News from Nowhere

Sunday was (would have been) Frances's birthday; ten days ago was her funeral. Her (three, adult) children had found a note, handwritten in pencil, listing a number of small bequests, and saying that she wanted a full requiem mass followed by a celebratory wake: so that's what we did.

It was a good funeral: it met that essential test, that the celebrant had known the deceased, so that Frances's personality shone through the entire ceremony, the parts conducted by the church which had been such an important part of her life, as well as the contributions of her friends and family. Good, too, in that so many of those friends and family managed to be there.

I don't think I'd ever been to a Catholic funeral before, and was ready for all sorts of unfamiliar ritual. In fact, there was much that was very familiar: a niece read the 23rd Psalm, rather unsteadily; a graddaughter read from Proverbs:

Who can find a woman of noble character?
She is worth far more than jewels...

Not the translation I know, which my father was fond of quoting, the price of a good woman is above rubies... (my mother's name, which she rarely used, was Ruby), but the change from the familiar words making it easier to hear this portrait of an entirely domestic paragon, and see it as at least a partial portrait of our friend.

But I wasn't ready to find myself not recognising the hymns. I learned afterwards that they had been chosen from those Frances's children had sung at school: does that explain why two of them were entirely Marian? Yes, I know this is a thing, but I've never met it in action before. The one which provided the title of this post has the refrain:

O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May,
O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May.

This is something I wouldn't have been surprised to encounter among the Victorian parlour ballads which make their way into folk clubs. Contrariwise, I was surprised that the final hymn of the service was one - at last - one I knew: Sydney Carter's Lord of the Dance. I shouldn't have been: I think of Carter as a writer of (often political) folk songs, The Crow on the Cradle and Sing John Ball, but his Guardian obituary opens with the popularity of his songs with school assemblies. Afterwards I asked the left-winger of the family whether this was his choice, but he was completely unaware of this connection: Lord of the Dance had been his mother's choice. Another sign of a good funeral, that you learn something new about the deceased.

Later at the wake I learned something else. There was all the pleasure of a reunion of old friends, who had known Frances since our university days when several of us baby-sat for her. The introduction was made by someone who came from the same village as Frances's mother-in-law, and I assumed they had met there, but no: she explained that she had run into her neighbour in Marks & Spencer's in Durham, and had both exclaimed in surprise "What are you doing here?" The same day, Frances had phoned to invite her to dinner. Well, of course she did.

As if the equinox was a signal, we took not one but two days out, including the first visit of the year to the coast. I though of this at the time as emerging from hibernation, but that would suggest it was the start of something: in fact, I've spent much of the week-and-a-half since then hitting deadlines which had unexpectedly come closer as a result of those two days off. Nonetheless, there are signs that spring is stirring. Starting with those two days off:

• On the Friday we accepted J's invitation to lunch and an exhibition about the history of food and drink on South Tyneside: this was to be durham_rambler's birthday treat (deferred). Both J and durham_rambler had morning commitments, but we set off at midday, driving away from the city, where the sun was shining, to the sea fret of the coast. At durham_rambler's request, we lunched at the Marsden Grotto, and gazed out at the grey sky over the grey sea while we ate fishy things. Then on to the South Shields museum, one of those magnificently random local collections:
  
  
  
  
  
  Here's a selection of their "treasures"; the only information offered beside it is a sign saying "Rory, the South Shields Lion (suggested by Lucas Ball, aged 7)". The exhibition - titled 'SCRAN' - looks very much as if it had been compiled by going through the collection picking out whatever might be fitted onto the theme: a cabinet of Roman pottery, watercolour paintings of local farms, the inevitable collection of Be-Ro cookbooks, oil paintings of local shops, histories of local businesses, pre-eminently Wright's biscuits, whose 'Little Mischief' mascot (a painting by Mabel Lucie Attwell to which they had purchased the rights) is the face of the exhibition. I liked - less for the exhibit itself than for the accompanying label:
  

  Paper bag, mid 20th century, from Duncans grocery: This paper bag is a rare survival, having been used to store wedding cake decorations kept by Elsie Mary Bell (nee Law) who wed John Robertson Law at St Aidan's Church, South Shields on 16 September 1940. Mary's beautiful wedding dress can be seen on display downstairs in the museum's 'Treasures Gallery'.

  
  
  At the last minute we were tipped off (by another J, as it happens) about an 'archaeology day' organised by the County's Archaeology department: a day of talks in Bishop Auckland Town Hall. Not particularly spring-like - we were indoors all day, and anyway it was raining - but worth the early start: a fine and varied collection of talks (a farmhouse which conceals a Gothick manor house associated with the poet Thomas Gray, mapping the Roman road network, a previously unknown neolithic / bronze age ceremonial site near the Tees, pretty things brought to the Portable Antiquities scheme during the year) and a chance to catch up with J.



• There are windows open all over the house. I wish this were a celebration of fine spring weather, but no, it's a sign that the painters have arrived to work on the new windows. The weather is fine enough (the work wouldn't be possible otherwise) but it's still chilly and the house smells of paint.



• This means more early mornings - or at any rate, earlier than our usual, up and dressed before the painters are due at eight. Monday morning was a bit of a struggle, no chance of gradual adjustment to Summer Time, but we made it. They - or we - have tomorrow and Friday off, and then they come back on Monday to finish the job. I'm looking forward to seeing how the new windows look once the scaffolding is removed...



• We have local elections this year, for the County and Parish Councils. durham_rambler is standing again for the Parish Council, as an Independent. I don't really understand why, because he has, since losing his seat four years ago, continued to attend committee meetings and contribute the the Council's work on planning; and there was no obligation to attend full council meetings, or do anything he didn't feel like. Ah, well, no doubt he has his reasons. So the last few days have been all about submitting his nomination papers and drafting a leaflet, and the month between now and polling day (which is May Day) will be all about delivering those leaflets, with the help of his little band of volunteers. "Does this mean we won't be taking any time out over Easter?" I asked. "Well, we have a lunch date for your birthday..."



• To begin at the beginning: / It is spring... I have been re-rereading Under Milk Wood - which is a story for another post. But my, isn't it full of spring!

I do habitually read the obituary pages of The Guardian. I don't think this is morbid: you meet so many interesting people there, and although it is sad to learn that they have died, it is often a joy to learn that they have lived. Random example: Richard Gibson, the architect who persuaded Shetland that the traditional harling not only resulted in drab grey houses, it was also harming the beaches from which its raw materials were extracted, and so introduced brightly painted timber cladding instead (timber! in Shetland!).

But every now and then I stumble across someone who touches me more personally. ( Ruth Wyner )

( Tom Madden )

That's all I've got, really. Obituaries: sometimes they make you sad, sometimes they cheer you up, sometimes they lead you a merry dance through memories and things you have forgotten.

Sunday began with fireworks, but fizzled out into a damp squib. Oh, but with a cherry on the top!

( Fireworks before breakfast )

( Tax anticlimax )

In the evening we tuned in to a LiveToYourLivingRoom event with Sandra Kerr and family talking about Bagpuss: for which I may have been somewhat spoiled when I saw it in Hartlepool. Still fun, if not quite as magical.

I spent yesterday afternoon at the Eye Infirmary in Sunderland: this was by appointment with my opthalmologist, and did not go as expected.

The good news: I have glaucoma, which is managed by the regular administration of eye drops. At my last visit to the clinic, the opthalmologist noted that the pressure in the left eye was high, and suggested that this could be improved by laser treatment. I wasn't looking forward to this, but I have enough confidence in him to say yes. But yeThis could men anything. sterday, when we had gone through all the usual preliminary eye-tests, he said actually, the pressure had gone down of its own accord...

The less good news: ... but had I noticed my eyesight getting worse? Well, of course I have. I think I said so, last time I was at the clinic, and that I was coming round to the idea of the cataract operation (this would be my second) he had been offering. Whether because of this, or just because we were conveniently at the Eye Infirmary, he sent me down to the photographic department for some scans, on the basis of which - well, on the basis of which he asked for a further scan, and he wants to discuss it with colleagues.

This could mean anything. Maybe my eye is getting worse, and there's nothing to be done about it (which is bad news). Maybe it's getting worse, and there is something that can be done (which I won't enjoy, but is probably less bad news in the long run). All this seems to be about my left eye, which I don't see much through anyway; it has always been very short-sighted.

Anyway, any unpleasantness which might have happened yesterday has been deferred, and I am enough of a wimp that I'll settle for that.

Where to start? Hartlepool's as good a place as any.



For some time now we have been plotting an autumn getaway, nothing ambitious but with a definite intention to leave the country: which meant that we were waiting until durham_rambler had a final meeting with his cardiac specialist, at which point he could tell the insurance people he wasn't awaiting any appointments, and things would get cheaper. And then we would book the ferry to Belgium... Instead of which, the specialist confirmed what we had been told, that everyone is very pleased with durham_rambler's progress, but they are curious about what caused the problem and would like to do an MRI scan. And the insurance people didn't simply raise the price, they declined to cover us.

After a bit of cursing, we came up with Plan B, to holiday in the UK. Our first thought was to head for Scotland again, and we had some specific ideas that had distinct possibilities. But then I remembered a conversation that GirlBear and I had had, a year or so ago, and suggested a visit to Essex instead. There are reasons why this strikes me as a really good idea, and reasons why I find it quite absurd, and perhaps some of them will become apparent as our ten-day break unrolls. But for the moment, here we are in Harwich.

We had protected those ten free days in the calendar, without making any plans or bookings: now they were almost upon us, and we had to organise a holiday in between work and laundry and two separate visits to the GP for three separate vaccinations (each) and did I mention the Hartlepool Folk Festival? If the picture above is a bit confused, it's because it was taken at a moment when there was a lot going on: I was sitting in a deckchair, enjoying the (October! in Hartlepool!) sunshine, eating chips and listening to the Wilsons, while the giant fish and crow and skeleton puppets chased each other back and forth... Another highlight was more sedate, Sunday morning with Alistair Anderson in the Fishermen's Arms. These are old friends, of course, and it would be nice to have stumbled over something new and thrilling, but it's a lot to ask, and there was plenty of interesting stuff without it.

We gave ourselves Monday and Tuesday to pack, and needed both: even so we weren't away before midday yesterday. We stayed the night with D. and valydiarosada in Ely, always a pleasure, and today we visited Sutton Hoo. About which I will say only that a picture is worth a thousand words:



Then we crossed the Stour into Essex, and here we are at the Pier Hotel in Harwich. And there's a shanty festival about to start happening. We had no idea, though it does explain why we weren't able to book as many nights here as we wanted. Perhaps tomorrow we'll find some shanties.

durham_rambler has just heased out to his appointment, with a package to post: a birthday present for K. whom we visited in Ludlow. Even with first-class postage, it will probably arrive late. There is no justification for this: I bought it in good time. In fact, both gidt and card were purchased at the Piece Hall in Halifax, on our way home from that visit. Why am I so bad at wrapping and sendong gifts? Oh, I'm no genius at finding them, either, but on occasions like this one, when I had found something which was the perfect combination of appropriate and silly, why do I delay over getting it into the post? It was, admittedly, breakable (but not actually fragile), and I would have liked to find a box of the perfect size in my stash of might-be-useful-one-day boxes... And then I couldn't find the Sellotape...

Well, it's done. A box has been confected from cardboard and lined with bubble wrap, and the whole has been smothered in sticky tape. My stepmother used to complain that my father and I shared a packing technique which relied on lashings of sellotape, which was effective but inelegant, and a challenge to open. I just hope it will succeed, and that K. will like her present.

The card was this one, by Kate Lycett, whose work I saw in one of the little galleries in the Piece Hall, and would like to see more of. In contrast. here's Hebden Bridge A to Z in wood engravings.

There are people who schedule their holidays to allow themselves a day or so to prepare beforehand, and to recover afterwards: I am not one of those people. I plan the longest holiday we can fit in, which is why our departure is often rather breathless. On this occasion, our return has been busy too, and not because we intended it that way: we didn't actually go to the pub quiz on the evening of our return home...

It's an easy drive home from Kirkcudbright. We had planned a supermarket shop at Waitrose in Hexham, but as we were driving through Brampton we noticed it was market day:



so we stopped there instead. I bought vegetables (including English asparagus) and bread (a black wheat loaf from Warwick Bridge Corn Mill - and some of the flour, too!) from the market, and random supplies from the very grand farm shop on the corner of the square, and decided that would tide us over until I could place an Ocado order. So we came straight home...

First thing the following morning, durham_rambler had a hospital appointment for a scan. I'm very glad that his progress is being monitored, so although this timing wasn't ideal (and couldn't be changed without substantial delay) I am not complaining. And once it was over, we had a coffee date with - how shall I put this? Old friends? Someone we used to know and her no-longer-new-husband who we hadn't previously met? People who had remained on our Chrismas card list despite our not having met for oh, twenty or thirty years? Any combination of the above? Anyway, that had got in touch to say they were taking a short break in the area, and could we meet, and we had arranged to meet at our favourite farm shop on their way home. I won't say we bonded instantaneously, but it was all very agreeable, and I'd happily do it again. I wouldn't even insist on waiting another twenty years...

The next day, which was yesterday, durham_rambler spent the morning in an online meeting and then dashed out to the unveiling of a blue plaque at the site of Durham's ice rink: I had the sort of staying-home-and-getting-on-with-things day you need after you've been away.

Once you've unveiled one plaque, though, you can't stop, so today we both went to the presentation of the City of Durham Trust's Architectural Award: which sounds very grand, and was grand, but in a good, and very domestic way. The award went to an extension to a domestic house (I can't find anything on the Trust's website, but here's what the architect has to say about it): the lady who lives there had organised a magnificent buffet from the Claypath Deli (which is not somewhere we habitually go, but I should work on that) and we milled about admiring the extension and the way it integrates with the garden and its cathedral views, and had a couple of speeches and enjoyed ourselves generally.

durham_rambler came home from hospital yesterday afternoon, with a bag of new medication and the promise of follow-up appointments in three months time. He has just now taken a phone call from the Community Nurse, and made an appointment with her a couple of days after Easter.

I was there for his discharge interview with the doctor: the instruction is to do what he feels up to, but to bear in mind that he may not have as much energy as he is used to. Asked about driving, the doctor delighted us both by saying, "well, don't try to drive all the way to Wick in one day," to which we replied in chorus that we wouldn't do that, we'd always stop over in Tain ... In fact I have for some time been pushing to schedule trips with more stops and shorter drives, so I'd file this advice under silver linings. Certainly, he seemed entirely happy about our planned holiday in Cumbria and Scotland in mid-April.

And when I asked about tonight's pub quiz, he just wished us luck. In fact, since we were both nodding off at nine last night, we will give it another week. Besides, I have developed a streaming cold.

For both of us, therefore, it's one day at a time and steady as she goes.

Well, that did not go as planned. We spent a pleasant, if low-key, birthday, as posted last time, and went to bed anticipating plenty of fun for the following day. But in the night, durham_rambler began to feel unwell. In retrospect, he has had a lingering overnight cough for several weeks, and has begun complaining of shortness of breath, in terms of being less young and less fit than he was: but by the small hours of Wednesday morning, he was coughing constantly, gasping for air, sweating - bad enough, in short, that we called an emergency ambulance, and by five a.m. we were in A&E.

As soon as they had him hooked up to an oxygen supply, he started to feel better. He has been extensively scanned and measured, and enjoyed, everytime he was asked his date of birth, being able to give it, with the comment that "Yesterday was my birthday!" which earned him plenty of extra birthday wishes - in which context, I should thank everyone who left greetings for him in my previous post: I have pointed him in that direction! He was transferred within the day to the ward adjacent to A&E, and is still there, still on oxygen, though he now has a portable cylinder, which means he is able to visit the bathroom, which has cheered him up considerably. He was also allowed to shower, though unplugging him from the oxygen left him a little breathless.

D. has persisted with his planned visit, and been immensely helpful about driving me to and from the hospital. I sent him out to shop for his own breakfast requirements, since shopping was part of the post-birthday outing plan which we had to abandon. Another abandoned plan was for the three of us to join D.'s sister and brother-in-law for lunch at the High Force Hotel and possibly a walk after. I have sent D. off to do this on his own, and I will visit durham_rambler this afternoon, when visiting is permitted: one of his colleagues from the City of Durham Trust has just phoned to offer me a lift, and I have accepted, with much gratitude (there are buses, but this is so much easier).

I asked durham_rambler if there was anything I could bring him this afternoon, and he asked for his shoes. I refused: they are heavy, and he doesn't have much storage space. He clearly anticipates being sent home at any minute, and I take this as a good sign: not because I think it likely, but because it means he is feeling much better. I'm sure when he is discharged, it will be without warning (and he will need door-to-door transport, so he'll be fine wearing his slippers); and I know that they can send him home with a portable oxygen cylinder. But I suspect they'll want more of a diagnosis than You seem to have a chest infection, let's see if it responds to antibiotics...

We live from hour to hour, visiting time to visiting time. He has his phone, and a whole tangle of chargers, only two of which he actually needs. He can call me with updates, and he does. He has ordered fish and chips for lunch, and solved three clues of yesterday's crossword. So it goes.