I bought some new work shoes from Sainsbury’s today, they cost me 20£
When I got home I ceremoniously binned my crocs
They had holes in the soles
I said a prayer over the Willie bin
RIP
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Twenty
O'Driscoll's Castle, Cape Clear Island
In the summer of 1974, I was twenty years old. A lot of things happened that summer. I covered hundreds of miles through hitchhiking. I made some money working at a Butlin's holiday camp and later on at a raspberry farm that overlooked Beauly Firth near Inverness in Scotland. I attended The Cambridge Folk Festival and I also visited Ireland for the first time, carrying everything I needed in a weighty rucksack - tent, sleeping bag, camping stove, extra clothes, toiletries, everything.
On June 12th in Dublin, I bought a little notebook which I used as a journal for the rest of that summer. I was pretty good at keeping up with the days. Fortunately, I kept that notebook and rediscovered it a few weeks ago. It is the diary of another me - a sapling. A young man in search of things - for understanding, wisdom, happiness, new experiences and of course love.
By June 29th I was on Cape Clear Island off the coast of County Cork. This is what I wrote that day:-
_________________________________________
There is a castle on an island promontory which looks out from the very edge of Europe. Years of gales and human neglect have caused its walls to crumble, so that instead of towering nobly above the mother rock, it has, rather like a chameleon, taken on an appearance that blends in with the cliffs and the rocky islets that cluster around it.
Ah, but in spite of this decline, the ancient fortress has not yet surrendered its history which the jealous rocks watched being formed. Still, still midst the tenacious rock plants in the crevices, standing there without motion you can sense times that have gone... A pirate called O'Driscoll, on those decaying stone stairs, his footsteps padding, a tankard of Spanish wine in his right fist. He stops on the parapet above that frothing sea, hacking his throat clear. He looks out through the moonless night to the horizon and his gaze stumbles upon distant torchlight upon one of his wooden ships returning from the Americas.
On that very same horizon two centuries later it's the blue and white spinnaker of an elegant French yacht which reveals itself to the island and the now crumbling castle. Oh that that man of the sea with lice burrowing in his scalp and food stains on his raggedy beard could see his proud fortress as it is today.
Perhaps standing with me in the soft summer grasses on the clifftop, his hard shell would crack and at last words would rise from his hidden heart: "I didn't know. I didn't know" and we would walk along the island's rim watching seabirds gliding to their ledges and O'Driscoll would survey it all then lean over the edge searching for his reflection in the waves below and having failed to find it he would renounce his days of power and plunder and see like me a world of waiting and wondering - not rushing to pursue foolish dreams.
Seagulls, rock plants, yachts, cliff faces, a distant lighthouse - I missed it all loading my camera.
Inner page of the notebook showing my 1974 sketch map of Cape Clear Island
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Choir
It was time to return to choir
Singing outside lacks the acoustic bang that the rafters of Gwaenysgor village Hall provide to our singing, and so after all of the risk assessments have been done, Jamie with his not so RAF 1940s lockdown beard decided it was safe enough for us all to return.
Meeting last week for Debra’s funeral underlined the power of our little choir, even though many of us in one section don’t even know the names of others in another.
Jamie’s mom, who sings with the soprano’s, described things rather personally and tearfully when she referred to the choir as family.
A family that shares songs rather than food, or history, or relationships
Tenor Hattie hasn’t had her baby yet.
Everyone has been asking.
Lindi ‘s dog Charlie has been sadly put down, and she wryly reminded the choir that no one will see “her Charlie” on zoom anyone, which was the constant lockdown choir joke.
I’ve just had a long bath which made me feel human again and dressed in a clean outfit I was just about to have a coffee before choir when I spied an email from Hillary the choir secretary
Choir cancelled tonight, it read, Jamie has a bug.
Bollocks !
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Happiness
Happiness for today
Great sleep
A smile
Yummy breakfast
Your turn?
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