Reading while dead

Reading while dead

Sunday 11 March 2012

The Cooling Towers

We woke up really early this morning - so that we could go and see the cooling towers come down.  Mark thought very few people would be out, but as we came to the Westcliff there was a solid stream of walkers and the whole area above the bay was full of people - some on top of the cliff, others at the  bottom.   We spent a lot of time trying to get the right photo - and position - etc.  The demolition was scheduled for 9.00am, but I didn't think it would really happen on time, so while we were fiddling with the cameras there was an "oooh" and I looked up to see the first tower falling - then the second, then the third - finally the great chimney.  All that was left was a great cloud of dust - and then we heard the four explosions.

I felt a bit unengaged by it - because I was too busy worrying about the camera.  When we first came here we hated them, then like everyone we began to see them as a sign of home: one could see them from afar - like Avebury Hill - they acted as a signpost to Ramsgate.  I am curiously sorry to see them go - I wonder what they will do with the land - perhaps more solar fields.

It was a beautiful sunny day and we went to the Belgian Bar for breakfast - along with everyone else, which is why we had to wait an hour to be served!  But it was nice to be out together, although M clearly had low blood sugar and was a bit agitated - he wanted to sit outside...kept going on about it.  I realise it is quite wearing the way he insists on saying or doing something again and again even when I have told him... last night he kept trying to give me a glass of wine at the theatre even though I'd said "can you wait until my hands aren't full (tickets, money, programme, change, purse, etc.) - 4 times he tried to give me the glass - even though my hands were full and I didn't have a free hand.  Why?  It is some sort of brain damage I fear... or not engaging or noticing.  I don't think it is getting worse, but I fear my patience has completely worn away...

Last night we had another cultural highlight - a performance of La Traviata - in Broadstairs!   It was wonderful.   I have to write a review about it for Stage Corner... which I haven't done yet.

We are going out again this evening - to see Robert's Eidophusikon - based on works by de Loutherberg - he has been talking about this for a couple of years and I am intrigued to see what it will be like - whether just a panorama - or something more engaging?

Robert is a great artist -  but in an art so reliant on the artist's presence that I fear he will disappear after his death - unless other theatre people take up and revive his work.  Still, he's only a few years older than me, so I hope to enjoy much more of his art before the end.


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