He did it!

Here we are on our maiden voyage, all the way to the next village. We are feeling lazy with the sunshine and not getting on with the job of preparing the caravan for a few days away. Everyone else seems to be on holiday and having adventures. If I can I'll be listening to New Life radio during the coming week. The programme makes interesting reading with quite a few old friends' names cropping up. I'd like to go and get some input, but there you go, can't have everything. The bike was a snip, comparatively, having belonged to a young lad who gave up biking when he came a cropper and damaged the bike. Consequently it requires some bodywork which will keep the HoF occupied for the next few months.

Follies

The world is growing crazier by the year. I have just been sent this link: http://www.bunyansblog.com/2009/07/pshe-state-sponsored-corruption-of-childhood/ Seems our government would like children to know all about things we'd rather they didn't. I guess they'll say it's something to do with human rights or health and safety which seem to be current deities. If this underhand attempt to make laws unnoticed annoys you too, then please complete the questionnaire.

In the village there is a campaign for a new improved playground. What I wonder did previous generations of children do about play? It's not as if we live in tower blocks of flats; we are surrounded by countryside. I suppose that if you sing 'If you go down in the woods today, you're sure of a big surprise' to modern children, they don't think of teddy bears. Nowadays we are fully informed of all possible risks and we're afraid of everything. What happened to playing in the garden; improvisation; making dens; dressing up; climbing trees? Well probably there are no climbable trees any more; someone might get hurt. And dressing up probably means getting ready for a disco. Sorry. I'm having a curmudgeonly phase. And yes, my grandchildren would enjoy a better playground when they come.

I've just finished 'Stepping Heavenward' by Mrs Prentiss, date approx 1880 in which she say:
"People ask me how it happens that my children are all so promptly obedient and happy. As if it chanced that some parents have such children or chanced that some have not! I am afraid it is only too true, as someone has remarked, that "this is the age of obedient parents!" What then will be the future of their children? How can they yield to God who have never been taught to yield to human authority? And how well fitted will they be to rule their own households who have never learned to rule themselves?"
She thought that in 1880? She should see us now.
So maybe all generations despair of the next. I'm so glad I'm not bringing up children in this one.

We went this week to visit the delightful garden pictured. Those buildings that look like Victorian follies were actually built fairly recently by the current owner. We were over that way, Kidderminster, for another reason. HoF has the hots for buying a motorbike. Now is that folly or not? Should a good wife encourage this pursuit of a hobby as the Big Number Birthday approaches? I'm keeping mum, appropriately, until I see whether the enthusiasm lasts.

Anglicanism

We had a holiday, well a few days, away in the caravan as I mentioned, and visited Brecon Cathedral which is rather nice and almost homely as such buildings go. An amazing thing happened while we were away near Hay (where as one joker said 'book prices are way-on-high). I lost a special ring on the last day. Special because it was given to me by an aunt who said it belonged to my grandmother. When I had it altered the jeweller said it was made in 1847 which was the date that my grandmother's grandmother was married, so I like to think it was hers. I hadn't noticed when it slipped from my finger onto the grass of the field where we were pitched. We were on hands and knees and scrabbling through bags of waste for the rest of the afternoon but to no avail. In the evening HoF went back with a friend's metal detector and found it! Hurrah and hallelujah! I felt I had reneged on my family trust by losing it, which was strange as there was really no-one to know but me.
In the village we now have a new rector but such is the working of The System that although we all know, we aren't allowed to know, if you see what I mean. We have seen him visiting the village, know that his name is Mike, know that he's being inducted in November. But we aren't allowed to know more until he's told his home parish that he's leaving and then an offical announcement will be made. Still. the prayer group has been praying for a married male rector (not out of prejudice I hasten to add but to balance with the new female Methodist minister)and it seems those prayers are answered. We wait and hope.

Flossie welcomes the Beer Festival 2007

Back home

We are back in a green and pleasant land after a visit to Reading where the grass was more reminiscent of holidays in days gone by in Nimes, France. HoF didn't have too good a time, having spent most of it working but still not finishing the job he set out to do. I fared better having spent his earnings in the sales!
There were two obituaries in national papers to the late lamented Flossie. There is another one here.
I think it tells you more about the writer who is a well known resident with a picturesque turn of phrase, and also looks nostalgically back to a past era. I begin to realise just how past my era was when I read about health and safety issues. As a child I was allowed to go off by myself for walks in the woods, coming home when my tummy dictated. Can you imagine any child being allowed to do that now? I'm glad I grew up when I did all except for central heating. But then I did get to see Jack Frost decorate the windows.