Living Between the Lines
A wry look at family life
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It makes you laugh…
We love to laugh. Sometimes, humour comes from the most unexpected places. For instance, those overheard conversations between fractious couples in supermarkets, could be us, or the innocent comments of children and of course, the snippets gleaned when passing someone in the street that can make one giggle out loud. It was the latter type which had me giggling today. We had had a particularly delightful walk, despite the steady drizzle and the wind that whipped our faces. We strolled through the town, stopping for a browse in FatFace and then a mandatory coffee in the Coffee shop before walking up to the newly refurbished Fowey Harbour Hotel, where we…
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Having the Right Tools
Sometimes, just walking up Twynhams Hill, feels more like climbing Everest. At others it’s a breeze and I don’t even notice it. It struck me today, as I almost sauntered up the incline with one of the dogs, that life is a series of hills that we have to climb. Sometimes they are steep, sometimes gentle and the same slope you climbed effortlessly yesterday can seem more difficult to get over today. Today, I took our four and a half year-old border terrier, Charlie, for a walk. When on the lead, Charlie has issues when he meets another dog coming towards him. He goes into panic mode and begins growling…
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Christmas in Essex
Well, here it is, 2019…and a Happy New Year to all! Christmas 2018 was spent in Burnham on Crouch, Essex where we sampled the delights of Creeksea Place Barns (all 6 of them) joined by various members of our large family for the week. Feeling as though we were living in a time bubble, we collected my mother from her home ten miles away and brought her to join us. Lisa’s mother came too and as Dave’s Mother lives in the village, we were all very close for the first Christmas in years. Our ages spanned from 3 to 93 years. We did not drive ourselves the 125 miles from…
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Cotswold memories & 100 years later
When Dave and I first married, in November 1979, (not 100 years ago) we lived an idyllic life in the Cotswolds, in a two up, two down, cottage. We had no car, no TV and no furniture to speak of bar a bed, two dining chairs and an old, formica topped kitchen table. Nor did we have any form of heating except an open fire. One carpet remnant furnished the living room, cut offs were laid around the upstairs landing and two bedrooms providing a pathway on cold wooden boards. The cottage nestled near the end of a terrace on an unmade track. There were no street lights. At night…
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We saw a dog…
We saw a dog… Not a major event in most people’s lives but in Charlie’s? Well, put it this way, for the past few months, Charlie Brown has been undergoing intensive training to rid him of the panic he gets into when another dog approaches him while he is out on the lead. He has been getting progressively more anxious ever since he was set upon by three dogs, in the woods, when he was a pup. Well, could that be the reason? Maybe. Anyway, on a walk back in the Spring, we chanced to come face to face with two large dogs. Charlie immediately went into defence mode although…
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An English Holiday
Need I mention the heat? Nope. I think not. We had respite from the worst of it for ten days when we went to Fowey, in Cornwall, where temperatures were a few degrees cooler. (Who goes on holiday dreaming of rain? Are we never satisfied?) I won’t mention the heat though. Rain – I will mention the rain. Such cool, refreshing and thirst quenching rain it was that met us as we set off on the ferry from Fowey to Polruan, a mere 5 minute trip. Of course, the trip itself was not without incident. There we three were, alone on the quayside, the only ones in the queue. Presently,…
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Who are we to judge?
‘Follow me, through these doors – I think it’s already started but you’ll be fine…’ beams the enthusiastic woman who has just met us. Thrusting a sheaf of papers into Zoe’s hand, she ushers us away from the brightly lit foyer, through two sets of double doors, into the extraordinarily loud, darkness, leaving us without further instruction. The three of us stand there for a moment, taking in our unknown surroundings. Students are already striding along the catwalk to the vibrant blast of a well chosen House instrumental. (I am not an expert but it is loud). Spectators sit in rows on both sides of the catwalk, their attention on…
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A very different battle…
In the town of Battle, Sussex – April 2018 Thanks to the hand-held electronic guide that I carried that day, I now know far more about the Battle of Hastings than I did previously. Despite having learnt about it in history lessons (the very act of learning about it now confined to history itself, of course) my knowledge was scant. i.e. On 14th October 1066 – William, Duke of Normandy, beat the English Saxon King, Harold who took an arrow in the eye. That was the sum of my knowledge on the subject. Now, thanks to the excited commentary that accompanied my walk around the ancient battlefield, I have a…
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There is hope…
When my younger brother, John, was three years old, I remember our grandfather bending down to kiss him goodbye. Three-year-old John took a step back and frowned, “Mens don’t kiss mens,” he informed Grandfather. Everyone laughed and Grandfather dutifully gave him his hand to shake, which John did with some aplomb. I was reminded of John’s innocent statement recently, when reading an article in The Times by Alice Thomson, about the ongoing struggle for gay equality. It beggars belief that we should still have a need for this discussion but we do. As readers of, “The Boy in the Cowboy Hat,” may remember, my brother John, was gay and died…
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Misplaced Guilt…
Do you suffer from misplaced guilt? The smallest thing can cause this condition to appear, such as wondering if you have said the right thing or if your actions have been misunderstood—the latter is a big one for me. I am working on it though. I give myself a good talking to if unwarranted guilt threatens. That said, it is always there, biding its time, ready to pounce at any given moment. It can seem as though someone is standing at my side demanding, “Explain yourself!” Today there were two occasions when misplaced guilt raised its ugly head. The first was as I left the supermarket and headed back to…
