.  I soon got to know a few more!

The following year, I was persuaded to join the branch committee and allowed my name to appear on a ballot paper for the District Council elections.  One summer's evening in 2018, as I was leaving the theatre in the town, I was spotted by our chairman.  He quickly explained that the secretary had resigned and asked if I would be able to take the minutes at our meeting in a few days' time.  The rest, as they say, is history, and I've now been the branch secretary for a year and a half.

Administration is one thing, but what does it achieve?  From the outset, I needed to do something.  I quickly discovered that I couldn't cope with the twists and turns in and out of gateways to go delivering leaflets and I knew that I don't have the personality to get involved with canvassing.  So I became an itinerant helper with the operation of election campaigns.  My first venture was just after the famous Brexit Referendum in 2016, when the Prime Minister resigned and there was a by-election in his constituency, Witney in Oxfordshire.  I realised that this was a driveable distance from home and, over three weeks, I spent a total of four days in their office, albeit staying one night at a charming little B&B near Swindon, and making a 'mini-holiday' out of it.

The next spring came an impromptu General Election, where I found that the candidate in St Albans - much nearer home - was the daughter of someone I was at school with, so I went there for a week, commuting on a daily basis and I've just started an elaborate plan of helping there again for three days a week to fit in with my other commitments.

Meanwhile, there have been other excursions.  This summer I spent a couple of days in the lovely countryside of eastern Wales, staying at a B&B in Llandrindod Wells and helping in the Brecon & Radnorshire by-election.  In Sheffield in September, there was great uncertainty whether there would be a by-election or an imminent General Election and I found it convenient when house-sitting for my cousin's holiday, to commute in that direction for a couple of days helping a campaign that had been reduced to a gentle simmer.

All in all, it's a wonderful combination.  There's the underlying feeling of 'doing something to help' while, at the same time, the mundane duties and growing friendships with new colleagues are an adventure of themselves.  And if - as in the case of Wales and Sheffield - there's equally attractive scenery as a backdrop to it all, that's an added bonus!  To me politics is far more than talking and a cross on a ballot paper!

Operation Overload?

Somebody famous once said, "You know what will happen if you do that again!"  Or at least, if no one did, someone ought to have done.  While I feel, partly, as if I'm in the 'doing it again' camp, at the same time I'm on the 'but this time it's different because ...' team.  Before I put flesh on the bones of that enigma, I'm going to tell you a story.  See if you can guess the end from the beginning.

To protect the identity of the central character of my tale, I'm going to call her Anita, which isn't her name.  I recently undertook the now annual task of identifying those of the regular and devoted worshippers at my church who would be willing to venture up hill and down dale across the length and breadth of our parish to deliver the church Christmas cards.  It sounds demanding, I know, put like that, but in reality, it's all quite flat, and over the years I've split it into walks of between 50 and 150 homes, so no one should be engaged in the task for much more than a couple of hours.

The sales pitch must have been much more persuasive than I'd thought, for Anita boldly came up to me after the launch the other week and said 'I'll do some', whereupon I gladly slotted her into my programme and thought no more of it ... until ...   I envisage that, after she'd got home, Anita was chatting to her husband over Sunday lunch, and realised that her life as a working mother-of-three offered little or no 'spare' time that wasn't already taken up by the almost countless tasks that beset ladies in that situation.  A couple of days later a crie-de-coeur arrived in my inbox, saying, "I can't realistically see how I'm going to find the time to do this, please remove me from your list.

At this point - my story now ended - I recall a conversation (or at least part of a conversation) with one of my fellow-helpers at the drop-in where I spend my Thursday mornings.  I forget what had prompted my comments, but it was directed towards the fact of me living alone.  I told her that my life is full enough already, and if 'Miss Right' - or, more realistically at my age, the former Mrs Was-Right-Once - should come into view this minute, I wouldn't have the time to devote to building a new relationship.

You see, I have form.  My life has more than once been through this cycle, and by now I should know better.  Gradually I've taken on one social commitment after another until my life has been so full, I realise that things that ought to be taking pride of place, like family and relationships, have been squeezed out.  Then, in order to try to rectify matters, to restore the proper balance, you might say, I've shed things abruptly, causing problems to other people in so doing.

The drop-in started a couple of years ago, almost to the day, as it happens.  With almost two years of retirement behind me, I heard of a plan to explore this possibility, hopefully to be run by volunteers from the churches in the town.  While it was outside of my comfort zone, I could see both the value and the necessity of the project and felt I ought to help.  I attended the preliminary meetings and was eventually drawn into the operating team.  Now, not only do I find it rewarding, but I can see clearly how my own behaviour patterns have changed for the better as a result of this involvement.

This was only one of a number of new ventures to become part of an active retirement.  Finding time heavy on my hands, I began working at the warehouse run by the local hospice to serve its retail shops in the business of raising funds for the caring work that is its focus.  Originally this was on Tuesdays and Friday mornings, but recently I've switched from a Friday morning shift to one on Thursday afternoons, giving me a 'clear' four-day weekend.  Only now, of course - you won't be surprised by this - I'm itching to fill those days, too.

With the General Election now at last declared, I've made plans to repeat my involvement of June 2017, when I spent a week or so helping my school-friend's daughter who is contesting the nearby seat of St Albans.  This time, of course, the time I can spare for this purpose has to be fitted around a now firmly constructed pattern of voluntary work.  It goes without saying that I've readily decided to sacrifice my 'extended weekends' - or at least the extensions themselves, i.e. Fridays and Mondays - and to these I have added some Tuesdays and some Thursdays, limiting the impact on the respective charities to what I hope is an acceptable pattern.

Now, on the brink of executing this plan, I'm looking back at the 'form-book'.  Have I over-filled my week? Can I fit all that needs to be done 'on the home front' into the three remaining days, which already carry some regular commitments I wasn't willing to sacrifice?  On the other hand, as many thought in 1914, 'It'll all be over by Christmas'.  That wasn't, of course, but this is finite, and will be.  On that truism stands my 'this time it's different' philosophy.  I hope it proves to be the case.

Smaller than Mine!

A couple of weeks ago, I reported disposing of some excesses from my personal library, to the extent that a whole bookcase had been made redundant.  A friend had been enquiring recently whether anyone had a bookcase, because she found herself in need of one.  I asked if this need had been met or whether mine might thus find a new home.  Sadly it wasn't the right size, but she did suggest a possible outlet for it.  I investigated and subsequently made an arrangement for it to be collected.  These things are never instant, of course, but by 10.0 this morning it was gone.

I'm not actively down-sizing in the accepted sense ... I can't imagine living in a smaller home than at present!  That said, I'm well aware that many of my possessions - like those books - are surplus to my actual requirements, and may find fresh ownership over the coming months.  I'm also well aware that many people do live in smaller accommodation than mine ... and not always by choice.

In my kitchen - and in fact, in daily use - I have a certain spoon.  On first glance, it is just another teaspoon.  It's marked 'stainless steel' and bears a number '18/0'.  I like it because the handle is slightly longer than usual, making it able to reach to the very bottom of a jam jar.  Its only 'distinguishing marks' are a few scratches on the back of the bowl, that constant use and washing up are slowly removing. 

Those scratches remind me where I got it some ten years or so ago: it had caught my eye, just laying there bright and shiny on the car park as, having just returned from a delivery, I walked from my van to the office.  Its scratches and their probable cause, the spoon's presence on the car park, remind me too of someone who might possibly have been its previous owner ... although, like a found coin, there is no way of establishing this one way or the other. 

Like me, he was a courier driver and, like me, he was prepared to drive long distances and long hours in order to make a living.  But that's where the resemblance ended.  Peca - I never knew him by any other name - was about half my age, give or take five years or so, tall, dark-haired and athletic.  From his accent, I should say he was of east European origin, but I don't ever recall chatting to him.  He had little English beyond the vocabulary necessary to doing his work.  Neither do I know how it was that he suddenly appeared in our Garden City.  I imagined that he was a refugee, or a migrant, who had arrived with sufficient funds to acquire a van, and little more.

Somehow, Peca had discovered the same business that it had been my good fortune to trip over when I had been out of work some years earlier.  Like me, he had found our boss welcoming so long as we did what we were asked, and unquestioning as to what went on in our lives outside of our driving.  So far as Dave was concerned, if we did a job well, we were likely to get it again and, if we didn't, he'd think twice not only about our repeating the same job, but also about doing anything of a similar nature or for the same customer.  It was, after all, his reputation on the line, and his business that would bear the consequences of a less than perfect service!

That determined my attitude while I did that work.  I tried always to be polite and efficient and my efforts were rewarded.  I took little interest in the other drivers and - as a recent post here recognised - tended to be very inward looking beyond the work itself.  It was some while, therefore, before I realised that, at about the time when Peca had appeared on the scene, so too a large and scruffy white van had become noticed in the corner of the car park.  To all intents and purposes, it had been abandoned.  So far as I knew it didn't belong to us, was always there and was never seen going off on a job.  It seems that, for the early part of his time with us, that stationary vehicle was Peca's home.

How long it stayed there, I couldn't say.  Certainly not all the time Peca was with us.  Where he moved to, I have no idea.  Eventually, as he became more familiar with our language, and our ways, Peca became more assertive, more willing to object if he didn't like something, and there were disagreements between him and some of the other drivers, and between him and Dave, the boss.  Finally, after upsetting an important customer - I don't know how - he was told not to darken our doors again.

Sometimes when I look at that spoon, I recall a lonely immigrant living in a van.  I remember the odd journey I made when it was necessary to spend a few cold hours trying to sleep in the back of my van and the desperation that made me drive on, although not really refreshed, simply because that was the only way to get warm again.  And I imagine how unattractive it must have been to know that it would be the same the next night ... and the next ...

And it's frightening to realise that there are those in our community today, who find themselves in the same plight ... for whatever reason.  It may only be one morning a week, but it's a privilege to play a small part in an operation called Ark that can offer a crumb of comfort and hope for such folks.

Feeding Young Minds

Scarcely a day goes by in these times that we don't hear something about foodbanks.  On one hand they are a very good thing: they provide an essential lifeline for families or individuals who find themselves unable to cope with the basic necessities of normal life.  On the other hand they are a bad thing, since their very existence is a condemnation of the social and economic structure that has led to this situation in the first place.  Had the nation's affairs been better managed, there would be no need for foodbanks at all.

However, we are where we are.  For centuries there have been two distinct classes in our society: the haves and the have-nots.  The rebellion led by Robert Kett in July & August of 1549 features prominently in the history of my native Norfolk and, nationally, what schoolboy hasn't heard of Wat Tyler and the Peasant's revolt of June, 1381?  (I wonder, though, whether that features in today's curriculum.)

As the son of a farm worker, I grew up very much aware of being one of the 'have-nots'.  I remember at primary school the acute embarrassment when, having passed the pre-requisite hearing test, I had to report that my mother couldn't afford the few pence that would enable me to have violin lessons.  Little more than a decade later came the shock of discovering that, only a year or so out of school, I was earning - or at least getting paid! - more than my father.

In later years, as I drew towards retirement after having been at work almost constantly, as one situation had followed another, for all but a few weeks of my adult life, I came to realise that there was now a new underclass, who were much worse off than me.  It placed upon me a responsibility that I had been given no idea how to deal with.

From time to time, since I started writing these pieces, I've drawn upon my dreams for inspiration.  I'm firmly of the opinion that, as the mind unwinds during our sleeping hours, it throws together random thoughts, people and instances from a wide variety of times in our past, from childhood to yesterday.  The juxtaposition of these snippets can provide some quite bizarre 'stories' that are usually beyond our complete recall upon waking.

Sometimes, I remember two faces that I've known years and miles apart appearing in the same 'scene'.  On other occasions, I might call to mind a complete act of the night's nonsense play, although, in reciting it to myself, I'm aware that I've incorporated a waking link to make 'sense' of the whole thing; and I've lost count of the times when it seems quite clear that I've visited some fictitious place before and know what is - or isn't - round a corner or through a door.

In my 'dream theatre' the other night, I found myself at some kind of children's party.  I had been engaged by the parents to bring along the presents that they had provided, rather like Santa Claus (although there was neither sight nor sense of a white-trimmed red cloak).  After the party, I tried to load the contents of those presents back into the car.  But now, of course, they had all been unwrapped, played with and, in some cases, broken, and they would no longer fit into the same space.  I had to remove those in the worst condition and throw them away, sensing the possible disappointment of some of the children as a result.

I don't hold to the theory that dreams are always 'sent' to inform us of something important; but sometimes I find that the thoughts evoked by their recollection can lead to something positive and maybe helpful.  In this case, I was aware that the parents had spent a fortune on the presents while, once the children had satisfied their curiosity about what was inside, they didn't appreciate the toys and had swiftly moved on to investigate the next parcel.

I have little to do with children in my waking life.  Nevertheless, I believe that many of the families who 'have' (going back to the introductory thoughts above), spend sums on their children that are extravagant and can appear to be unlimited, with the result that the young ones grow up with a range of unreal expectations.  When, as young adults, they discover that they can't have every last thing they desire, this realisation causes a variety of social problems.  It's better, perhaps, for such loving parents to express that love not in physical possessions but in providing their children with attitudes and strategies that will enable them to deal wisely and generously with the real world that they will later find surrounding them.

(Written with apologies and acknowledgement that many parents are already doing this!)

Eye off the Ball!

Last Saturday, I watched a football match at a lower league than is lately my custom.  The difference was more noticeable than I'd expected.  As I mused later, on each team there were three or four players who 'knew what they were doing' or, as one player who had been substituted at half-time, was already changed and was watching the closing stages from the stand, observed, 'they think football'.  One evidence of this was the way that some would turn their heads away and let the high ball hit their head, rather than skilfully use their head to affect the direction of the ball's travel.

The same trait can be devastating in cricket, where it's imperative for the batsman to keep his eye on the ball from bowler's hand to bat, or risk it passing him by and splattering his wicket ... or worse, hitting him on the head!

It's true of life, too, as I discovered twice this week.  I recently realised that in a collection of about 900 books that adorn my flat, there are several that either will never get read, or have been read and are unlikely to be read again.  Consequently I've sold a few on line, and donated a far greater number to charities in the town, with the knock-on effect that the total has reduced by about 15% and one complete bookcase has been made redundant.  As I went through this exercise, I disposed of volumes that I had bought as a result of a passing whim, or a project long since abandoned either through lack of interest or the counter-attraction of something else.

During the course of this moderate de-cluttering exercise, I shed a lot of loose papers, too.  The discovery amidst them of one snippet that I wanted to keep sent me to what passes for a diary, since that seemed the most appropriate place to store my find.  As I searched for the exact spot, I browsed some of the writings of what is now very much a passed age.  There was very little of interest to the modern, happily-retired me.  It was virtually all work-related: picked this up, waited for that, went to one place, then another; expressions of frustration at having to wait hours for something to turn up ... no indication of how those hours were spent, or the passing of the seasons.

That said, there was the occasional note of relief, for it happened that the right spot for that discovered document was but days away from the momentous occasion - reported on this blog at some time, I'm sure - when I at last broke through a significant brick-wall in my family research and discovered my great-uncle at Colchester barracks in the 1871 census ... he who had been so elusive since his last record at home ten years earlier.

The impression given by that diary record of only eight years ago was, however, of someone almost completely inward-looking; even that sliver of relief was self-focused.  Who else, after all, would be interested in an ordinary nineteenth-century soldier whose greatest achievement (so far as I've been able to find out, anyway) was to drop a target on his trigger-finger and thus gain his discharge, enabling him to settle down to a quiet family life in a small Irish town?

For many a year, I fear, I had taken my eye off the 'ball' of normal life.  And, although I'm only too aware of many things that lack the ideal level of attention, I'm glad to say that - in my own opinion, at least - I've been able to achieve a much more balanced existence in my retirement.

Keeping the Score

Last week I trailed my diary for the coming days; I can now report back.  I mentioned my plans to join friends on Saturday for the annual autumn ringing outing.  Unlike the ill-fated visit to Warwickshire in the spring (where I tripped and fell after lunch, causing some weeks of discomfort), this was an unqualified success.  We had gloriously sunny weather and the pub where we had lunch was conveniently close to the church with good food and good service.  Even the challenge posed by the bells themselves didn't defeat us.  The first ring were a bit heavy for some of us but, as the day progressed, we found lighter bells that were more welcome.

At our weekly practice before the outing, my friend Bob had suggested that I might like to revise some of the compositions that he knew I had conducted in the past ... although recently, with our efforts being geared to teaching new ringers, I had not been called upon in this way.  He planned to invite me to do so at some point on our outing.

Now, on five bells (with the sixth and heaviest bell keeping time at the end of each change), 120 possible sequences, or changes, can be rung.  There are many different patterns in which this can be achieved; each different pattern is called a method.  In their simple form most methods only provide 30 or 40 of these sequences, and to obtain the full 120 changes, known as an extent or, in the older parlance, a 'six-score' requires a number of alterations in the pattern, which is where the conductor comes in.

Bob had spoken of an ancient method that we ring called Grandsire, of which there are ten different ways that the six-score can be achieved, some more complex than others.  It was one of these more complex compositions that I had revised and prepared.  I was, I admit, apprehensive about doing this, having been out of practice for so long.  In fact, I'm not sure that I have ever successfully called this particular composition in the past.  I confess that I was therefore pleased to have a band of strong ringers around me to achieve the feat this time.

Easby Abbey, North Yorkshire

I also mentioned last week my planned attendance at the funeral of a 95-year-old friend.  This, too, was blessed with fine weather, despite a forecast of rain spreading from the west.  As was expected, the formalities included reminiscences from family members, son, daughter and grandchildren and all was executed without a hitch.  I diverted slightly from my 200-mile return journey to visit a nearby abbey ruin for a few minutes reflection as I explored the site.

I think it was the next day when I was once more reminded of the passage of years, and the approaching completion of the psalmist's allotted 'threescore years and ten', when my new driving license fluttered onto my doormat.  With such thoughts in my head, did I really need a friend to comment within a day or so about 'becoming a grandmother again'?  I recalled that my granddaughter - of whom I've heard nothing for years - is now 22 years old and, for all I know, I could be a great-grandfather!

Perhaps the balance was restored yesterday, when another friend proudly displayed pictures of her daughter, whose boy-friend had last weekend descended to one knee and made a proposal of marriage.  I was reassured that the niceties of a former age have not totally evaporated when my friend explained that the young man had earlier spoken to her husband upon the subject.  I recalled that I had done the same thing some two-score and eight years ago ... and even then was thought of as 'old-fashioned'!

Annual Adjustments

"C'est aujourd'hui le 1er Octobre", the teacher wrote on the blackboard.  She then read it aloud - I can remember it now - and explained that this was the day when pupils at all French schools returned after the long summer break.  I've no idea whether this is still the case but it certainly makes a lot of sense that the whole nation operates in unison in this way ... as any parent with children at school in different counties will agree.

Whether or not, it's certain that the start of October marks a significant turning point in the year.  Evenings are becoming dark earlier; by the time I've had my evening meal and washed up, I need a light to see my keyboard.  Mornings have already become dark.  We have a weekly church breakfast at 6.30 on Mondays and for several weeks we have arrived in the dark; we now have to leave for work or home afterwards also in darkness!

And there are cold bursts, too.  The other morning I woke up aware that I'd not been properly asleep for some while.  I realised that I was cold and, with several hours before 'getting-up time', I was forced to dig out a blanket to throw across the bed to afford any possibility of further sleep.  It used to be a tradition that there was no heat in school until the start of October; this discipline is one that has followed many into adulthood, me included.  I remember giving way soon after the start of last September, but I did stick it out until Tuesday this year, and a resolve that it was still not really required - accompanied by a Wednesday switch-off - didn't last and it's now on again ... this time for the duration.

The arrival of the heating season in my home was accompanied by a slight re-arrangement of furniture to allow the heat better to permeate into the rooms.  This was particularly necessary in the bedroom, where 'stuff' had been allowed to accumulate close to the heater. This isn't very effective anyway, being both too small for the size of the room (in my chilled but unskilled opinion) and tucked away in an outside corner.  In order to sort things out in the most useful combination, I bought a new extension lead long enough to run around the edge of the room to feed, among other things, the clock-alarm beside my bed.

Unplugging this, of course meant that, when it was plugged in again, the clock would need to be re-set.  I decided to be lazy, with the clocks 'falling back' at the end of the month, and set it for GMT.  I thought it would be easy enough to add on an hour when I look at it for the time.  It was about 8.30 last evening when I suddenly heard voices coming from the bedroom and realised that all was not as it should be.  Not only had I set the clock element for 'AM', when it was already afternoon: I had also mis-calculated the hour difference and set the alarm for 7.30 to get me up at 6.30, when I should have set it for 5.30!  By this morning, all was working as it should, thank goodness.

Another seasonal change that will come into effect next week concerns what I call 'work', my volunteering activities at the local hospice warehouse.  Instead of working on the vans on Friday mornings, visiting the high street shops, I've arranged to fill a vacant slot indoors on a Thursday afternoon, thus giving me clear Fridays to match the clear Mondays at the other end of the week as well as keeping me from getting cold and wet in the winter weather.

I described it as a seasonal change but it might become permanent, because it also relieves me from the mental strain of dealing with a variety of 'pre-loved' items that are no longer required and have been carefully packed and parted with in the hope of their finding appreciative new homes but when they arrive at the warehouse, those with far more experience that I can see that this will never happen and consign them to re-cycling straightway.  I say mental strain, I suppose because I've inherited in my growing up the wartime concept of 'make do and mend'.  While not actually mending things these days, the practice has evolved into one of being content with something secondhand if it will do the job.  Therefore the thought of replacing something that is still working by a flash new article smacks of vanity and waste.

If you're wondering how that squares with my driving around in a new car, see my earlier blog here, explaining why this was a necessity.  While you're doing that, I'll drive off with my friends tomorrow to the ringers' annual autumn outing.

When Two Worlds Collide

I well remember, some years ago now, meeting my then hairdresser in the supermarket, saying 'hello', and then puzzling for hours before recollecting where I'd seen her before.  This event was recalled yesterday when, as I walked down the street, I saw passing each other before me two people I know in totally different contexts.  Not surprisingly, neither showed any knowledge or recognition of the other and they probably didn't notice each other's existence.  One was a man I meet at the warehouse where I volunteer on Tuesdays, and the other a client at the drop-in centre that I'd just left.

Sometimes encounters like this can be foreseen and therefore prompt no reaction of surprise when they happen.  One of the ladies from my church recently completed her studies and was ordained in the summer.  As it happens, she is spending the first years of her new career as the curate in the neighbouring parish, where I've been one of the bell-ringers for many years (our own church has no bells).  Thus on one occasion in late spring, I was present at the gathering to celebrate her life with us for the last number of years, and wish her well as she moved on.  A month later, I was a peripheral member of another community, who had just taken part in a quarter peal to welcome its new curate!

At other times these 'two-world' experiences can be deeply personal.  Since my retirement, it has been my custom most weeks to attend the mid-week service at the church.  It only lasts about half-an-hour, and the congregation, while averaging perhaps nine or ten, is drawn from a couple of dozen or so souls who, like me, value a spiritual highlight during the week, whenever they are able to attend.  As I left the church on Wednesday morning, I was aware of being quiet and having a feeling of peace, of being 'settled within'.  Perhaps it was simply the contrast from the previous evening when I felt pressured by two or three e-mail conversations that had dominated what would usually be a restful time after a day's work.

Whatever its cause, this tranquillity was just what I needed later in the morning, for the post brought news of the death of an old friend.  She was no only old in years, having made it to the age of 95, but - as I later calculated - I have known her for about 35 years and knew of her for some years before that.  Lilian had been my children's primary school teacher and, as she often reminded me, often thought of them (and, I suspect, of many hundreds of other children who had passed through her hands down the years) and wondered how they were getting on.

She lived a few miles away, but after her retirement still liked to keep in touch with the village where she had taught and so joined a Bible study group attached to the church, which is how I came to know her.  A few years later, she and her husband moved - as many older couples do - to another part of the country to be closer to her daughter, son-in-law and growing grandchildren.  We exchanged Christmas cards each year, but of all those with whom I had such links, she was the only one who carried on a correspondence sporadically throughout the year.

When I started driving for a living, I sometimes found myself delivering in her area or beyond and would occasionally drop in for a drink and a chat on my way home.  I can't recall when it was that I learned that her daughter had been in the year below me at school, but on one of these 'drop-in' occasions, Lilian greeted me at the front door and announced, 'there's someone here who would like to meet you'.  I was ushered through to the kitchen, where her daughter was waiting and I think it warmed her heart to see the two of us chatting away about our schooldays of some forty years earlier as if it were only yesterday.

Goodbye Lilian, may you rest in peace.

Puff, Puff and Splash!

For the last few years, I've managed to take a day out on the East Anglian coast, reviving old memories and generally relaxing.  Some years ago - maybe three, maybe more - it was Yarmouth, where I visited some roads associated with the family my parents and I had stayed with on our holidays in my childhood.  Two years ago it was Yarmouth again, and I explored the relics of the Midland & Great Northern Railway (M&GNR) which originally had its terminus at the Beach Station, now long since converted into a coach station.  A few hundred yards up the line from there was the site of Newtown Halt, where - in all ignorance of its origins - I used to park up with my then girlfriend.  Last year, I had aimed for Lowestoft, but took a wrong turning, found myself in Dunwich and revived other memories.

I realised yesterday that, since next Saturday is already booked for a striking competition in the morning and an FA Trophy tie in the afternoon and the following week brings the ringers' autumn outing, this will probably be my last chance for a 'day at the seaside'.  As I quickly made plans last evening, I questioned whether this was actually going to be focused on a sniff of the briny or a hunt for signs of a lost railway, for I had decided to venture further north, again to a place with an M&GNR connection.  During the Edwardian years at the beginning of the last century, this railway company - itself under the joint management of the Midland and Great Northern companies - entered into an agreement with the Great Eastern Railway (GER) to create two small and quite separate lines that would link up these two networks.  This arrangement was known as the Norfolk & Suffolk Joint Railway (N&SJR).

One line ran down the coast from Yarmouth to Lowestoft.  I remember being parked in Corton, one of the villages through which it passed, and watching in the distance as the final train made its journey on that line when it closed in 1970.  The other line ran from the M&GNR station in North Walsham (two stations were there, side by side, the other being the one built by the GER that still serves the town) round the coast to Cromer, where it ran around the town, through a tunnel (the only main line tunnel in Norfolk) beneath the GER line, to join up with the M&GNR line from Sheringham and run into Cromer Beach Station.

This line closed along with all the rest of the former M&GNR's system in 1959, with the exception of that loop around Cromer.  When the GER arrived there in 1877, it sited its station on the high ground on the southern edge of the town; the Beach Station, however, was quite near the centre and much handier for visitors.  Once all the railways companies were merged into British Railways, and with the general level of passenger traffic declining after World War II, there was no need for there to be two stations in a town the size of Cromer.  A link was made where the two lines crossed so that trains from Norwich (the former GER line) could also use the Beach Station and the former GER station, after being renamed only in 1948 as Cromer High, was closed in the early 1950s.

Today's expedition was to the small seaside town of Mundesley and brought with it a variety of memories.  First, as I drove into Norwich along Newmarket Road, I passed the end of a little opening called Eagle Walk where, in my late teens, I had found a small motor-cycle shop, now long since gone.  That was in the days when the price of a secondhand bike would roughly equate to its engine size;  I think it was there that I found a 200cc Francis Barnett that I couldn't afford, and later settled for a 175cc BSA Bantam.  Next was a journey through the middle of the city ... well, not quite so 'through the middle' as I had anticipated for, as I got to the top of St Stephen's Street, I was confronted by a 'buses only' sign and had to divert either to east or west around the 'inner ring road'.  I chose west and passed the site of a garage on Grapes Hill where I had once bought a little yellow Citroen.

As you might imagine, some sixty years now since their closure, there is little to be seen of either the M&GNR or N&SJR lines today.  All I spotted was a short stretch of track-bed through the trees as I left North Walsham and what could have been the site of the line south of Mundesley as I turned a corner to begin my return journey this afternoon.  So my attention was, perforce, concentrated on the seaside element.  Despite the warm sunshine there was a strong onshore wind, which made the cliff-top walk a little uncomfortable.  There was one person swimming in the sea, however, and another - more thoroughly clad - surfing.

The sea is the sea, however, and after satisfying myself with sight of it, I turned my attention to people-watching on the attractive and well-kept greens and supplemented my lunch with my first ice cream since buying one in my brief visit to Ennis while in Ireland earlier this year.  With hunger now satisfied, I set off for more 'holiday-like' experiences.

At Potter Heigham, I found a convenient car park - free for three hours - for customers of Lathams, 'the Broadland Superstore'.  I couldn't resist making a few purchases, while fulfilling my customer duties, and then amused myself watching the difficulties of a novice boatman trying to park by the staithe and equally a couple of children trying to get the ducks to feed from their hands ... with mixed success!  I think it was at Potter that I once hired a boat for the day and took my children for a ride up the river and back ... but I couldn't be sure whether it was there or Wroxham.  I wonder whether they would remember that now.

Soon it was time to head for home and, being so close, I decided to make use of the ferry at Reedham.  It's the only place between Norwich and Yarmouth where the Yare can be crossed by vehicular traffic and the ferry was run as a family business for more than a century.  Whether the present proprietor still maintains that tradition, I couldn't say.  At two vehicles a time in either direction, he's kept constantly busy.

All in all, a wonderful mixture of new and old experiences, and all of them pleasant.  I wonder where the whim will take me next year!

Late Summer Sunshine

"The hose is there; if there are two days without rain, please water the beans and raspberries." This was the welcome I had at my cousin's home, and the hose has been in operation twice in the week.  I think the only rain came one morning - and that didn't last long.

My 'holiday' of house-sitting and cat-feeding has been quite enjoyable.  Many would say unexciting, and I suppose that's true, too.  But I've enjoyed it.  Two days were spent 'commuting' to Sheffield, where - despite the reversed resignation of the sitting MP - a by-election campaign has continued, albeit at a low key.  Of the four journeys, there and back, none has been uneventful.

The first morning I followed SatNav until it seemed that it had missed the expected turning off the M1.  By then I was in the city's suburbs and my electronic 'friend' had no hesitation in leading me into the centre, where roadworks and traffic took their toll and the journey that should have taken me about an hour took nearly two.  I returned that afternoon via Chesterfield, but having got there, too the wrong turning off the A61 and found myself onto the motorway too early, with the resulting delay in my return.

On Wednesday, I decided that it wasn't the right weather to watch cricket, so went back to Sheffield, this time going the 'right way' but had to take a very tight left turn when almost at my destination and stalled; I was very grateful to the driver behind me, who pulled up sharply while still on the corner.  The journey home was delayed only by the Chesterfield rush-hour traffic.

Main Street, Egginton, Derbyshire

Between these trips, I made a family history 'pilgrimage', first to the record office in Matlock, where the staff couldn't have been more helpful, directing me to the computers instead of re-directing me to Stafford for a query relating to records not in their area.  My other quest, to locate my uncle on the electoral rolls of the years immediately after World War I, was only partially successful.
After visiting a local pub for lunch, I took a detour and went for a look around the village of Egginton, where my uncle and aunt lived until 1923 or 4, and where her family came from.

Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Thursday was a cricket day and, for only the second time ever, I visited a first-class match and watched the third and last day of Nottinghamshire v. Kent.  When I arrived, Notts, batting in the fourth innings of the match and chasing a target of 440, were 29 for 2;  When I decided that the time had come to make for home, they were on 195 for 9 and I find that I missed only 17 runs after that point.  Apart from the not unusual event of the umpires needing twice to find a replacement ball, the other excitement was one that those around me declared they had never seen before.  The batsman struck the ball in the usual way; it went only a short distance, so there would be no run; more importantly, he was left with just the handle of the bat in his hand, the blade having spun down the wicket to say 'hello' to his colleague at the bowler's end!

Today has in some ways reminded me of seaside holidays of my childhood.  Instead of playing on the beach, we children would find ourselves dragged up and down the high street, as the parents visited known shops to make purchases to take home ... often, we later realised, for Christmas presents!  So, my last full day of the week began with shopping, and then back at the computer completing some regular tasks ... like this blog!

Now, along with my furry friend, I have to declare it to be teatime!

Twenty Years On

Twenty years ago this week marked the end of a short reformative phase of my life.  Inevitably, this has been a time for looking back down the years and reflection.  In those days, I was still working in an office and receiving the highest salary of my career.  The job had its snags but the work was, in the main, satisfying.  The millennium year gave me the opportunity to travel more than ever before and I spent five weeks working in the USA.  My boss wasn't the easiest bloke to get on with, but he could be generous. 

Those five weeks spanned the 100th birthday of HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, and I had already made plans to ring bells in her honour.  "No problem.  Come home and ring, then go back again," he said, as if it were just the other end of the country.  I left the office in California on Thursday afternoon, was ringing on Friday evening, went on a coach trip I'd also been booked on, but would have cheerfully have given up if necessary, on the Saturday and was back in the office by Monday afternoon!

Two years later, the business had changed completely and I found my situation no longer comfortable.  It all came to a head one Tuesday morning when I decided, 'I can't work like this!'  I walked out of the office and got a train home.  From the safety of my lounge, I phoned the boss and told him "I quit!"  Apart from telling me he thought I was making a big mistake, he took it very well.  I didn't know until much later what else was going on at that time (and the detail isn't appropriate here).  Suffice to say that, within months the whole business had collapsed and I had had a narrow escape.

Meanwhile, I had started a new life behind the wheel of a van.  I'd always enjoyed driving and now I was seeing places I'd never dreamed of, and getting paid for the privilege.  By the time I retired some 13½ years later, I'd covered almost a million miles, very few of which I hadn't enjoyed.  Naturally, my income had fallen substantially and, for a couple of years, I tried to cultivate secondary income streams, first as a writer and later (and completely without success!) teaching an adult education course.  Soon, the demands of being a same-day courier had rendered any other aspect of life - business or social - virtually impossible.

On the domestic front, I moved through a succession of flats, and had begun to build up a social life from scratch in what, twenty years ago, was to me still a virtually unknown town.  Being a bell-ringer eased this challenge and when, a few years on, I faced a crisis in my church life it was through a ringing friend that I found a new place to worship and to grow spiritually ... the church that I still attend, some thirteen years later.

Retirement brought with it another upheaval.  I remember from my past a friend for whom that transition had proved impossible and within six months he was dead.  I resolved that this wouldn't happen to me and I was in the fortunate position of being able to enter a plan of phased retirement, working three weeks out of four for a while, and then two, gradually building up other interests at the same time.  I think this was successful and now, four years on, people occasionally ask, "... and are you fully retired now?"

Politicians often excuse their demise by 'wanting to spend more time with their family'.  That's not my situation, at least not in that way.  I was able to spend more time on family history but, though absorbing - and many would say addictive - it can't command all one's time.  Throughout my life, I've always had a 'project' of some sort on the go.  Sometimes these would take a week, sometimes - like the twin family tree for my cousin's golden wedding a couple of years ago - many months would be devoted almost exclusively to their completion.  Such things absorb time, but don't provide a proper structure to life: certain organisations or interests that occupy a regular weekly 'slot'.

Two years ago (with some trepidation, I admit, for this was outside of my 'comfort zone') I expressed interest in an inter-church project to develop a weekly drop-in facility for the homeless and vulnerable in our town.  Gradually my involvement there grew from monthly to fortnightly and then every week as I found myself more and more able to take a greater part in the work.  However, this was only one morning a week and time was beginning to feel heavy.  Again, a friend came to the rescue.  This time it was another volunteer at the drop-in.  As we chatted one morning, she explained that she had recently become involved with our local hospice.

Like many such places, the hospice runs a number of high street shops as a source of finance and my friend suggested that I might enquire whether they would like some help in that direction.  I was soon sucked into their operation and now help in one way or another a day and a half each week, and more often if convenient and necessary.

For the moment this active retiree has a comfortable framework, and sufficient other interests to occupy the time between eating and sleeping.  How long each aspect will continue to contribute to this comfort is not for me to determine but I have many resources to turn to when change occurs!

Keeping All the Balls in the Air

It's been a tiring week ... I don't suppose I'm the only one to say that, given the hottest August Bank Holiday on record.  Sleep has definitely been at a premium and - although they say that the body only ever makes up for two-thirds (or is it three fifths ... something in that order, anyway) of the sleep it loses - I've been yawning my way through most days this week.

Looking back at what I've done, I don't think there was much out of the ordinary; at least, nothing really 'extra-ordinary'.  I visited my cousin as I usually do on bank holidays, but spent the day-and-a-bit indoors, rather than gallivanting about the locality ... at our age it takes very little to dissuade us from any idea of a gallivant!  I couldn't sleep until gone midnight on Monday morning, but drove home in the evening non-stop with neither traffic hold-up nor fatigue.  It seems to have caught up with me once I'd regained home terrain.

Work on Tuesday was exciting, not for variety but because of coordinating help both in the morning and the afternoon.  When there is no help, I'm happy to work alone, but when someone else arrives to share the work, it involves re-arrangement of the work into a 'production line' and the two parts don't of their very nature operate at the same speed, so there is either a hold-up or a build-up, which creates dissatisfaction so far as my mind is concerned.

On Wednesday afternoon I devoted three hours or so to the apparently lengthy task of preparing the items I'd collected last Wednesday, getting them ready for sale.  Although helpful of itself, this underlined to me what a lengthy job that will be ... for someone, but certainly not exclusively for me!

This morning's excitement was the follow-up to the problem with the van that gave me a day off last Friday.  The problem, though identified by the garage, is still not fixed, and new alarm lights meant that our usual routine was curtailed.

Nothing daunted, I'm planning watching another football match tomorrow.  The team I'm becoming used to calling 'mine' (while recognising that 'other teams are available'), Biggleswade FC, are playing their first Saturday home match in the Southern League, and I'm hoping they will repeat their performance of last Saturday when they achieved their second FA Cup win of this year's competition, going into the draw for the First Qualifying round for the first time.

In the meantime, I'm finding light relief catching up on other voluntary commitments ... desk jobs in the political sphere.  With the conference season upon us and Brexit lurking in the background, life is nothing if not exciting!

Such Days Make One Week ... or Weak?

Most things don't conveniently end at the end of the week and many's the time when I sit down to write another blog and pick up the threads of what I wrote the week before.  So let's do that.  Monday and Tuesday were quite routine, except that on Tuesday plans were confirmed for the execution on Wednesday of the favour that was the subject of that phone call last Friday afternoon.  A well-known high street company had offered some end-of-line stocks for sale in our local charity shops ... provided we collect them from their head office site.

It was agreed that a van would be hired - of a size fitting to the job - and that I would drive it, accompanied by another volunteer, to collect the goods and bring them to our warehouse.  I may have been right when I surmised that it was in consideration of my background and my abilities that I was asked if I would do the job.  It happens that, in my courier days, I had previously visited the company in question on a number of occasions, and thus knew precisely where I was going ... no fiddling about with an unfamiliar SatNav, or the hassle of transferring my own to the van.

The journey was a piece of cake.  My 'shotgun rider' - someone I'd not met before - proved to be chatty, resourceful and helpful, and the roads presented no hold-ups.  The only minor difficulty was the generosity of the donor.  The amount of goods we were presented with exceeded by 100% the amount specified.  This meant that, instead of bringing back the bins we'd taken, neatly packed with goodies, the van was piled to the roof with 'goodies-plus'.  But we weren't complaining.  It was a most satisfying day and, home once more, I felt justified in doing very little else.  The 'payback' - not that it was intended thus, of course - came yesterday afternoon in a text message telling me thanks for my efforts, and saying that the van I usually help on had to go to the garage today, so I could have a day off!

The other 'big event' of the week has been on the domestic front, where I've had to deal with not one, but two desk-top rebellions.  I replaced the ink in my printer ... a necessary and, one would think, innocuous task.  The printer, however, had other ideas and refused to have anything to do with the new black cartridge I'd installed, despite its being physically identical to the one I'd removed.  In desperation, and thankful that it wasn't quite empty, I replaced the old one and things are OK at the moment.  New ink has been ordered and hopefully will arrive before the old black cartridge finally runs out.

Like many others, I imagine - certainly two users I know have shared their experiences - I suffered severe delays a couple of weeks ago as a result of a mammoth update to Windows 10.  For many years I have been a happy user of a program called Windows Photo Viewer.  I like it because, by simply rolling my mouse-wheel, I can enlarge a picture virtually instantly, instead of engaging a menu, selecting the magnification I require and then probably finding it's not exactly what I want.  This instant magnification facility is very useful when I'm transcribing census documents, which I receive as a .jpg file.

Windows 10 doesn't have, as standard, the choice of using this program to view these files.  It has been replaced by Photos, which doesn't have this capability.  I discovered this with my old computer when I upgraded from Windows 7, and was able to recover its use after an online search for information about the problem and its solution.  Somewhat annoyed that, having been using it on my new laptop for well over a year now, suddenly it was gone, I resorted to the internet once again and, an hour or so later, I am now able to use Windows Photo Viewer once more.  I freely admit I'm not exactly sure what it was that I installed, but I followed the instructions from the screen, and am satisfied.

I realised yesterday evening that, if I download a number of photos at once - as I shall have to when I receive another batch of census pages - they now arrive in a different format from the zip file I'm used to, and the 'compressed file' abilities of Windows Explorer are unable to extract them.  I see more troubles in store as I try to overcome that one in the coming days!

How it's Meant to Be?

There's one very important thing about being a volunteer ... personal power!  I don't mean power in the sense of getting everyone else to do what you tell them - far from it! - but power over your own person.  You get to do the things you want to do and have no responsibility for the things you don't.  At least that's how it seems to me.

Note, I said it's an important thing ... not a good thing.  Someone asked me the other week how I was getting on, did I enjoy what I was doing there?  I think she was a bit surprised by my reply, "I like to see a system working the way it should."  She had to follow up to get the response she sought.  "And what about this system?"  When I told her that in my opinion it worked about 30% of the time, I think she was surprised, but a conversation ensued that, I hope, will ultimately be to the good of the whole enterprise.

As I look back over my life, I see lots of separate strands: jobs that don't necessarily form a 'career path'; friendships and relationships that have been discarded ... few have survived the years; projects left unfinished that have eventually ended in the bin; skills learned, but not taken to a formal qualification or fully utilised. There have been so many ships that have been 'jumped'. In many ways I've been a drifter rather than a sticker.  

To read that summary you would think that my life is a misery but that's not true.  Yes, there has been unhappiness down the years ... whose life hasn't had some?  And there are regrets, things that, with the advantage of hindsight, could have been handled better.  But those strands have twisted together to make me what I am.  I'm independent, strong willed even if the body isn't so strong these days, can be stubborn or willing, selfish or considerate and compassionate according to the attitudes and behaviour of those around me.  For good or ill, I'm my own man.  And now I'm a volunteer.

Yes, I'm a volunteer.  I have quite a wide range of personal skills gained over the years and I'm free to offer them wherever they can be of use.  It's good to be able to sit at a computer for a day, confident in operating a particular system, but able to pack a box, fasten it securely and take it to the despatch area.  It's good to be able to spend a morning on a van, meeting people, moving bags and tubs of 'stuff', loading tidily and securely, unloading carefully and systematically, and able to drive it if required.  It's good to be able to offer a bit of management advice, form design and spreadsheet development skills where they're needed.

But I'm a volunteer.  If there's something I don't want to do, or feel incapable of doing, I can just leave it for someone else.  There's no compulsion to work until the day ends; I can leave when I want, and what's left undone someone else can pick up tomorrow.  And provided I don't breach the requirements of health & safety, endanger or injure someone else, and meet the basic needs of human decency and courtesy, there's no voice of censure.  

The outcome is, as I told the lady, a system that works properly about 30% of the time (my estimate, not a statistical fact).  Because there's no continuity, no enforceable plan, efficiency is sacrificed.  Resources aren't always to hand, but have to be sought, materials have to be conveyed to and from what could be an efficient production line.  Because it's a voluntary workforce, relying on donations rather than commercially procured raw materials, it is de facto inefficient.  

We have to ask, is the efficient production line a desirable situation?  Isn't it far better to have a happy, chatty workforce, in a situation where personal needs and wishes can take centre stage.  When a manager can ring me - as she did yesterday afternoon, while I was sitting at home at my computer as usual - to say "I have a favour to ask.  You don't have to do it, feel free to say 'no'."  The situation she faced was explained, along with the part I could play in its resolution, and I gave a willing - nay even excited - 'yes' to her request.  I wondered afterwards whether she had said to her colleague, 'I'll give Brian a call.  He's the chap to help us out.'  In a commercial situation, that would be called being taken for granted, undue pressure or favouritism (according to your standpoint).  In this case, far from it.  I was delighted to be thought of.

But I'm a volunteer!

Animal Magic!

Let me begin with the racing results ... I ended last week with the observation that one horse was becalmed mid-course, since I was awaiting the outcome of an offer of help.  The horse fell, and never finished the race.  I had a text exchange with my friend early this week, saying that the quantity of food involved was much more than a car could accommodate and a van had been arranged for the job ... oh, to have turned the clock back a few years!

I also mentioned last week the excitement of using on-line conferencing technology.  When the instructions arrived on Monday, I found them confusing and, being unclear whether I should need to use both laptop and phone, I decided to have a little run-through the link-up process before the event.  It was as well that I did for, although the program was simplicity itself to use, it did require a preliminary set-up to match the software with my laptop and a brief test with a picture of myself on the screen, asking 'what shall I say, then?' and waiting for the echo of my own voice (it never sounds right, does it?).  Once the second sound option had been chosen - I hadn't realised that the laptop has a hidden microphone to complement the webcam - all was well, and I was able to bookmark the configuration ready for the live meeting last evening.

The meeting itself went quite smoothly.  As the 'new kid on the block', I said very little and learned quite a lot, about the organisation itself and the ongoing business that the meeting was held to discuss, but also about some of the people involved.  I imagined the chairman to have been an engineer in his working life; he had done all the thinking and designing and now needed to write the whole thing up so it was in a fit state to make public.  The secretary seemed to take little part in the meeting, but at the end demonstrated her efficiency by being able to reel off a comprehensive action list of what each of us had agreed to undertake before the next meeting.

And the other significant follow-up is the business of changing horses mid-race.  The switch-back to BT will now not be going ahead.  The people at Virgin explained that there is much more involved than simply responding to BT and saying 'yes, please.' not least the fact that their contract requires 30 days notice of termination.  Other factors, too, are involved, including a new contract at a lower price.  A friend has made me a novel piece of furniture out of scrap wood, at the precise dimensions to fit between two bookcases and carry the Virgin hub in a sensible position instead of dangling on the floor like a dog straining to get off its leash.  This little 'dolls'-house table' will not now be suffering immediate redundancy.

The latest snippet of gossip to emerge from my now secured internet connection has taken nearly 136 years to reach me.  In an idle moment - yes, they do still exist - I was making yet another attempt to document the demise of my great-grandfather.  He was present at the census in 1881, ten years later his wife was described as a widow, and in 1892 she re-married.  Search where I might, for the last twenty years I've been unable to find either a death record for him or a record of his burial.  I decided this week to begin a detailed search of the newspapers that are available on line.  Searching for 'Evans' and the name of the village where they lived, 'Syleham', for the 1880s, I again found no trace of great-grandfather, but the first of about 40 results mentioned his son, my grandfather. 

The extract that had appeared in the results simply provided the text immediately surrounding the key words I'd submitted.  I saw "defendant.  Zechariah Evans, labourer, Syleham" and my immediate thought was 'Oh dear, what had grandfather been up to?'  Like you, perhaps, I hadn't spotted the full stop.  When I looked at the article, which actually covered several column-inches of the Ipswich Journal of 24th November 1883, I discovered that the word 'defendant' finished the previous paragraph, which had identified the man's solicitor.  My grandfather, 15 at the time, and his elder brother, 18, had seen the defendant driving two very lame bullocks along the road, and the defendant, a local farmer and dealer was brought before the local Magistrates Court for the non-reporting of a case of foot and mouth disease.  The boys had seen two of the beasts being brought home, essentially from market, and were the first-reported of a number of witnesses in a successful prosecution.

I'm now looking for more idle moments that I can use to dig even further into this rich resource.

'Racehorse Fits Car into Diary' Problem ... or Similar

There are weeks when the many strands of life resemble those racehorse games that used to be seen at the fairground.  Those of you of a 'certain age' may well remember them.  Each position along the front of the stall was assigned a horse on the big board at the back, and you propelled your horse toward the finishing post by means of scoring points as a result of rolling balls into holes in front of you.  Sometimes your horse would appear to have lost its legs completely, so long did it remain in one place; then all of a sudden it would shoot forward several yards, as the mechanism beneath jerked it into life.

Fairgrounds apart, there are days when I return home after hours away and say to an empty doormat, "Right, that's the post dealt with; what's next?"  After a sequence of such days, yesterday was definitely not one of them.  I returned home at lunchtime to find three white envelopes waiting for me.

Following the anniversary of my little sports car being written off, and the subsequent acquisition of a new replacement, the said replacement has just had its first annual service, and is resplendent in the afterglow of a professional clean courtesy of the local Volkswagen showroom.  As part of the anniversary celebrations, I had renewed the VW insurance policy, and the first envelope I opened contained all the confirmatory documents ... and the all-important Certificate of Insurance.

The second one was a leaflet from the National Health Service, distributed by my GP's office, offering a free general health check for an age range that includes me.  This seemed a very worthwhile service, so I rang the surgery immediately to make an appointment.  It's actually two appointments, because they do a blood test first and then chat to you after they've seen the results.  Coming only two days after I responded to an earlier letter about an annual Asthma Check, they would appear to have commandeered my diary for the coming month.

They don't get it all their own way, though.  A little over a year ago, I decided to change my broadband provider after being told by a nice young lady at Virgin that, when my introductory discount was about to expire, I could call their customer service number and arrange a new discounted deal to replace it.  Fool that I was, I believed her and, a week or two before the expiry date, I rang the number only to be told that nothing could be done, because my existing contract was still in force.  Though I pleaded my cause, I got nowhere and now that the full price has kicked in, they have e-mailed me to say that this will be increased even further from from September.

So, when I opened my third letter this morning and found an attractive offer from BT, I looked for the almost-hidden important phrase 'will revert to' and, having found it, did some comparisons.  The outcome is that I have now arranged to return to BT as a new customer and enjoy a discount for 18 months for their latest variety of high-speed broadband, before moving to a new price within a pound or so of what I would be paying Virgin next month.  And with BT there are a lot of hidden extras and good service, too ... the only reason I left them was the attraction of discount ... and a pretty voice!  Another appointment has been entered to my diary, this time not a go-out, but a stay-in event, just in case the engineer can't do all he has to from outside the flat.

The excitement isn't all over yet, however, for this evening I received a long-awaited e-mail from another committee I was invited to join a few weeks ago, inviting me to fill out a doodle-poll to say when I would be available for the first meeting to involve me.  This will shortly lead to another filled slot in the August diary.  This one will have the added excitement in that the other committee members are in Edinburgh, Bristol and a host of other locations I've yet to  memorise and the meeting will take place on line, using technology hitherto beyond my horizons.  Very much a case of 'watch this space'!

Of course, there is one horse in the race for my time that is presently becalmed mid-course.  Some months ago I attended a meeting in the town, where it was decided to produce cooked meals during the summer holidays for some of the less well-off families in the community.  Cooking is not my strong point - far from it! - but I decided I would be willing to help behind the scenes.  The other week I responded to an appeal to collect food being donated by two local supermarkets.  Last weekend, I was shifting chairs in church alongside a friend who is helping with the same venture, but wasn't the one who had sent out the appeal.  To my surprise it was this friend who apologised for not getting back to me with the details of what I shall be required to do.  It seems that, in that committee, the one who sends out appeals isn't the one who actually deals with responses!

No doubt there'll be more diary excitement next week.