Aberfan, the passing on of generations, death and memory

Aberfan brings all these things to mind.  50 years ago I sat up in a double bed with my grandmother and brother Tom, watching the Nine o'clock news on our black and white portable telly.  We saw images of a school building, covered with black slag, and children being dug out and - occasionally - carried away, led away (few of those) crying.

My grandmother grew up in a Welsh mining town - Abertillery - which had, I believe, 6 collieries.  Mining disasters were not uncommon during her youth.  The 6 Bells Colliery had one of the most famous ones, and that colliery was in Abertillery, although it didn't happen until 1960, years after she left the valley.   However, I already knew about mining disasters - I'd seen "How Green was my Valley" on telly, with Grandma, probably, at least twice and I seem to remember there was a mining disaster in that film.  So I already "knew" about these events and the emotions that they evoked in my grandmother, a sort of pride, knowledge, belonging as well as the normal sentimental feelings.

It was a strange relationship, I was very close to my grandmother, she was foul-tempered, narrow minded and very annoying.  She was also an extremely loving woman whose love offerings were frequently misunderstood and rejected.  She tried to please people and be kind - and was frequently given short shrift.  I did not realise her good qualities until she died, when I suddenly recognised them in a moment of epiphany.

The memory of that evening is very clear, as it was the night before we moved out of London, into our new house, the 16thC haunted house on the edge of Slough.  After that evening I don't think we thought much more about Aberfan, I was only 9, I didn't yet read the papers.  There were reports of the deaths, the funerals, the miraculous escapes but those faded against the excitement of the new larger house, and the enormous garden, full of trees, the stream, the fields.

I only realised how this feature of history - mining disasters - was closely linked to my life, while to Mark there were simply "facts".   And of course I realised that mining disasters meant nothing to my children, they have barely been to Wales (except en route to the Irish ferry) and the mines all closed before they were born.   They have seen the old mines around here, what's left of them.  We've been for walks on the shaley park at Fowlmead.

And this made me reflect on the sadness of family history - once I die, all connection of memory with that life in the valleys will be gone.  My mother never cared much about it, and I know so little about it.  I don't know exactly where they lived in Abertillery (I thought Bridge Street sounded familiar) and I don't know which colliery they worked in, although the name "Rose Heyworth" sounded familiar (although that could just as well have been a girl they were at school with).  By "they" I mean my grandmother and Aunt Eileen, and perhaps Jimmy and Joe too.  The older children were already at work, either in the mines or in service.

These are melancholy reflections, and they are eternal - each generation cannot pass down the memories to their children, otherwise our brains would be too packed with precedent to create anything new.  When we went to Abertillery last year (my first visit) all the collieries had gone.

The Rose Heyworth Colliery, Abertillery - in 1985, just before closure

There are signs, and memorials, to mark the sites, but no buildings there.   The man I spoke to pointed out an abandoned leisure centre, that had been built on top of a colliery.  It was so long ago that the leisure centre too was defunct.  It seemed a symbol. The bright plastic system built leisure centres of Thatcher's time (for the redundant miners to spend their free time in ) were now gone too, unloved.   The fine buildings of some collieries still stand - a beautiful redbrick miners' welfare building had become a health centre and nursery in another village; the beautiful Edwardian shops were also still there.

In September, when we went to Cardiff, I was surprised to see a painting in the National Museum, I immediately recognised it as Abertillery - I don't know how, but before I saw the label.  Something about the contours of the valley must have been distinctive and memorable.   I took a photo of it.  The colours are much less yellow - and I was surprised by the fact that it was Lowry.  I didn't know that he left Salford much!   Abertillery is an interesting choice.

 

Bloody gardening

The day started beautifully sunny and I decided it was high time to get on with the autumn pruning campaign.  The fig tree is being cut back to grow against the wall, rather than to fill the front garden.   Then there was the sad case of the sambucus niger in the back garden.  Only 3 months ago someone was admiring its lacy foliage and colour and now it's dead.   First all the leaves on the top half of the tree withered and droopped without dropping, a week or so later the lower half of the tree followed.   I snipped a few bits, but it had lost the green appearance and was clearly not planning a revival.   The ordinary elder tree in my neighbour's garden did this two years ago, although his other elder is thriving, still has all its leaves which are slowly yellowing, so in comparison with that, ours was a goner.

There's a lot of folklore about elders and their relationship to witches.  I should apparently have asked its permission to cut it up.   But as it was dead this was a bit difficult.   After I'd been chopping off branches for a bit I went for a change of scene and snipped away at the clematis tangutica with the secateurs, until one handle fell off - apparently due to metal fatigue!  It was sliced right away from the blade.   After coffee I was back on the elder, chopping the branches into smaller lengths for kindling and so on... I nearly put my eye out with one twig, when the branch twirled in my hands and the cluster of twigs at the top turned and bashed my eye (I closed it in time).  Then I kept getting pinched by the twigs in various ways, so once I'd disposed of it all, I decided to make a start on the plants surrounding the elder, which would have to come out before we could remove it.   These were lightly rooted iris foetidissima but they were rather densely packed between paving stones and an old holly root.   I took a fork to the edge of the clump to losen it, and found it unshiftable - I place the fork elsewhere - and felt some movement, so I leaned further on the fork and the shaft promptly snapped.   I nearly toppled into the flowerbed,.  When I removed the fork, I noticed it had bent one of the tines.   I bought this fork for £14.50 about 2 or 3 months ago, to replace a very good fork that broke after about 20 years.  Sigh.  

I do not intend to suggest that I should have asked the elder tree's permission first, but a series of set backs like that could make you wonder.  The unpleasant smell of the elder doesn't help.  

Bernard the cat

This is a short piece I wrote in the summer, while I was sitting in the garden "working"

Bernard the cat is looking at the mangled frog beneath his paw in a contemplative way.  If he grips it in his mouth again, will it struggle to move and give him some more play?  He tosses it away, then pounces, scoops it up with one paw and volleys it - then leaps on its corpse, tussling dramatically with it, even though it can no longer resist and its short life has ended, here on the lawn, only a few yards from where it was noisily fertilised into life a bare three months ago.

See Naples and Live

I had a slight anxiety about going to Naples, which was quite unnecessary as it happens, since it was much nicer than I remember it.  Thinking about that first trip in 1978, I don't remember one single distinguished meal there, except the pizza we ate in pizzeria that was little more than a cave, rough walled, with a couple of formica topped tables and a pizza oven in a corner.   There was rough wine and paper napkins and those were the only distinguishing features.  There were about 3 types of pizza available.  It was OK.

On this trip we only ate pizza once.  This is because of my desire not to eat flour products (I did try, but not hard enough, and it doesn't seem to have made any difference to my foot health).  The pizza we had was dire, served luke warm, I had a seafood topping which was basically a nice pile of sea food mix, on top of what was essentially passata soaked dough.  Mark had something more elaborate but it was lukewarm and soggy, not in a good way.  However, overall, our experience of food on the trip was not much better.   I will make a longer blog about that subsequently.

What is great about Naples is that the people are incredibly helpful, and fairly charming - although the waiters keep asking you how the food is, which is awkward when all you want to say is "Average".   The sights of Naples are astonishing because many of the most beautiful things are hardly mentioned, such as the 4/5th C baptistery in Santa Restituta, part of the Cathedral.  We didn't go to Pompeii, but we did visit Herculaneum - where things were sadly decayed.  Wall paintings and mosaics are largely unprotected.  RSJs have been introduced periodically to prop things up.  There is a good deal of scaffolding.

As a whole Naples itself does not have any stand out iconic buildings or works of art, however, it has an incredible wealthy of very good buildings and works of art.  So while there are no "must see" destinations there is something wherever you look.

I can't remember what this building was, but it was at the bottom of the Via Toledo I think - and there is architecture like this everywhere, despite frequent earthquakes and terrible bombardment in WW2 by us, the US and the Germans.

The real joy of Naples is wandering the streets and dropping into things as you wish.  Being able to go to the famous Caffe on the Pzza Trento e Trieste and just sit and stare is great.  And of course there are the endless glimpses of the bay and of Vesuvius - so although not "every prospect pleases" a great many do.

Parts of Naples have been cleaned up a lot since I was last there, and there are places like the Spaccanapoli which were formerly a bit threatening, have now basically become tourist thoroughfares.  It's not clear how many people stay in Naples for any length of time.  Judging by the BA passengers most of them went to Sorrento and did day trips in, escorted in groups by umbrella-brandishing guides who shwoosh them through Santa Chiara and out again.  The Duomo seemed to be the biggest draw, but the beautiful Baptistery was almost empty.

This picture has been doctored a bit, it was quite dim in there.  Each of these corner apses has a symbol of the Evangelists.   Remarkable how architecture and significant groups seem to fit.  Suppose there had been 5 evangelists?  How would that have worked?

I would love to go to Naples again, and see the things I missed, and find better places to eat, or at least have lower expectations this time!

Reading for the Holiday!

I seem to have read about one book for every day we are going to Naples, as a way of preparing myself and returning to  more Italian mindset...

A view of Vesuvias, across Naples

I read Norman Lewis's "Naples 44" which I enjoyed very much at first, until the sheer fuckwittedness of the military miindset and the British and US behaviour in connexion with the Neapolitans, began to depress me.   The description of the Vesusvius eruption was interesting, not one of the more drastic ones, mercifully.   Accounts of how people were starving unaccountably surprised me.  I don't know why.  Obviously they wouldn't have anything to eat.  It must have been a while before food supplies returned (they do during the course of the book).  I wish i knew more, about how people recovered after the war.   I don't suppose those much lauded Elsa Ferrante books tell you that, otherwise they might be worth reading (yes, I know, everyone's reading them, says they are brilliant etc).

Then I began to read "Gomorrah", the journalism on which the film was based.  It was depressing, and would probably make me think it wasn't worth going there, or even frightened to go there.  It's ludicrous, I haven't been to Italy for 8 years, in my 20s I went virtually every year.  I didn't realise I hadn't been to Naples since 1978!  It was a bit of a hustle, but we coped.  I am sure that it is now a bit less ground down and impoverished, and that I am more savvy, so there really shouldn't be a hustle.  And no one has ever tried to steal my handbag from a Vespa.

I bought a book called Joanna, Queen of Naples on the Internet.  It is excellent, but I haven't got very far with it.   The medieval history of Naples is tricky, a lot of discontinuity.  I believe it was part of the Holy Roman Empire for a while (possibly Frederick II hung out there?)  Then there were the Angevins, Charles of Anjou et al (how did they get hold of it?)   Then the Aragonese had it (they couldn't get hold of any more Spain - so they conquered it?  Or was it inherited in some way?).  Eventually it became a Bourbon kingom, the Kingdom of the 2 Sicilies, which is the era I am more familiar with.   Perhaps once I've read the Joannna book I'll be more au fait with the situation.

I also bought a short novel by Alexandre Dumas about Queen Joanna - which I have not yet started.

Then there was Route AD66 - an interesting book about tourism in the Roman Empire.  That was very interesting, but I decided to stop reading it after it left Athens.   The book retraces Tony Peroettet's tour around the favourite Roman tourist itinerary with his girlfriend and intersperses nuggets of information gleaned from classical writers.  A lot of this is familiar stuff, but quite enjoyable, not sure how reliable a lot of it is.   I was a bit mystified by the author, although he presents us with a lot of erudition, he says some remarkable things about the Roman's cotton tunics - the Romans had cotton, imported from India and China, but it was hardly an every day fabric, although I suppose those rich enough to take the Grand Tour could probably afford it.  He also described someone choking on polenta in a Greek inn - unlikely given that maize didn't arrive until the 16th C, there were a couple of other questionable references, which made me think that perhaps he was not exactly steeped in the Classical world, but had simply done a hack job on the source materials.   Still, it was amusing enough.

Tim Parks "Italian Rails" is not strictly about Naples, but it was an excellent way to remind me of the Italian mindset and the important words furbo (cunning) and pignolo (a jobs worth).  It wasn't as funny as some of his other books, but very recognisable.   His conversations on trains, and attempts to avoid them are very true to life.

The first book in this set that I read was Bepe Sevignini's "La Bella Figura" which was a very kindly view of Italians.  It explained them in a better way, and made me understand that perhaps they really were better, more Christian people than, say, Brits.,  It was a good way to read about them, from the inside, rather than the outsider view (however well established Parks is he still knows he's an outsider).

Oh, that's only 7 books, I expect I can count the Lonely Planet Guide, the Eyewitness Guide and other materials, to say nothing of all the websites.

Jeremy Corbyn - in the flesh! And in the garden!

Here is the East Cliff at Ramsgate, the area around the bandstand, opposite Wellington Crescent, where Jeremy Corbyn spoke on Saturday 3rd September.  I had long standing other commitments to cooking that day, but I had to leave the house to take N to A&E and decided to make a detour on the way back to see if I could see anything.  I was thrilled as I dawdled along Wellington Crescent, to see so many people there.  It made me feel rather emotional to think that so many local people had come to hear him.   He was actually speaking as I passed, so I heard a few positive sounding phrases.   I was sorry I hadn't been able to be part of the fun.  I was amused to hear later that UKIP had insisted that there were only 1000 and they had all been bussed in by trade unions.  Even the BBC had said that there were 3,000 people there.  No sign of the coaches could be found.   It contrasts famously with Nasty Nigel's "mass rally" at Cliftonville in 2015.  He spoke from the UKIP battle bus - Jez spoke from the back of a fire engine.   UKIP claimed 300 were present at NN's rally, but a careful count of the audience photo showed approx 79 people.     However, that's enough sectarian nonsense.

Later I was at the BBQ, an LP fundraiser, and someone said "Jeremy Corbyn's here!" and he was, in the kitchen.  So I retreated to the garden, and soon he came out to join us, and we and some others began a chat about gardens and allotments.  I can now reveal the following fab facts.
He has a 30 ft garden which is mostly paved because the soil is largely builders' rubble, however he grows vintes and olive trees, because they thrive on lime.  At his allotment he has grown a lot of beans and spinach which he freezes.  It is difficult to grow some things, because they need daily watering.  He has problems when he goes to the AGM because they always want to vote him onto the Allotment Committee.  Mark told him about our old allotment, and Jane H's niece commented that she goes running up there.  He told us that allotments couldn't be developed by councils if there was demand for them, so clearly we need to create demand to stop local ones disappearing.  Someone said Ramsgate houses had huge gardens, but I said that a lot didn't because they were built as holiday lodgings.  Someone else said that gardens were often full of buildings, and the conversation shifted and Jane H wisely nabbed him to talk to him seriously about mental health...

So, there we have Jeremy Corbyn, a nice beardie man, standing in a summer garden chatting about growing veg.  I didn't even dream of trying to talk politics with him.  Is he ready to lead the country?  Why not?  I swear we've had worse people.   Intellectually/socially he's probably roughly equivalent to David Cameron, able to mix affably with people and have normal conversations, although rather lacking in DC's PR skills.  I also noticed that in conversation he didn't try and draw other people out, this is fairly typical of men in general, so I won't hold it against him too much.    He does have courage and integrity and these are rather more important in a leader.,  I doubt whether Churchill was much of a one to draw out people in conversation either, it's not an essential skill, although I suspect it would help if one was trying to get to know one's Shadow Cabinet better.

The Book Group read #1

I have been in a Book Group for 12 years yet I don't think I have ever blogged about it.  There are about 4 of us who have been in it almost since the beginning (I was not there at the beginning).  We have lost members to bad eyesight, boredom with the books, boredom with one of the other members incessant chat, a refusal to read the books.  Occasionally people have turned up once and never come again, and we had a flounce out of a long-term member.

We have a policy of reading intelligent books that take us out of our comfort zone (actually, I am very seldom taken out of my comfort zone, but I usually enjoy the books).  We have a policy of having no easy books. We occasionally read non-fiction, but most of our choices on the whole are pretty safe and reliable.   If I find them challenging it's sure as dammit the rest of the group will hate them.   There are several former teachers in the group, a retired librarian, retired social worker, a former radiographer and my friend J who worked in the media.  I am the youngest by about 7 years I think. The oldest is 93.  We are all women (the founder and sole male, Barry) moved back to Lewes 11 years ago!

July/August 2016 Book

River of Smoke by Amitahv Ghosh

We read Sea of Poppies in 2010, but no one could remember it, except me, because I absolutely loved it and thought it was brilliant and wished to write something that clever but knew that I couldn't.   Recently the third book in the trilogy came out, and I suddenly realised we hadn't read the second one yet.

It is a long book and it is, like its predecessor written from several points of view.  The main character is an opium smuggler called Barry Mohdi - it is set chiefly in 1830s Canton and the main characters are Parsee, Muslim, English, French, Chinese etc.   Canton was clearly a fantastic place.  The story tells of the events surrounding a clampdown on Opium sales in China and the characters are becalmed in Canton, trying to sell their illicit cargoes.  There is also a search for an illusory form of paeony (or was it azalea?).  So many different strands, and the whole society is brought alive.   Characters such as Neel are carried over from the previous book, but I had forgotten about him until halfway through.

Modhi is a deeply sympathetic character, rather like Robert Maxwell.  The book is curiously relevant, because it echoes the present economic times, with merchants who are illiberally fixated on Free Trade at all costs, regardless of what this will do to the economy.  The British sold the Chinese opium, because they had no other commodities the Chinese wished to buy.  They did not wish to have a one-sided trade where they bought tea and silks and porcelain, and all their money went into China in return for perishable goods.   Just like the Roman Empire, and just like now.  The modern obsession with Free Trade in a globalised market place went echoing through the book.

My favourite aspect of the book were the camp and clever letters written by the young artist Chinnery to his friend "my fair Puggelina".  Ghosht manages to transform her nickname into every imaginable silly camp foreign title and never repeat himself once.  It was a delight, and it lightened the tone of what would have been some very depressing events that could have turned the whole book into a gloom-fest.  Clever!

The other glory of the book was the fact that one was getting "history lite" in the most stimulating possible way.  I understand far more about that period and the run up to the Opium Wars than I ever have before.  A five star read if ever there was one.

End of Month Accounts

I feel I am about to start a new term, with an almost clean slate.

Many of the matters that were hanging over me during July and August (apart from the book) have been cleared up.

Harry, while not deliriously happy, is a bit sorted, with a job, an income, regular trips to a probation officer, and will be paying rent from the end of the month. He should be seeing a bereavement counsellor in the future.

Ned is back for a break, sorted with a new house, trying to get a job, and shortly going to re-start working.
So he's sorted, ish - because still depressed and low and anxious about the degree.

Finn has a job, part time, for weeks.  He's also able to go back and do selected bits of his A-levels, which is a good thing.  Much relieved to find this out!  And I didn't have to bribe them with a massive donation to school funds.

And Mark still hasn't finished his first Cambridge report, but our financial problems have been massively relieved by an influx of funds from my Pa.   As a result we are going to Naples for a week or so next month.  I am still in limbo about the book, but I have "peace" about it, because chatting to Tara yesterday, I decided not to self-publish in October.  Somehow this has freed me up mentally to start writing again, or at least working on research for the new book.   A complex multi-stranded story of 3 women who are in conflict with the authorities of their day.  Yay!  Misogyny through the Ages!

The New Family member

Since late July we have had a new family member, my nephew Harry.  The reasons why he is living with us are dramatic, criminal and sensational (by my standards) and they are not really my story to tell.  However, he came here, or rather I collected him from a homeless hostel in Andover on 20th July (when there was a full Moon in his birth sign, Capricorn, which suggests something has finally crystallised).  Originally my idea was that he would be here for a fortnight and then we'd see what happened.  By 6th August, when my father came over, with Coells, I had been impressed by how sensible and organised (relatively) Harry was, and how he had immediately set to to sign on and look for jobs.

The anger and disgust I feel at my brother's behaviour is appalling.  I was telling a friend about how he'd behaved and the consequences, and she had tears of sympathy for Harry in her eyes.  Dear thing!    The funny thing is, I haven't had a lot to do with H over the years, I don't exactly get on with his mother, and he appeared at Christmas and sometimes in summer and I seldom talked to him.  But I do remember when he was a child thinking what a short straw he and his sister had drawn getting T as a father and saying to myself "well, all I can do, is be there if they need me."  I had forgotten this vow until a week or so after I'd rescued Harry (I know that seems a strong word, but it is what I did).

 There was something very intense about my response, when I heard that he was sleeping rough I immediately thought I ought to get him (I had already thought I would ask him to stay when I heard he was in prison).Anyway, I feel it was a sort of unconscious memory of the historic vow that impelled me to go immediately, and overcome my historic torpor.    I didn't have any real doubts about it, I needed to check with M and F of course, but they were both surprisingly positive about the idea.  I realised that some of my Christian ideas must have rubbed off on them  as thet both felt it was the right thing to do.  There was no resistence, only a slight anxiety about the disposition of the kitchen knives, but nothing more.  When I suggested he stay longer term, everyone including Ned seemed happy about that.   In a weird way, although it means I have even more blokes hanging around, it makes me feel more connected with the rest of my family.  

What I have not blogged about 2

Finn's A-levels
N's mental health
A trip to Norwich
Our drinks party and the loveliness of many friends
The Ramsgate Festival
My nephew H
My appalling brother's appallingness
The snails
The weather
What the hell am I going to do with my life if I stop writing?
The Littoral Lumations and why does Littoral have 2 t's when it comes from litus?  
Am I getting stupider and less able to concentrate
My gout???
Dull stuff about dietary habits  (be grateful).
What I have been reading  (not very much).
Finn's job prospects.

Labour Party splits...

Another failed FB post on the Thanet & Sandwich LP page....

The truth behind all this is that the party has moved so far to the right since even Jim Callaghan's time, that Corbyn's policies are less radical than the 1983 LibDem manifesto - and there are people in the party who like it that way. I dare say if it was policy to introduce the NHS now, the right of the party would be saying "Oh no, that will upset the insurance companies and the doctors will all leave the UK...." The fact that people are joining who are roughly on the same page politically as Nye Bevan is sending the right of the party into a flat spin - yet there was nothing unelectable about Bevan and Callaghan..I don't think I've met you Edward Lucas, but whenever I read one of your posts I feel quite angry. You've become the Simon Heffer of this page - the power to annoy without the power to actually do very much. I've always believed the LP was a broad church and that was the only way it would gain mass appeal, I don't believe in deselections and expulsions and suspensions except in extreme cases (subjective!)...but how on earth can we work together if people keep putting up destructive and futile posts?

A short rant about the PLP

This is something I posted on FB, which I rather liked.

Well, they started it. In the aftermath of Brexit what we REALLY, REALLY needed was a united party, a united response from Labour that could have shown people what we were about and how we were going to face the future, instead we get formation posturing from Mrs Hodge and half the Shadow Cabinet... It so was not the time to start this silly game. It WAS the time to let Jeremy shine - and if he couldn't shine then, well they might have given him enough rope to hang himself and he could have gone within the next year and fewer of us would have been so disgusted about it. But hey, why let strategy get in the way of your over-inflated ego and your parliamentary salary?

I do like a good rant.

AirBnB Horror

Most of our AirBnB guests are lovely and give us really nice reviews, so it is always an extra shock when someone isn't lovely.

This afternoon an elderly guy turned up.  He had booked quite a while ago, and when he appeared he seemed a little pedantic, a bit slow on the uptake and I didn't, on the whole, get a good vibe off him. He seemed disconcerted about the fact that the room was on the top floor even though it's in the description on the AirBnB website.  However, I'd got the room ready, ironed pillow cases, sewn back the lost buttons on the duvet cover, put out the tea and coffee things. M had cleaned the small upstairs bathroom. The guest, "Roy" had booked for 3 nights, so it was a good booking, and I was prepared to grit my teeth if we didn't get on. I asked him what had brought him to Ramsgate, he said he wanted to see the Turner, and had booked somewhere in Margate, but she'd cancelled the booking and then put the price up. I said it was easy to get to Margate on the bus and Ramsgate was much prettier.  He said he was going to have a rest.

About two hours later I went out to offer him the house key as he was walking down the stairs.  Strangely he was holding a roll of loo paper and the top of a Bonne Maman jam jar in his hand.  He said he had had a terrible allergic attack, he was allergic to dust.  I said I was sorry - it must be because of the work we're doing on the house. He said he'd only ever had such a bad attack once before.  Then  he held out the lid of the jar.  The jar sits on a tray in the room, full of ground coffee which is there for guests to make coffee in their cafetieres with.  The jar is not in the first flush of youth and some black spots were appearing beneath the lining on the inside... he waved it at me "it's not very nice is it!"   "It's just coffee" I said, thinking the black spots were bits of coffee.  He launched into the attack, "I'm very disappointed with it all/this is not what I expected"    "Look, it's extremely clear on the website," I said, firmly.  "it's work in progress.  It's a family home, not a posh B&B!" "Don't mention the word posh!" he spluttered.  "This allergic attack...." he raged. "Well, of course, in the hay fever season" I began sympathetically  "This is nothing to with hay fever, Madam!" he shouted. "I was only trying to say, a lot of my family have allergies and...."  "No Madam, no.  This is quite different! "  "You aren't the only person who suffers allergies" (My father and I both have dust allergies) "I have found somewhere else, and I'm going there."   "OK, that's fine" I said, relieved to get rid this contumacious git.   I went back into my room and shut the door and he stomped off somewhere.

I sat at the laptop, unable to work, just willing him to go.  Mark came in.  "What was all that about?"
I told him.
"He's going" I said "I can't face talking to him again, you can see him off the premises."  I briefly ran through the argument.  I felt quite shaken.  I just wanted him out of the house.  Mark came back 20 mins later and said "he's gone."  "Did he speak to you or say goodbye?" "No, he just left."

I felt relieved, and also rather frightened, in the last few hours I have this fear that he will somehow come back and want to fulfill his booking. I have to keep reminding myself he hasn't got a key.  I thought about his behaviour - he seemed to get so angry.  What was he expecting me to do about the top of the coffee jar? It was a complete non-problem.  His approach was entirely that he had a grievance against us and wanted us to be in the wrong.   For a man who has had a bad allergic attack, he seemed quite well.  When I have a bad allergic attack I have to lie down in a darkened room.  He looked quite normal - I had heard him sneeze a couple of times - but nothing like the 10 or 12 sneeze outbursts I commonly have.   Anyway, he was an astonishingly rude man.  I just hope he wasn't an "AirBnB secret shopper".

I am now worried that he is going to have a big stroppy review of us.  He will probably want a refund too - and so I hope we won't have to have some process with AirBnB.  I fear that he should seek help, the erratic and volatile behaviour combined with his apparent disorientation when he arrived made me wonder whether he was in the early stages of dementia. I am writing this account while it is still fresh in my mind - I was really upset by him, and am frankly delighted he has gone. 

Jeremy Corbyn: A Good Man, but a Bad King?

I've always loved the book 1066 and All That.   Sellars and Yeatman's categorisation of (chiefly medieval) kings into these categories  A Bad Man but a Good King (That must have been Edward I?)  etc always amused me and I've found it useful for political leaders.

When I supported Jeremy Corbyn and voted for him, I felt he was a Good Man and that we needed a change and I disliked all the other candidates.  However, during the Referendum campaign, I kept wondering where he was - he was almost invisible.  Apparently he was travelling the country meeting people and speaking, but apparently he never said anything worthy of quoting etc.   Of course,. this could all be due to the media failing to report anything interesting, and being obsessed with the Tory party's attempts to rend itself.  But I fear that our system, much as we dislike it, thrives on conflict and confrontation. Unless JC was spitting blood and thunder, he would not be covered.   This brings us back to the PMQ's issue.   JC's policy of reading out questions from the public for the PM to answer was interesting, but he seldom seemed to have the invective that made his responses in PMQs very memorable.     I had heard him speak last year and hoped that this quiet measured style would bring people over.  I think to some extent it has, an improvement in the Labour vote in the Local Authority elections in May, and quite good support from the Daily Mirror.  

However, I do not feel in any way inspired by him.  I did sweet FA about the referendum, but frankly, if he'd been loudly urging people to do this, I might have pulled my finger out.  I feel passionately about Europe, the economic side is important, but it's a much more visceral, cultural thing - about social values, open societies, civil societies made up of CITIZENS - this is our contribution to the world.  I wanted to hear that, and I wanted the Brexiteers to hear that most of the decisions they were complaining about, the austerity, the shortage of housing, poorer NHS services were not European decisions, but the Tory government's own, quite independent decisions, and I wanted to hear a strong message that immigration would not change because we have to have freedom of movement to trade with Europe.  SO!   Occasionally we heard this, but not strongly enough, not loudly enough.

There is much to blame the media for.  The papers have their agendas and loyalties, but the BBC has been pretty disgraceful - we are almost going back to the forelock tugging days of the 1950 "thank you very much minister for your gracious granting of an interview" - Brexiteers were given a luidicrously easy ride, their lies left unquestioned.   Most of the BBC staff must have been remain people, but either the journos weren't properly briefed, or else they felt that the arguments were too openly ludicrous to bother to engage with them. Or what?   I'm not a conspiracy theorist.  It is clear that there was insufficient coverage of the LP's campaign during the Referendum, because of the focus on the Tory leadership.

However, there is this article http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/jeremy-corbyn-allies-sabotaged-labour-in-campaign-and-fuelled-brexit_uk_576eb1b5e4b0d2571149bb1f which I've only just read.  Is it true?  Since I posted it, it has been removed, but it is suggesting that JC's office removed a lot of the more hearty remain rhetoric from speeches.  I have subsequently heard that none of them ever went to the weekly Remain campaign meetings with Alan Johnson et al.   Some of this stuff is coming out via Laura Kuensberg who is a notorious anti-Corbyn journo, so what do we believe?   If it's true, then it's appalling and frankly he loses my vote.  Membership of the EU is more important to me than his leadership.  I knew he wasn't stretching every sinew to keep us in, I knew he was ambiguous, but this is pretty unacceptable.  

This is where it's a definite disadvantage having all this "integrity" - keeping totally true to yourself is not possible in politics. You need to sway people's emotions, to work them over until they think they agree with you.  Reasoned argument isn't enough, balanced and nuanced arguement are a waste of time when something major, such as EU membership is at stake... If JC won't do it himself, he has to put up a big articulate beast (John McD - Tom Watson - someone...) to make the argument, to sway the country, to slog the message out.  And it would have been helpful if the LP had reminded its members that every vote counted,  We could not rely on the big cities voting for us.  But this is just the benefit of hindsight.

Now what?
There appears to be strong support for JC amongst the LP membership, no doubt there are a few waverers like me.  My vote will depend upon who's standing.  I dread the party falling back into the claws of the Blairites.  But I think JC will tough it out - despite the mass desertion of the shadow cabinet. And then win the popular vote of the members.   Another wave of people are joining - to protect him I suppose.  And I do believe that his tortoise like progress was beginning to make inroads in the popular mind.  If he sticks it out it can only enhance his reputation - although I suppose the Daily Mail will be busy blackening everyone's names.   If he's still leader in 3 months time, what will his approach be to the negotiations for brexit?    However, my gut feeling is, he will have to go.  It's unsustainable.  But a lot of people will leave the party.   And if that milksop Angela Eagle, who's an even less inspiring speaker than JC, wins, I will be horrified.

What I have not blogged about

There are a number of topics I considered blogging about in the last few days.  I haven't had the urge, so I will merely list them.

N's mental health ideas
A weekend in France
"Enhanced security" and its consequences
The banning of the Calais convoy
F's A levels
Father's Day
Terrine des escargots - and why I did not try it.
The Euro referendum, the exchange rate, Brexit etc.
Planet Narnia - by Michael Ward: Book of the Month
My teaching experience in the last 6 months
Writers' Block?
Who is eating our bed linen?
A Single Man - and the joys of grown up films
Marguerite vs Florence Foster Jenkins
The Warehouse and the Jungle
.

Facebook Posts

Almost everyday I find myself deleting an FB response because it will not endear me to the originator of the post. Sometimes these are quite long and thoughtful, and perhaps worth jotting down here.

In response to a post about a survey that discovered "shockingly" that 44% of people were "proud of the British Empire", which is clearly not something you are allowed to say in polite society, because you really need to be lacerating your breast and howling with shame, I posted this:


"I am neither proud nor ashamed, it was what it was, none of us were there to bring our 21stC liberal values into the frame. A few people black and white began to speak about the iniquities of it and gradually it faded away - that's history. So many people judge the past by contemporary values. And we tend to keep to the more recent past - I don't hear people getting all uptight about the feudal system in Europe, yet for centuries, millions of European peasants had to put in backbreaking toil for their feudal overlords in exchange for having a small patch of land on which to subsist...right up to the 19thC in some parts of Europe."

Some notes on a trauma

These are notes I made on the evening of Ned's accident in September 2015.

The worst bit, of so many worst bits, was seeing N with his nose hanging off - hunkered down and very still, not daring to move, bloody lumps of flesh hanging off his face like dark red clots.  And a pool of blood on the floor, endless dripping of blood, trying to get him to sit back.  

Incessant questions from the 999 handler:  "How much blood?"  "Still dripping?"  "Get a pad and hold it in position."   I knew I couldn't do that - I called Katie and Ruth - they came at once and were so good.

At the same time I was trying to sort out our AirBnB guest on the computer.  The paramedics came at last, and took him into the ambulance.  I came too.  They were working on him for hours.  When were we going to leave?  It took 30 minutes to strap him up - put in the cannula.  This was where Ned, who had been ultra calm, became panicky.  He calmed down once the morphine hit him.  Then he became more excitable, wanting to talk.  Mark tapping at the door, standing outside in the rain with an umbrella, wanting to know what was happening.  We are leaving for Ashford. I hadn't thought of this, I had assumed our local hospital.  Will I have to stay the night?  I need my Kindle, paper and pens.

I must be in shock too.  It's claustrophobic in the ambulance, it's like a mobile clinic, drawers, bins, intravenous drips, hooks etc.

It's a long journey - at last we reach the hospital, straight into a group of staff standing by.

Everyone is lovely, the two paramedics, both women, one northern, one southern, and Katie and everyone remarking how calm N is.  No shrieking - they are grateful.

Doctor's questions, nurse sorts N out, He's Turkish.  We also see a max-fax registrar, an older anaesthetist and a younger woman anaesthetist.

It's hard for N to talk - I answer questions.  He goes for a CT scan - his tooth apparently stuck in his lip.  He may have swallowed one, and needs a chest X-ray. They will keep him in over night in the head injury ward and operate in the morning, we hope.  Nil by mouth from 2 am, not that Ned fancies trying to eat or drink.
The nice max-fax doctor wipes his eyes clean, it's just closed with blood.  He can see, his eyes seem OK, thank God.    It's a strange thing that N has had three of these head injuries in his life, all of which have been pretty spectacular, but not serious in any long term way, simply resulting in scars or breakage.   More sound and fury than anything seriously wrong - a bit like N himself at times.

While Ned dozes I sit and listen to the people around me.  A doctor in the next cubicle is asking an old man about his wife.

"Does she smoke?"
"No she used to sing with a band and smoke a bit - but when I met her I said "it's cigarettes or me" and she chose me."
Later he tells the doctor that she's never been to hospital before.  She got Parkinson's but now it looks as though her kidneys have packed up.
"She's not in a good way" a woman says "We have to take more bloods".
She's clearly in pain, a lot of grunts and groans, heavy breathing, the curtain shaking violently.
She probably dying I suspect, but not in a good way.
Her husband jokes gamely with the nurses.  Someone probably told him to keep a smile in his voice when he was young.

Ned looks gruesome - head bandages padded over his mouth.  We haven't washed his hands.  I offered to but he said "No thanks".  They are covered with blood from where he held a succession of kitchen towels and sacrificial tea towels to his nose.  I guess we'll get rid of those now.

The lady next to us is going on a drip  "and we'll take it from there".  It's a sodium bicarb infusion.  It doesn't sound good.
"Let's hope she starts to improve."
"If she doesn't well, there's nothing we can do."
"Thank you very much" says a modest sounding female voice.
The doctor is breaking the death sentence down into manageable chunks.  She is thanking him.  It's nearly midnight.  Does she understand what he is saying?   Or is she just keeping it all under control?
The doctor is suggesting alternative treatment to the nurse.  Hypos? It all sounds grim, but they are still gamely trying to save her.

It's obviously sudden and shocking for her family - they were coping with the Parkinson's, but this sudden collapse is too much.  Suddenly, unable to wee, dehydrated, a build up of salts, perhaps an undiagnosed ulcer.  When I hear that I wonder if it's stomach cancer.

In the other cubicle a young thug of a child called Olly is resisting treatment with shouts and screams and considerable indignation.  I have the impression that he's hitting people.

I am ravenous, I haven't eaten for 10 hours.  One wants to be with the sufferer, but one has one's own adrenalin to cope with.  M will be here soon I suppose.  Its more than 90 minutes since I rang him.

"Let me breathe!" Gasps, whimpers.
A period of harsh breaths.  Is it the death rattle?   No, she recovers again, back to gasps.  A mask is put on, calming her.  Laboured breath, in grunts, laboured like a woman in labour.   The work of dying, the work of giving life.

Olly's cutting up rough again, screaming and kicking.
"No!"
I think they are trying to take blood or put a cannula in.  Or give an injection?
Whatever happened to tranquilliser darts?
The child is now shouting
"I want it in my other one!"
What?  Hand - arm - leg?
His shouts are making N agitated.

Then it's quiet for a while.  The woman's family have gone for a break.  There's bleeping from her cubicle.  The curtains are open and I see a tiny old woman curled up in bed,.Is she calmer because she doesn't have an audience, or have some drugs kicked in?
It's quiet - still no sign of M.  

The three stories of the evening could provide an episode of Casualty, suitably sexed up..

Brussels

Last Tuesday Finn set off for Brussels with a group of 6th Formers from his school.   They left very early in the morning, and I got a bit upset when I heard on the 3 pm news that there'd been a "shooting incident" in Brussels - so I went onto Facebook (the fourth emergency service) to find out what anyone knew.  The answer, of course, was that they were all fine and quite a way away from the shooting.  Finn reported that he didn't find out about it until after dinner and that the city was full of heavily armed men, military rather than police.

This morning, exactly one week later, we woke to the news of the multiple bombs on the metro and at the airport.  People are going to say all over again "Why don't we make this fuss about Burkina Faso or Ankara?" and I'm going to say again, because we haven't been there, we may only know one person, if any, who has been there; because Brussels is local - I could drive there in a couple of hours once I crossed the Channel... it's easier to get to than Birmingham (although I've never been of course - to Brussels).  And of course all the Brexit types are going to say "YOU SEE!  This is all because of immigration".   I am disgusted, saddened and, although it's frivolous to say it, bored, with all this.  Round and round it goes, there are a few initiatives that make things better, but over all 'they' do this shit to divide 'us' and make us argue with each other - and we fall for it. They do it for other reasons of course, but you would have to be a bit blinkered to think that religious faith, rather than political expedience was the real mover.  It is difficult to discern because Islam is a much more potentially theocratic religion than Christianity - we rather gave up on that idea by the 17thC (and earlier in a lot of places). ISIS are of course proclaiming their caliphate and the glory of sharia law, while we have to settle for dreary old man made law and precedent and living in a society where you get to vote on the government occasionally, but at least the Pope or Justin Welby doesn't make undemocratic pronouncements of what we can and can't do which have the force of law, and we no longer have to almost worship our royal families as though they were God's spokespeople.

Meanwhile...
The new IDS substitute turns out to be another right wing Christian who thinks homosexuality can be cured.  I just wish Toryism could be cured and they could all settle down and become collectively minded lefties.  He's called Stephen Crabb - I wonder if he's descended from Lionel "Buster" Crabb - the notorious spy frogman...who disappeared.  Probably not, L Crabb was gay I suspect - married late, divorced after 2 years, no kids and clearly more at ease in male company (yes, I know, only circumstantial evidence, but good enough for me at this time of night).

katehamlyn.com

I have finally created a website for myself, chiefly to promote my literary efforts, which are more fully discussed in the other blog "Only writing"  katehamlyn.blogspot.co.uk.

I bought a domain name in late December, having been told by a number of people that I must get myself out there a bit more.  I also bought a very cheap bit of software called Website Builder that only cost about £3 or something.   I then looked at it and despaired.  Eventually, I called my friend Ruth, who designs websites for a living, to come and help me.  It was actually pretty straightforward, this is because it is limited in what it can do for you.  However, it doesn't look too bad and after Ruth and I had put it through its paces I spent parts of yesterday afternoon and this morning writing and straightening it up.  Remarkably I had plenty of pics to put on it, although Finn complained that the one of me was poor quality and cropped oddly.  However, there aren't many really nice pix of me (yes, I have residual vanity).

It was very exciting though to find that, having started the website on Friday that I had something simple and workwomanlike available to view on Sunday, and although there is a bit of a template, it's very flexible and effectively I designed it myself!   So, I am now competent to knock up websites for anyone, any time any where... as long as they are based on that simple model.

katehamlyn.com

Birthday

Today is my birthday and I have received an enormous amount of greetings from people, thanks to the glories of Facebook.  I have also had a reasonable number of Birthday cards and virtually no presents (except from Anna T and a couple from Mark - which are tokens because all I wanted was spending money for the Spanish trip).  M made a cake, and Finn made sure he did.,  We had fish and chips and half a bottle of fizz (I didn't like it for some reason, it was Freixenet Rosado, and it seemed a bit metallic, although I thought it was lovely at Christmas).

I had my first sweet food since I began the anti-inflammatory diet, and this evening I have had my first bout of cramp (in my thigh, and the front of my shin) for a month or so.  I cannot help feeling there could be a connection.  I feel very good, since I am now a stone less than I was at the beginning of January.   So on the whole, despite a few deficiencies, this has been a good birthday.

What made it good really was the fact that I have been terribly happy since Monday/Tuesday, when "my editor" in Ireland told me how much she loved The Malice of Fairies and that she would strongly recommend it to her publishing house.  So I have been working with her all week and she has been tremendously helpful, especially with Irish terminology...it's incredibly exciting to have someone who loves your work, and this has sustained me in happiness all week.  Also I managed to finish the re-writes today, and send them off to her, so I am kind of off the hook now, until I go to Spain (I think).

Relate

We've been going to Relate, which, for non-Brits, is a service devoted to helping people with relationship problems.  Arguably we should have gone to it in about 2008, but it took a while to get around to it.  I tried in 2010 - but it went horribly wrong - and then we kept passing each other the contact details but neither of us did anything about it.   Then in December himself took the plunge, just in time for the New Year's Eve row...

So in early Jan we turned up at the Canterbury office.  It was exactly as my friend said, a waiting room with a gas fire in a nice old building.  In the consultation room I found myself wondering what had happened to the broken mouldings.  Our first appointment was a general "what do you want to get out of this?" session.  About 40 minutes in the counsellor suggested "So you really want to discuss ways of parting amicably?"
I wondered whether this was a "trick" question, to elicit a response.  3-5 years ago I might have said "Yes" but I'm more cautious now, and I like my house.  The truth is, we want to find out whether we do want to separate or not, because I don't know any more.  M was quite excited by the prospect a while back but he's calmed down a bit now.   There is a nagging feeling - did she ask that question to get that response?  Or was it what she had really concluded from our responses?   It reminded me of when James and I went to Westminster Pastoral Counselling and got the "We think your marriage is over" answer from the gang there.  I think this woman thought the same, but unless someone I love comes along and commands my love and affection, I am likely to remain in this situation until some people come to remove me in a box.  M is casting about, and if he gets this job in Portsmouth perhaps we'll get the trial separation. The experience of going to Relate is not an unpleasant process, because to a great extent we already know all this stuff about each other, although I occasionally find myself digging up horrifying examples of bad behaviour that I have buried and forgotten and forgiven and feeling surprisingly upset by them..

Tonight, to celebrate a new job, we went to our local Italian. We hadn't been for ages, but the waiter was immensely apologetic because there was no lamb "I am so sorry, and last time you were here I made a mistake..."  I assured him that I couldn't remember the mistake, only the good experiences (the limoncello, the flavoured butter, the nice food).  I felt remarkably cheerful (Citalopram and the anti-inflammatory diet!) and we had a second bottle of wine.  I walked there and back, which is extraordinary, I never used to do that even in my healthy days!  I must be getting better.  We decided not to go to the pub afterwards, as we had had our bout of sociability (our lovely Spanish teacher turned up along with Ned's old boss J - a married man, scandaloso!) and feared that A might be there (although we believe him to be in the Far East). That's the trouble with small towns, but also the delight.

Good bye to all that

I've been thinking about decluttering, because we have far too much stuff, and some of it I am very attached to but there are also items that are endlessly being moved from place to place.  Two ideas have come together: I heard someone say that one should get rid of one item a day. Years ago when we wanted to get rid of the kids' toys someone suggested we photograph them before getting rid of them, so the boys could always have the memory years after they had grown out of the toys.   So, I am thinking of trying at 365 day blog on the topic.   This is a test post, I needed to see how easy it is to use my tablet to photograph things and upload them here. It is extremely easy. So here is today's object. My old shoes:

  These shoes were bought in 2009, early in the year.  I was wearing them in April that year when I went to a rather fateful private view in Oxford.  They are Clarks shoes and were really comfortable for the first few years.    I stopped wearing them in winter 2014/5 by which time they had been mended about 3 times, and the upper was tearing away from the base of the shoe, again, and the cobbler refused to do them again.  I wore them all the time.  They weren't in the least lovely.  For a while I kept them near the back door for use in the garden, but they were too far gone - my feet got wet, the unlovely rubber clogs were more practical. 

I don't know if this picture does them justice - the backs weren't crushed like that - I was using them to slop about it indoors before I finally decided that my slippers were better.    A couple of weeks ago I bought some new winter shoes.  They are less lovely to look at than these, being lace up Hotters with thick soles and a slight hint of "surgical boot" about them.  

The only decision is whether to give the items their own blog, or to keep them here.  I think it's own blog might be more fun.  Yes - this is the address for the other blog   http://schmoozydeclutter.blogspot.co.uk/ but the first post is basically this, only written slightly more elegantly. 

Corbyn, McDonnell and lefty claptrapping...

I don't know what you call that automatic applause that occurs at socialist meetings whenever certain trigger words (currently "NHS", "Junior Doctors" and "refugees") are mentioned, but it's bloody annoying.   In the last six months I've heard Corbyn speak (in August) at the Winter Gardens, and this week, the Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, at the King's Theatre in Ramsgate and I've heard a hell of a lot of this. For some reason I think it's clap trap - but it can't be can it?  Perhaps claptrap is what the politician says to provoke applause and I noticed McD commented on something at the beginning of his speech, saying he hadn't said it to promote applause.

There was an awful lot of "spontaneous" applause on Tuesday night.  Not just for McD - but for every word that issued from the mouth of another speaker, and a tremendous deal of it for the striking junior doctors present. Yes, we want to show our appreciation, and Raushan, our local socialist restaurateur definitely deserved it for her work and her kindness but actually a lot of the claptrap is counter-productive since it slows the flow of the speech and the ideas.  And a great deal of what is being said to provoke it isn't especially new or interesting - usually a re-statement of long-held positions.

Both Corbyn and McDonnell said one, different, interesting thing which I wanted to applaud.   At the Corbyn thing I applauded and people followed (it was an attack on the supremacy of the market - seldom mentioned) and McDonnell said the new mantra for the LP should be "invest, invest, invest!"   This received zero applause.  Was it because it was a new idea and people weren't sure about it?  Is it because a lot of socialists actually are economically illiterate?  Or frightened of investment because it has capitalist overtones?  I don't know, but I found it disconcerting.   It was an enjoyable speech and quite funny, when he dealt with personal anecdotes, but I was much more interested in HOW Labour would implement policies, which McD was trying to explain.  I was glad to hear about all the advice they were taking, they sounded as if they were getting it sorted and using a diverse number of people,  many sensible former civil servants etc. as well as everyone's favourite comedy game theorist, Yannis Varoufakis.   As a former fan of Mr V. I was thrilled to hear that, nevertheless, I feel applying too much game theory to negotiations has not been a success for the Greeks, so God forbid a future Labour government should make too much use of him.

The healing power of blogging

The following day, after I posted the health moans, I woke up and I was not stiff and aching all over.  I swung my legs out of bed easily and stood up without hurting myself.  This was quite wonderful.   I walked to the bathroom and coped with the steps... and I felt so energised I got up and cooked bacon and eggs and black pudding and anything else I could find (a manky tomato and some shiitake mushrooms, mashed potatoes).

I have continued to feel better, today I went to the Library and back without aggro, and walked down the stairs there.  It's almost normal.  There's a sore pad on my right foot and my left knee (the one I suspect of being "the problem")  was painful but that could have been a result of walking awkwardly for the last few days.   I doubt whether I am ready to start springing about leafletting and canvassing - but at least I am well enough to walk to from the car park to Relate tomorrow (oh, the joy!).

Yes, there's still the gynaecological mystery, but the decline in aching and stiffness is very welcome.  Could it be the anti-inflammatory diet working already?  Can it be sugar and gluten?  I've lost a couple of pounds, but nothing exciting, and my left knee really does hurt...so maybe the knee is an issue of its own.  I managed to damage both my knees in separate teenage accidents, so they always give me intermittent gip anyway.

Perhaps it was blogging about my imminent death that challenged the fates!  Or the "darkest hour is before dawn" being true.  Or Mark's desperate prayers ("Lord, let her get up and do some housework!")

Health Moans

So, as usual, one begins the New Year with a diet and a vow to exercise, a walk to the pool at least.  And then I bought some new, sensible, comfortable shoes and began to walk around in them and they seemed fine.  Then last Saturday, while we were at the cinema, seeing Carol (glorious cinematography, high production values and otherwise a tad vapid), my right foot began to hurt, in a place where it has hurt before, beneath the toes in the ball of my foot.  It's tender and sore and it doesn't tolerate having weight put on it.

On Sunday I wasn't able to walk on it - going to the loo was painful.  I stayed upstairs until Tuesday when I managed to limp downstairs.  By this time the pain was shifting around my foot to different places.  I went to the doctor.  I told her that I hoped it was reactive arthritis, because I also had conjunctivitis.  She said she didn't think it was, but wanted more blood tests as my inflammation
indicator was high.  The following day I had the dreaded blood tests, dreaded because I have weedy, skinny little veins which hide deep in my body, and have to be coaxed to give blood.   I took the precaution of drinking extra water (one phlebotomist told me this helped, another told me it was rubbish: on Wednesday it helped).

I was beginning to feel better, the pain had obligingly shifted to the top of my foot so it was easier to walk, although agony if my foot made contact with any thing like a chair leg or a table...I even walked back from the Library (5 minutes - uphill - an achievement).    On Thursday things seemed set to get back to normal, the pain kept shifting, and I was still limping.  On Friday during a memorial service I found that standing for all four verses of "How Great thou Art" was pretty unbearable... and my back was being difficult too.  Then I went to have a scan at the local hospital.  One of those lovely ones - internal and external, full bladder and empty bladder... the radiologist (or whatever you call them) said my endometrium had thickened, again.  He thought there was "something there".  Well, all my fond hopes that my foot was improving, and that the scan would put an end to my series of health appointments, were dashed, he said he would be recommending further scans and another coloscopy - and reminded me about the "granulation" they found last time, three years ago now?

I found today I was thinking, would I be delighted if I made it to 72?  Would I rather have endless muscle/nerve pain or take the muscle relaxants and painkillers which have been implicated in Alzheimer's and Stroke?   It doesn't matter so much really if I die now.  I doubt whether my books have anything great in the way of insights to share with the world.  It would be sad not to be there to support Finn and Ned and spend time with my grandchildren, but it would at least end my money worries.   And yes, I am being a drama queen, I don't think I'm going to die this year, or even within the next 5 years.  But it's the possibility hanging over one that is upsetting, and the pain I am feeling, which has gone up a level today, with new pain in my left ankle, making walking difficult again, that is reducing me to a state of self-pity and anxiety about the future.

What is to be done?
On Wednesday I began to do a bit of research about diet, anti-inflammatory diet seems basically to be a sort of Atkins, no gluten or sugar - lots of everything I like.  Might have to start making my own mayo though.  Of course there are dozens of diets online and mostly US websites, and all have subtly different lists of foods you should eat (mostly herbs and spices I'm happy to say).  The one I like is called Dr. Mercola, a rather handsome bald Italian-American, I was on the website for over half an hour and they never tried to sell me anything.  There is loads of information, and he's quite a health/food socialist in his way.  There are lots of articles (I liked one on Rockefeller and how he made oil so dominant in the US, even infiltrating it into the Food business...(well, not Rockefeller personally - but he seems to have been at the beginning). So, I'm taking advice and seeing how it goes.  M is cynical as usual, he prefers his own untested theories  (the swelling is caused by some sort of blockage in my circulation?).  I am going back to the doctor on Friday, but I am distressed because of the pain and a feeling that I am not better.

I talked to my friend P - who fears if may be fibromyalgia - is that what the mysterious invalid great aunt had?  I just can't quite accept that.   I was so happy on Weds/Thurs when it seemed to be getting better, I felt full of pzzazz... not I am down again.  I have been complaining about brain fog for ages, but during the last week, I don't seem to have suffered it that much, so I'm hoping it isn't FM... the GP I saw (Bonnet) said she thought it might be a nerve thing... oh heck, surely too late to get MS.