Another fine afternoon in prospect although an easterly will somewhat suppress the temperature. Note the slightly nautical term there, easterly. It’s going to veer north easterly on occasion which doesn’t help the cause. It’s probably not nautical per se but certainly associated with the sea. The shipping forecast perhaps.
From the age of six I lived mostly near the coast. Since leaving university all those years ago I’ve inhabited an inland island called Lincoln. I miss the sea. The nearest coast, the East Coast, is not particularly attractive at least when compared with the rugged scenery of Wales and the West where I grew up.
Too late. Ain’t gonna move now. Lincoln is in any case somewhat of a paradise surrounded by miles of featureless agricultural flatlands. It’s interesting that one of the more noticeable aspects of the Lincolnshire countryside are its churches. They stand out and can be seen from miles away across the fields. A clear reminder of the past.
At one time the countryside would have been teeming with people working the fields and filling the churches. Not particularly because they wanted to be there but because they were given no choice.
Now we choose to live in Lincoln and whether to go to church or not. I choose to go for christenings, weddings and funerals although few funerals tend to be in a church nowadays and I can’t remember the last christening I attended. Probably our youngest son John. Longtimeagonow.
This gap since the last christening could be partly to do with the fact that it is only in recent years that we’ve started going to weddings again as our friends’ progeny reach marriageable age. There ya go. Another throwback to the past. Marriageable age! It’s about time you got married young Godwin, Larkin or Caspian. Or Agnes, Constance or Petronilla.
I had to google ‘mediaeval names’ there. As an experiment I also just googled ‘most popular boys names’ and for the UK it came up with Noah, Theo and Oliver. Still mediaeval really although they would probably have used Theodore, or Theophilus even. Good name Theophilus. I dunno. It’s all Greek to me.
Outside three towels, left out on the line overnight, sway gently in the morning breeze. Two pinkuns and a ddraig goch. Also a pair of swimming shorts left out to dry after my swim yesterday afternoon. Another booked for today. Two forty five. Actually one of the pink towels is a quilt cover. Doesn’t matter.
At six twenty five it has been light for some time and farmer Noa will have been out on his tractor for a while already. Probably starting to think about going in for his second breakfast. A hard life. We stayed with our friend @Cyberdoyle last summer, on her dairy farm in Wray. Her son, the farmer, was up very early every morning to do the milking. A hard life. I guess working in the great outdoors does offer its compensations.
Gotta go. Time to mek the tea.
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Sat in the shed listening to some calming classical music. The shed feels a little like a fulcrum. No, not a fulcrum because that suggests there are just two sides to life. The centre of Tref’s known universe perhaps.
I looked up ‘centre of the known universe’ and the folk who know tell me there is no centre. ‘According to the standard theories of cosmology, the universe started with a “Big Bang” about 14 thousand million years ago and has been expanding ever since. Yet there is no centre to the expansion; it is the same everywhere.’
This suggests that the big bang happened everywhere at once. In some respect that is the same as my universe.
I’ve travelled a lot and one thing that has always struck me that people’s lives carry on when I leave their world and return to mine, the shed. So the Black Boy Inn in Caernarfon continues to serve guests when I am not there and the woman selling food in the floating market in Thailand is still probably floating her boat.
So my universe carries on regardless and is still happening everywhere. Everywhere I’ve been. Sometimes my universe has been known to collapse in parts. People die, pubs and restaurants close and buildings are demolished. My universe must be constantly changing.
The centre of my universe is certainly a communications centre. I communicate with many friends I’ve met all over the world. I see them live their lives, their kids being born and growing up and getting married. It is an amazing place to be. Many of them I won’t see in person again. Swayitgoze.
Big mystery innit, the universe, and how it all began 🙂
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Pool update. Two forty five today. Already six people in the slow lane when I arrived poolside. Only two in the fast lane but I know my place. Fortunately it didn’t take long for five of them to get out so I was left with just one other. She was even slower than me but we didn’t get in each other’s way.
After a while a bloke got in who did one length and man handled his way for his second length clinging on to the side. Thought this was a bit odd but hey, maybe he was in rehab or something. Then he dived in at the deepest part and swam along the bottom, reaching the other side in no time whatsoever. Hmmm.
After that his pal came in and they seemed to mostly hang around the side with the occasional dive to the bottom, until the attendant came and shooed them away. This was a lane swim not a social event 🙂
The slow woman then got out leaving the lane to just liddle old me. Did forty minutes of front crawl which I am quite pleased about. This swimming is making me generally a lot fitter and I find that I am walking with more (well a little more) of a spring in my step ish.
Before heading poolwards I planted the plum tree purchaysed a few days ago. Feels good. Obvs it will be a year or three before we start to see results but I am going to make a point of espaliering this one and doing it properly.