John

He was the younger brother of two British kings - King Edward VIII and King George VI and he was our current queen's uncle. His name was John. Prince John - the youngest child of King George V and Queen Mary of Teck.

Born in 1905 on the Sandringham estate in Norfolk he died there in 1919 at the tender age of thirteen.

For the last three years of his life, John, or Johnnie as he was known by his family, lived beyond the glare of the press and the public under the care of his nanny - Charlotte Bill. Prince John always called her "Lala".

At first John had seemed like a normal child but much of his brief life was blighted by epilepsy. Fits occurred with alarming frequency and they took a toll upon his general health. It is likely that he had other issues too - possibly autism.

Sometimes local children were brought to Sandringham to play and pass time with Prince John. He formed a special relationship with a Yorkshire lass called Winifred Thomas. She was the niece of one of the lead groomsmen in the royal stables.

Years later she recounted those times: "During the First World War I visited John nearly every day and we went on walks and took care of the garden. I remember in 1916 when the War was on John got so excited watching German Zeppelins passing over Sandringham. Father came to visit me that year and John was really happy when he met who he called 'a real, live soldier', Sergeant Frederick Thomas, my Dad. Queen Mary was always finding time to be with John and his Grandmother, Queen Alexandra also took time to visit him."

It is tantalising to imagine the hours that Winifred spent with her sickly but regal friend though we will never know for sure what they talked about and what made them laugh together. I would like to think that Winifred brought him some happiness.

Prince John is pretty much a forgotten member of the British royal family. Nowadays, with better medication and understanding of his conditions he might have lived a fuller, longer life.  He spent nearly all of his thirteen and a half years at Sandringham and died there in Wood Farm which incidentally is where our current queen's aged consort Prince Philip now resides.  It is likely that he will die there too.

Prince John is buried in Sandringham churchyard:

from Yorkshire Pudding https://ift.tt/3kowukO

 Feel the fear

Taste the tears

And rise again

Knowing 

How far

You’ve come

from R's rue https://ift.tt/3ePxFIF

Latin

 Sitting on the balcony

Remembering your throaty laugh

Trying to recreate it

While not sobbing

is a hard task

I miss looking down

at the pool

and having 

talks in broken Spanish

to every neighbor

Who already knew 

I was one of your

grandchildren

The way you 

were loved

is something today

that I aspire

to be known for

That says

She is mine

Latin roots

you leave them

but they don't 

leave you

They reappear

never to be

shunned again

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A Book? Yeah Right ....!

 

Isn’t there a saying which goes something like 

“ If you want something doing, give your job to a busy man ( Woman)”?

I’m back at work today, which is timely, and last night, after nearly three weeks enforced isolation inactivity, I left choir halfway through our zoom meeting, ignored Bake Off ( which has become incredibly boring without the more interesting characters ) and in a surprisingly short four hour period organised and plotted out my book of Going Gently

Seeing the words written down, is an odd feeling.

Mainly because the sentence looks incredibly pompous 

The book won’t be any work of art. ( of course it bloody won’t) but it may be  a frothy, light and hopefully occasionally moving version of Going Gently’s better bits. 

Cherry Picking fifteen years in the life  of a middle aged Gay man, who left a status job in a much loved Northern City to play at the role of county gent, smallholder and smug Village Linda Snell won’t be easy, but after a bit of playing around, some unsurprising dramatic licence ( !) some judicial cutting and pasting, the Skeleton of a plan has been made. 

And all in four hours sat at the kitchen table...going through broad chapter titles and flicking through lists in filofax notebooks.

Now all I need is a title. 

Going Gently is already the title of a very mighty fine novel by David Nobbs and so I feels prudent not to reuse it even though that may well be the way forward .....has anyone any ideas ? 

Answers on a postcard please! 

I shall leave you with a brief video taken this morning. It shows Dorothy’s progress with Walking ALL ON HER OWN ...I found my voice towards the end of the film....

from Going Gently https://ift.tt/2Ivz8aX