Afflicted, coping

Since Sunday my lower back has been giving me grief. The trouble which developed after tripping and falling in the dark at Montreux a couple of months ago is recurring, despite being sorted out by osteomyologist Kay when I returned to Cardiff. Maybe I didn't have enough recovery time at home. Although the discomfort hasn't stopped me walking 5-6 kilometres daily this week. 

Exercise is essential as the affliction makes sitting for any length of time painful. I just have to keep moving, which is tiring in its own right. Getting comfortable at night also isn't easy, so the last few days have been spent avoiding doing anything that makes things worse. Just as well I have had no duty assignments. I am having to learn to be patient with myself, and manage this with what I learned from Kay.

On Halloween afternoon I walked to Garrucha and found the 19th century Capilla de Nuestra Señora del Carmen in that part of the town centre which houses the ayuntamiento buildings. In the absence of any midweek Anglican celebration, I'd intended to go to Mass there on Todos Santos and the Dia de los Muertos, but was not capable of doing this when the time came. I had to settle for praying in solitude on one of the church's great feast days.

Yesterday, All Saints' day the charco was graced with a visit from around fifty egrets, which settled for a few hours during the day, upstream of the bridge. But, they didn't stay. I heard from another bird watcher not long after my arrival that a flock of egrets had been sighted up-river, but apparently this was not a regular occurrence. This is just a fraction of the numbers of egrets that roosted regularly here this time last year. It must be something to do with their food supply hereabouts.

I learned from Clare about the death of our former neighbour Mike Creighton Griffiths in Queen Anne Square. The news has taken this long to reach us, largely because I have been away so  much. I used to meet his daughter Cindy at Tai Chi classes, but the last time I saw her was six months ago, perhaps just before he died. When I was Rector of Central Cardiff, he and his wife Valé would ask us in for drinks before supper and we'd enjoy hours arguing, setting the world to rights. His working life was spent as a public relations organiser, and although a nominal Anglican, he was appointed to manage the Papal visit of John-Paul II to Cardiff back in 1982. A larger than life character who took great pleasure in offering hospitality. May he rest in peace.