Unreasonable delay

After breakfast and Morning Prayer, I drove to St Catherine's for perhaps the first time, certainly in the Polo, but maybe since we've been living in the Parish, as it's such a short walk from home. The reason for this was to transport the heavy Bosch vacuum cleaner which Clare bought when I was in Ibiza last year. It's proved to be too heavy for either of us to lug around the house with painful joints. I offered it to church warden Sue for the church, as it's quite a powerful device, better suited to cleaning dusty surfaces in church. A new much lighter one arrives this afternoon.

For the first time since St John's Day in Christmastide, I celebrated the Eucharist this morning, with an improvised sermon. There were eight of us regulars present and I much enjoyed doing so. Although I've not presided for three months, I was more relaxed at ease doing so this time, not worrying about going through the necessary anti-covid precautions. The correct routine seems now to have embedded itself in my memory.

I received an email from the European diocesan Safeguarding team about participating in the on-line Stage Two training which is now a prerequisite for those who wish to hold a diocesan PTO. Those who have done it say it's a worthwhile activity, and even though it's unlikely that I'll get an opportunity to do locum duty abroad any time soon, I intend to keep my PTO so there'll no hold-up if I am asked again.

Back on 23rd February I was due to have a telephone consultation about blood pressure medication side effects with a pharmacological consultant, who cancelled for reasons of sickness on that morning. Today I received an appointment letter for the 25th May. The initial appointment request had been made by my GP last November. For better or worse I've taken the matter into my own hands and feel better for not taking an additional daily tablet whose side effects made me feel worse. There's something absurd about this. 

Just suppose the drug combinations was putting me at more risk than the side effects indicated? I could be dead waiting that long for an assessment. People with mental health conditions get stuck on medications they don't need and which rob them of well-being because their case doesn't get reviewed. The Covid crisis provides an alibi for delayed treatments, so there's no point in making an issue of it. I think I'll cancel the appointment, but suppose I should report this to my GP, in case the system flags me up as 'no-show' or 'non-cooperative' to cover up the uselessness of a service which doesn't even bother to enquire of a patient what impact the consultation delay might have.

Fran and Mark came over to see us and arrived just as I was returning from collecting our Beanfreaks weekly grocery order. We had a cup of te in the garden and then went for a walk around Pontcanna Fields together. One they watched the footage of the icon video I shot with them, they decided to revise the script and re-shoot it at a different location. The editing has now been done and it'll be ready for showing on the Parish 'Holy Ground' webcast in Easter Week. I'm pleased they were able to get to a finished product they were satisfied with. I had fun being a small part of the process.

Unexpected consequences

A bright sunny day and for me a fruitful morning as I wrote the final two Easter week reflections before lunch. Then I walked into town, in the hope of finding a store open where I could buy some new socks, as almost all those in my drawer have holes in them. I was delighted to find Marks and Spencer open to sell clothes, so I was able to buy just what I needed. 

I walked back through Bute Park, where scores of different species of trees are now in full blossom - its a glorious sight. I was astonished at the large number of young people out in groups of two to a dozen, chatting, picnicking, or just reading quietly in the sun. I'd guess around two thousand spread across all three open areas. I think they were mostly Uni students. Term may just about be ended now, but there are still restrictions on non essential travel so British students won't be able to go home to family yet.

There have been no covid related deaths now for several days and the infection rate is low, but caution is still being exercised over the resumption of normal activity. It's still a matter of the country feeling its way, measuring the impact of every relaxation, which I think is sensible, if painful to bear with. But at least, outdoor socialising is possible with better weather and lifting restrictions. 

The Inspectorate of Constabulary enquiry into the handling of the Clapham Common demonstration has exonerated Police action, seeing it as consistent with their obligation to enforce public safety legislation. Politicians came in for criticism about the lack of clarity and changes in legislation which Police were called to enforce, as this made this more difficult. Seeing the whole picture from many angles, the enquiry considered that the majority of demonstrators were seen to behave responsibly, and it was a small number of people whose conduct put others at risk, prompting the need for arrests, exploited on social media. The report highlighted weakness in police operational communications when the situation changed rapidly and went off-plan. Ultimately, a few big egos ruined the event for everyone else, just as I thought. 

Again this evening I walked to St Luke's for the Eucharist, attended by sixteen of us once more. The streets are quiet after dark except where fast food takeaways are open, but there are no queues, very few customers. I wonder how they survive economically. It's the same in the city centre by day too, shoppers are few and far between, some pubs and restaurants are in the throes of refurbishment. How they afford to do this after a year with only a fraction of normal trading is a mystery to me.

Requiem for a priest

I don't know where this morning went, it seemed to slip by un-noticed, although I did succeed in writing a fourth Resurrection reflection for Easter Week before lunch, and printing off some copies of the order of service for this afternoon's funeral. Before driving up to Thornhill, I took a quick walk to Tesco's to get some orange blossom honey for Clare and a couple of bottles of wine for Easter weekend, as Owain is coming over to join us.

This was the first funeral of a fellow priest I have ever done. The deceased's daughter brought along his Bible and Book of Common Prayer to place on his coffin, and I added my ordination stole as well, as she had given all of her father's liturgical robes to the village church in Leicestershire where he lived until he was unable to look after himself, and moved into a Penylan care home. We processed the coffin into the Briwnant Chapel head first to load on to the bier, as is customary for a priest. 

The chapel attendant appreciated the reason for this and promised he would see that the coffin also went into the cremator head first as well, out of respect for a priest's office. Nice to know someone still understands tradition. I had to explain it to the four mourners present, as they were unaware. The service was webcasted for the benefit of another daughter and her family, living in the USA. I should have left the explanation until the start of the service for her benefit really, but maybe one sister will explain this to another later on. One of three poems requested for the service was Rev Eli Jenkins' Prayer from Dylan Thomas' 'Under Milk Wood'. I couldn't help reading it as if I was playing the part on-stage, with a slight old parson's quiver in my voice. This raised a smile and a titter. It's a lovely piece with a quality that's  quite distinct from a liturgical prayer, and deserves the right treatment in my opinion.

Driving home I learned from the five o'clock news of the re-floating of the giant container ship stuck for nearly a week in the Suez canal causing a backlog of three hundred ships wanting to sail through. What lessons will be learned from this major disruption to the flow of global trade I wonder?

An early supper and then a walk to St Luke's for the Eucharist of the day. We were sixteen in church, six of us clergy. The altar on its platform has been moved back to the chancel step from the centre of the nave, to suit the Romanian Orthodox congregation that has been meeting there recently. Chairs for forty are arrayed in a huge well spaced arc facing east. To my mind this is more pleasing and easier on the eye to focus on the altar when you can see the east window beyond the chancel. Necessity has been the mother of invention in the fact of the pandemic. I hope the church council will be reluctant to revert to the previous arrangement once normality resumes.

I walked back, but as I was a few kilometres short of my daily goal, I walked on into the park and did a semi-circuit of Llandaff Fields in the dark. I thought I heared an owl in the distance, maybe in the woods by the river. The night air was mild and still, the sky clear with not many stars and planets visible. Sadly there's too much light pollution in the green heart of the city. Nevertheless, it was lovely.

Before turning in, I started preparing the second funeral service I have this week, on Thursday, in the light of the eulogy and I received from the daughter of the deceased. I wanted to get ahead with this, as I need to track down an osteo treatment for my neck and shoulder which are nagging for attention. Though not very painful, I need to work much of the time on keeping the shoulder moving so that I doesn't seize up. Mother Francis is currently having far worse trouble with an acute case of frozen shoulder. Just at the very busiest and most demanding time of the year. This kind of aliment is very much a product of far too much time spent on digital devices these days. I think we've become dangerously dependent on them.

Palm Sunday music-fest

A dull damp day, but nevertheless how good not to be in lock-down and able to worship together on this Palm Sunday. Sure, we didn't have a hymn singing procession around the grounds, for the second year in a row, but we had palms blessed in our seats, and the socially distanced choir sang a couple of anthems. Best of all, S Mark's Passion was read in dialogue form, steeping us all in the drama of Jesus' last week of ministry. For me this is one of the most important things we ever do as a worshipping community. It was so hard last year, having to read the entirety of Luke's Passion into my phone's voice recorder, before making the audio service offering of the day, wondering who'd listen, and identify with the story and be moved by it. There were thirty in church, four of them children. There's a children's Zoom service this afternoon. I wonder which kind of service will impress itself on their memory?

After lunch I went out for a walk early and readied the BBC sounds app on my phone to listen to Choral Evensong at three. I discovered that the preceding programme was a concert of Bulgarian Orthodox liturgical music, sung by a men's choir in the Patriarchal Cathedral of St Alexander Nevski in Sofia. This gave me a sublime treat of choral music of the 19th and 20th century, all new to me. Evensong came from Wells Cathedral, and included Renaissance canticles and anthems. I arrived home just before four. 

Clare and I then listened to another Palm Sunday special on Radio Three - Bach's St Matthew Passion, in a recording from the Netherlands. It seems the live concert had to be cancelled at short notice because of covid among the musicians. I downloaded a German text of the lyrics with English translation, and Clare downloaded the full score to follow the music, a somewhat bigger challenge. We're both familiar with the music, as we have a recording of it, but it was lovely to have time to sit and absorb the meaning of the text as it was being sung. So often over decades, I have been too bust, working under pressure to get everything ready for Holy Week, unable to relax and drink deeply. Laborare est orare, sure enough, but it's such a blessing to relax and reflect on a deeply spiritual work of musical art.

I watched the second episode of 'Line of Duty' this evening. Last week, the first attracted criticism from the media commentariat about shallow portrayal of some of the characters in the drama, and a remark by the lead investigator about a character he hadn't met being 'oddball' because of evidence found in his flat, and the person turns out to have Downs Syndrome, which he didn't know when the remark was made, and wasn't repeated. Not intended to offend anyone, but portraying perceptions made in real time. Were the critics paying attention to the structure of dramatic development here? Tonight's episode left us guessing who is corrupt here, the accuser or the accused? This series introduces a young police officer who was, as a teenager used as a 'runner' for a criminal network. He's now a corrupt undercover cop, bent on revenge I think, a narrative thread opened in the last series and developing in this. Unfortunately his presence on screen is spoiled by the use of sinister background music. Whose idea was that? Unless he is destined for an early dramatic exit. You never know! The enigmatic 'Line of Duty' is much watched, and just as much scrutinised for clues about how it will turn out.

It only takes a few

Although Saturday lie-in and pancake breakfast are part of our 'new normal', it still succeeds in feeling special - the absence of compulsion to get on and do other things. So much so that today I forgot to take my blood pressure medication altogether and only remembered while out walking with Clare at tea-time. I didn't notice the difference at all in fact, not like I noticed the difference when I stopped taking the top up doxazosin, absence of a fuzzy swimmy head, absence of unusual joint pains, and my blood pressure generally about the same, and not screaming 'crisis!' at me.

People in Wales are allowed to travel more than 5km from today. There were noticeably few people out in the parks, and not all the parking spaces were taken up in consequence. It was more like midweek than a weekend. We decided not to join the inevitable rush to the coast or the mountains. Not much point in traffic queues or hunting for parking spots. We can venture out when it's quieter, and people are back at work, although most children are back in school only for a few days this coming week, and then it's the Easter holidays.

Infection levels are diminishing, but not as rapidly as in the past couple of weeks. Given the third wave of contagion surging through several European nations, it's right that government public messaging repeatedly highlights the need for continued vigilance and precaution. International travel is tightly controlled and foreign holidays deemed illegal at the moment, which sounds bizarre and is a red rag to bullish libertarians. There have been protests this week in cities throughout Britain against legislation aiming to bolster police powers in relation to protest demonstrations. Last weekend, there was a vigil of protest on Clapham Common which police badly mishandled, arousing a storm of public indignation. 

More often than not, police manage demonstrations successfully, containing unruly elements, spotting and defusing threats of chaos. If something goes wrong, the world notices and pronounces before there's been any proper analysis or conclusion reached about the chain of events. Maybe that Clapham Common event went wrong because police team briefings weren't adequate or far sighted enough to achieve the objective of keeping everyone safe in a public space, without unnecessary enforcement action. 

Organisers of the demonstration claim to have planned and prepared with safety in mind, and most of the day's vigil occurred without issue. Things went wrong as some individuals decided to give impromptu speeches to the crowd without a public address system. This caused people to bunch up as they tried to listen and put each other at risk. The police saw the danger and acted clumsily to manage the situation. 

The fact that some people felt their voices must be heard, that they had a right to speak regardless of the circumstances, may not have been intended by the organisers. It meant they lost control, and the police were obliged to step in unprepared. Thus the thoughtless egotism of the few precipitated chaos. How much more powerful an expression of protest it could have been if this hadn't happened - unanimous disciplined silent witness, not disrupted by noisy voices stating the obvious.

How unfortunate this should happen as national debate over increasing police powers gained momentum. In a few days, the energy of protest shifted from violence against women to the tabled legislation. A demonstration in Bristol city centre turned into a violent attack on the central police station, and further protests happened there in the days following. 

When youth rioted in the St Paul's area of Bristol where I was parish priest back in 1980, it was very much a local incident of rebellion. In the hours and days that followed, anarchist activists with little or no local foothold arrived, to take advantage of the sense of injustice and discrimination felt within the community. They were soon spotted and told to clear off by local leaders. 

It's interesting to observe that the radical creativity characteristic of the city still contains a hard core of old school anarchists, willing to cause trouble and do so violently. It's another kind of selfish egotism, that masquerades as freedom for all. St Paul's rioted in Holy Week back in 1980. It gave us a different context for understanding Christ's passion and condemnation by a crowd turned into a vicious mob. It only ever takes a few people of ill-will or selfishness to re-direct the energy of a large gathering of people. Nothing has changed, in forty years, or two thousand for that matter.

Bed early tonight, as the clocks move forward an hour to summer time.

Getting ready for Easter

Occasional bursts of rain and cold winds today. I had an appointment for a blood pressure check at the GP surgery at ten. It's much the same as it was when I last went, when I was still taking the doxazosin, so at least I've not made things any worse. I had a good discussion with the practice nurse, who, knowing my condition wasn't unduly concerned about the reading she took. I discovered that she used to work on the Llandough day surgery colorectal surgery team with Mrs Cornish. A reassuring surprise.

As I've been asked to do the Easter Week on-line Morning Prayer and Reflection, I wrote the first in the series of six, starting from an idea I remembered from last night as I was falling asleep. I've also been asked to celebrate the Eucharist at St Catherine's next Wednesday. I enjoy being in the congregation on the receiving end, but no longer feel that as I priest I must, out of devotion if not duty, be celebrating as often as I can. Being able to stand in and support our overworked clergy team means a lot, and gives me a different kind of pleasure and satisfaction. 

I had a preparatory phone conversation with the chief mourner for next Thursday's funeral. I'm standing in for Fr Jesse in Caerau with Ely Parish. As it's Maundy Thursday, he'll be gathering, in the flesh or digitally, for the Chrism Mass with other clergy I imagine. I've had to cover in the past when there have been funerals on this day. 

Clare went into town to bank a cheque and enquire about transferring big sums digitally and she returned reassured by what she learned. I cooked a paella with prawns in it for lunch, and that worked out well. Clare was late returning, but it was just ready finally as she came through the door.

I fell asleep again after lunch and went out late for a walk, late in the sense that Clare had booked me to take her to Rumney for her first post lock-down hairdo with Chris at six. We were surprised at how little traffic there was. It took us half the usual drive time to get there. I returned, got supper ready for her, and spent the evening writing in front of the telly, catching up on this week's 'New Amsterdam' episode. One of the stories was about a prayer group which met in the hospital concourse. Good things were seen to happen when they were around. 

Dr Max Goodwin, the hospital director is of Jewish origins, a very secular scientist. He tolerates the group's presence, unprepared to see any difference their prayer is supposed to make until he himself ends up trying to intercede for a patient with a new life threatening ailment, who then inexplicably recovers. Everyone is relieved and grateful but mystified by what happens. Even the pastor of the prayer group admits he doesn't know how it happens: "But I know one good thing." he says smiling. "Prayer changes us inside!" A-men to that.

Forgotten childhood games

The day started with rain, but as the morning went on the rain clouds blew away and the sun shone again, as we hoped it would. I cooked lunch as Clare was working in the kindergarten and brought her colleague Jackie home for a lunch in the garden, the first time it;s been possible five months.

Owain has made progress in preparing for the purchase of his first apartnent, and asked if we could send him the initial sum to cover conveyancing and survey fees, I was going to visit the bank in town to ask about the security protocol for transferring the deposit money, which will be the next step, but by the time lunch was over the bank was about to close at two. So I'll have to go tomorrow.

Recently the suture has been giving me problems sitting comfortably, no matter what measures I take the relieve the pressure on my rear end. A toilet seat is about the only comfortable way to sit as it relieves the pressure by transferring the weight of my body on to my thighs. The standard pressure relieving rings and cushions are just not firm enough on their own to take my weight. After a particularly painful sit down at the garden table eating lunch I went to the hardware store on Canton Cross and bought myself a toilet seat I could experiment with. I have it mounted on top of my firm foam ring, set on a plank of wood, to place on a soggy settee cushion. This combination takes my weight and relieves the pressure nicely, so I could sit for three and a  half hours without pain and discomfort, or getting numb thighs. So, it was worth the effort.

In the evening I watched the 2014 movie 'The Lone Ranger'. The black and white TV series was one of the first things I recall watching as an eleven year old when we first had a telly, so I had some notion of the background to the storyline. It was beautifully filmed on location with much CGI used to concoct and choreograph sensational complex action scenes. The whole narrative was ingeniously framed with a boy in a Lone Ranger outfit visiting a Wild West Museum. He sees a tableau featuring the Ranger's Commanche First Nation companion Tonto. The figure comes to life and tells him how the Lone Ranger story began. 

So far so good. There's lots of quirky 'buddy movie' comic banter between the main characters in between crazy action scenes. Many of them however, are fantastic, hyper-real, over-stated. In too many of them the human frame is subjected to an excessive degree of violence without succumbing to injury or shock. I believe this is totally unnecessary. It adds nothing to the story and perpetuates the illusion that human hero figures are invulnerable, superhuman. Kids can't always clearly distinguish between fantasy and reality. This is meant to be a movie for kids. Although it has positive messages about First Nation people and how America treated them and shows how damaging greed and corruption can be, it could have been done far better without the level of 'excess to impress'.

Funny, although the movie began and ended with the boy in a Lone Ranger outfit, it took ages for me to remember that as a ten year old, a photo was taken of me in a similar outfit, sitting on the back garden wall. I was a big Wild West fan in Junior School, but very naive about that far off world. The enthusiasm soon faded away when I passed the Eleven Plus and went to Grammar School. What I recall of cowboy and indian play in the ferns and long grass on the hillside of The Graig near to home was so far removed from what we saw on screen. Do kids play cowboy and indian games outdoors any more? Or is it done exclusively on video game consoles nowadays?

Long awaited conversation

After breakfast this morning, my telephone consultation with Mrs Cornish was booked for ten o'clock. Minutes after ten, the phone rang. It was a routine robo-scam call about my non-existent Amazon Prime account! Minutes later Mrs Cornish called, with marvellous news. Day surgery appointments re-start on 30th April, and I'll get an appointment on one of the early lists in May. Wales has seen a couple of days with no deaths due to covid. Many people are still being treated in hospital, but with infection rates so much lower now local health boards in Wales are in a position to pick up where they left off, and work through the backlog.

I think I was over the top excited on the phone. I'd been steeling myself for a much longer wait, given the huge number of people needing treatment delayed by the pandemic crisis. Mrs Cornish was pleased with my January MRI scan showing progress had been made after round four of surgery last November. I was able to confirm that progress in healing has continued since then, even if the gradual closure of the wound has led to the loose end of the suture sticking into me painfully. At last the end is in sight!

As soon as the call ended, I dashed off to St Catherine's for the Eucharist. With so much to give thanks for, I couldn't stay away, and only arrived five minutes late. It was lovely to share the news with fellow worshippers who have been so kind and supportive over the past couple of years.

I shared the good good news with Clare when I got back from church. She'd been out walking when the call came. I went out again and collected this week's veggie bag, and then helped cook lunch. It was mild enough to eat outdoors in the sunshine. Sitting there with my eyes closed, enjoying the warmth, listening to sparrows chirping in next door's hawthorn tree, the washing machine finished its cycle and started to bleep. For a moment, those sounds put me back on the terrace of the chaplaincy house in Ibiza, just as vividly as pictures Google Photos pitches me a daily reminder of, a year after they were taken.

I walked around the park for another hour before tea, and spotted the first fully open dandelion of spring alongside on of the tracks I walk on. The two crab apple trees we've harvested fruit from are sprouting leaves. Interesting how some trees produce blossom first and then leaves, while others produce leaves and then blossom. I guess each species plays to the needs and ability of its pollinators, depending on the exact time and weather beneficial to both their life cycles. Lovely to have a mind free and time to take in the exquisite detail of they ways nature works.

Job done

After breakfast and prayer time this morning, I went down to St John's to meet with Fran and Mark to shoot the basic video clips for their icon presentation. We weren't there long when we learned that tree surgeons, delayed from last week, were soon arriving to start work on trimming the trees surrounding the island of green grass on which the church stands in St John's Crescent. Oops! Unforeseen diary clash. 

Churchwarden David arranged for us to collect St Luke's keys from the Rectory, so we left St John's to drive there, dropping off the St John's keys with Eileen the caretaker on our way there. As I got out of the car, I could hear the bell of St Catherine's being tolled by Clive to signify the end of the one minute silence for covid victims, on this lock-down anniversary. Our project had so absorbed us that we didn't notice time passing until then. So, a quick arrow prayer, and then on to St Luke's to continue the job.

Mark was delighted with the resonant acoustics of St Luke's, and we quickly settled on a good setting in the nave to shoot the video, and managed to do it in one complete editable take. The hour in St John's wasn't wasted, as it gave us a chance to run through the structure and ideas about set-up which gave us a head start in a different space. We finished in an hour and I was back for a late lunch of mussels (again!) by one fifteen.

Mark and Fran are good company and I think we worked well together, but I felt strange about being out of the house, doing something different, enjoying socially distanced, masked conversations about the creative process we'd embarked upon, and spending time with people who weren't family members for the first time in six months. I've gotten used to being a hermit of sorts, and for this needed to come right out of myself, and then focus intently on getting the camera to do my bidding. I took three cameras plus spare batteries and SD cards with me, but only used the HX90. I took my Linux laptop along, so I could transfer the video files from the camera to a blank SD card for Fran to take home and give to her son who will be editing the footage under mum's directorial eye, no doubt.

After lunch, I feel asleep for an hour on the sofa, and then went for a walk along the Taff. The river is now very low, as we've had little rain for the past week, and muddy footpaths are no longer treacherously slippery. I met colleagues Peter and Jan walking their dogs in Pontcanna Fields, and learned that ex-Area Dean Mike John is leaving Pentyrch for a part time job as Priest in Charge of Llancarfan. The other part of his job will be managing the diocesan 1Family project, looking after the resettlement of a refugee family from Syria, and all that entails. He did this before as Area Dean, and found that he loved it. How imaginative of the Bishop to innovate in this way. Bravo, both of them!

This evening there was a Zoom Q&A interview with Archbishop Rowan, arranged for the Christian Evidence Society, an august, venerable body public engaged in Christian apologetic discourse for over a century and a half. His theme was Christian spirituality and understanding of God. I didn't see all of it, but what I saw was very good. I had to work on providing documents for Owain for a conveyancing solicitor to authenticate the gift we're making to enable him to make a deposit on an apartment so he can get a mortgage. It's all terribly inquisitive these days on account of money laundering regulations. You have to prove who you are and that you have the right to give your own money away. It's a measure of the climate of distrust which prevails in today's world.  

Patience, a necessity

Sunshine and clouds again to start the week. I was surprised to find that Mother Francis posted the link to my video of last night's service on the Parish Prayer WhatsApp group, and a few people who weren't able to attend expressed their appreciation for this.

It wasn't such a cheerful start for me however, as the suture has been digging into the wound again, after a spell without trouble. Sometimes the preventative measures I take stop become ineffective. Remedying the problem is never without painful debilitating consequences, as the suture presses on the vagus nerve. It's not just the dull pain, but the way this drains me of energy that makes it so frustrating. It interferes with daily activity. Walking can ease the pressure, though not entirely. It slows my page noticeably - not the pain, but energy drain that accompanies it.

I walked for an hour before cooking lunch and for another hour after a post-lunch siesta. To take my mind off it, I took thirty odd photos of buds and blossoms with my Olympus OMD10 to add to an album from which I propose to make a video slide show, and possibly a photo book. I've asked Mark if he'd like to accompany this with suitable solo violin. It's something he could use to promote his music making and I could use to present the photo book, if I decide to go into production.

I had a good conversation this afternoon with Mark and Fran about the icon video presentation we're to make tomorrow. They sent me a script which we discussed, along with ideas about shots we hope to get, once we've settled on a background setting within the church. I'm excited about working with others on a creative project. I can't remember when the last time I did anything collaboratively.

In Wales from today, supermarkets are allowed to sell non-essential items again, and garden centres can re-open. I suspect they are going to be very busy for the next week or so. Clare is keen to visit, a garden centre, but neither of us are keen to brave the crowds at the moment. She has a hairdressing appointment with Chris for this coming Friday, right at the end of the day. He's so busy that's the best he could do to fit her in.

After supper, I decided to lie on the bed for comfort and watch NCIS episodes on my Chromebook, but it wasn't that comfortable. Sleep seems to be the best remedy for limiting the distress the wandering suture causes. I'm supposed to be having a phone consultation with Mrs Cornish the surgeon on Wednesday morning. Just as well this has happened now, as I won't forget to tell her. Clare says I'm prone to forget to mention bad days when I have a run of good ones. 

I've come to accept setbacks and stay mindful of the slow but overall persistent progress I have made. And that calls for qualified optimism. Set-backs happen, they mess me about, but I've had some experiences of seeking medical help that were a waste of time as the problem called for surgical expertise, and that's simply not there on call when you need it. Unless it's critical - life threatening or psychosis inducing - you have to wait in turn. It's what being a patient means,

Parish Music Milestone

After another good night's sleep, I woke up just after the Sunday Worship programme started on Radio Four, reflecting on the past year of life suffering and death in lock-down. We had a reflection on a Gospel story from the Archbishop of York, plus a sermon from the Dean of Winchester, using a different biblical text. Both were insightful, thankfully. A lovely English choral version of the Lord's Prayer was used, disconnected from the prayers of intercession, as if it was just a nice piece of music, and I'm not sure that we didn't have two versions of the same modern hymn, or at least two modern hymns that were rather too similar to each other. It felt like a cobbled together Ministry of the Word whose structure was something of a mystery to me. 

In contrast following this, we were treated to a ten minute 'Point of View' by poet Michael Morpurgo, the story of whose suffering and recovery from coronavirus has been widely reported, and he himself has written about the experience. This morning it wasn't what he was reflecting on. He spoke of how much he misses personal contact with his audience as a writer, through book signings, Q&A interviews at book festivals, reading his stories in classes of school children. All the things which make his life as a writer meaningful, in other words. 

Then he went on to speak about what he'd gained, learning to do the same things using Zoom and how, much to his surprise and delight, he found he was reading on-line not to audiences of ninety but ninety thousand all around the world. It's not about fame or recognition, but his joy, sharing something valued he has made. Something similar has been observed by churches offering on-line services over the past year, finding that audiences extend well beyond the usual circle of parishioner. And not only for worship, but also for on-line discussion groups as well. Will this last as part of the new normal, I wonder? 

Another sunny morning to walk to St Catherine's for the Parish Eucharist. There were about thirty of us. Next Sunday, St Luke's will reopen for worship. Few people from there have joined us in St Catherine's that I'm aware of. Did they go to other churches that were open or watch on-line? No everybody's needs are the same.  

After lunch I walked up to the Cathedral. The ranks of chairs in the nave had all been pushed back to clear a space in the front where half a dozen chairs were placed in a big socially distanced semi-circle, as if for a performance of some kind. I was surprised to see the high altar stripped bare, and a plain wooden cross placed on a pedestal in the choir. The place looked as you might expect it to look of Good Friday. I wondered if this was an innovative modification to the Passiontide liturgical environment in the light of the pandemic or the first anniversary of UK lock-down and asked one of the duty stewards. It was indeed in anticipation of Good Friday, as the Passion Liturgy of the day is going to be prerecorded later in the afternoon for streaming on the day itself. All will revert to normal tomorrow. 

I rather like the stripped down vista of choir and sanctuary. The blend of shapes and forms due to different architectural styles has a special quality unadorned. Monastic churches nowadays have that kind of simplicity about them, and are furnished only as necessary for acts of worship. I wish we could do the same in parish churches, but recognise this would cause a lot of extra routine work for parish sacristans. Shifting it all out of sight for the Holy Triduum and doing the annual spring-clean is enough of an exercise as it is.

We returned to St Catherine's this evening for a special Passiontide service with five scripture readings and choral items from the choir, singing socially distanced from the choir stalls for the first time in a year since lockdown UK began. I took a camera with me and video'd the service, handheld, which means it's a bit shaky in parts. The audio could be better, but I wasn't in the most effective position for this, but it does record a small but significant moment in the history of the pandemic and the Parish. I was able to edit the two video files taken that cover the service using the old Windows Movie Maker, which I prefer to the Windows 10 video editing app, perhaps because I can more readily remember how to. It uploaded to YouTube while I watched the first episode of 'Line of Duty' series six, so I could send a link to Fr Benedict and to Choirmaster Colin for them to circulate. Good to get the job out of the way quickly. On Tuesday I'll be making a video at St John's with Mark and Fran about her icon of the resurrection appearance to Mary Magdalene. It'll certainly be easier there to get the sound right! 

Equinox

Spring equinox weekend already. Nice to be reminded of this when switching on the radio and the 'phone this morning. We had our lazy extra half hour in bed before getting up for a pancake breakfast. Then I walked into town to take photos of the bus station construction site. Shops are shut with few exceptions, streets are deserted, buses come and go empty, or with one or two masked passengers. The construction site is busy nevertheless. I count half a dozen workers moving about on scaffolded decks above Wood Street, and there are sounds of machinery being operated coming from deep within the skeletal frame. 

Crossing the Wood Street bridge, I noticed a dredger at work in the river, by the the Taff Mead water-bus pier, so I crossed under the railway line and took some photos. Swans habitually gather on the river bank nearby, plus a few mallard and gulls. Today there was a Chinese goose among them, emitting a distress call loudly. A long feather hanging down out of place suggested it had a wing injury. It's almost the same size as one of the younger swans. I wondered if it was lost and had mistaken this group for its own kind, and then been expelled roughly. I heard another bystander speak on his phone to someone in an animal rescue call centre. I hope his concern was responded to in a timely way. Humans or other creatures mix with a swan's family circle at their peril.

In Canton and Pontcanna, streets are periodically busy with shoppers, or parents wheeling their infants or tugging their dogs to and from the parks. Construction continues rapidly on two neighbourhood housing developments throughout the week. Road traffic, although pretty reduced in volume seems to go in spates for no reason I can work out. Sometimes the roads are deserted, other times there are the usual long queues at traffic lights. Overall, the sound of ambulance sirens has become less frequent this past month or so, a welcome sign of a reduction in the covid infection rate.

Clare had gone out for a walk when I returned home, leaving the lunch half prepared for me to finish off, and we ate together when she returned. Later I walked down to Blackweir bridge and back. There was an organised football match going on, with a referee, linesman and teams in their colours. I'm still unsure how 'official' park team games actually are.

A third wave of coronavirus infection is growing seriously in several EU countries, dampening the hopes of foreign holidays for all but the super rich or desperately crazy. Border controls and quarantined entry and exit are likely to remain. Now that half the UK adult population has been inoculated, will Britain escape a third wave? Only if strict precautions remain for much longer than anybody wants or hopes, I'm sorry to say. I'm glad we have a short caravan break with the family in Oxwich Bay booked for the end of July. It could be within the bounds of what's going to be possible. 

Kath, Anto and Rhiannon are booked to go to Sta Pola in August, but it's impossible to know at this stage if that'll be possible. It's such a pity that the Oxford/AZ vaccination roll-put in EU countries was held up due to rare unverifiable safety issues, driven more by political egotism than concern for public health. A commentator on this week's 'BBC Question Time' programme expressed regret that the UK had left the EU on the basis that British pragmatism and enterprise would longer influence decision making and help concentrate European minds on crisis management. 

I think there's a grain of truth in that, but not enough to justify smugness by British parliamentarians. Britain didn't act quickly or strictly enough in border closures and testing once it became clear how fast contagion was spreading. The UK per capita death toll is one of the highest in the world, but now some EU countries have caught us up. It seems as if other countries have also paid the price for bouts of inattention and laxity in facing the pandemic, albeit it at different times from the UK. Much as we long for a return to normal, even a 'new normal', Europe wide, I wouldn't be surprised if that'll be another year to eighteen months away from now.

This evening I watched a foreign novie offering on BBC Four, set in Denmark 1945, about landmine clearance from the country's beaches carried out by captive young German army cadets. It was very powerful and tragic, portraying the deep hatred felt by Danes against Germans in general, not just nazis. A bitter angry Danish sergeant has a demining platoon under his charge. He is cruel and bullies them routinely to start with. Slowly as some of them are killed by their penitential labours, he starts to realise they aren't hardened soldiers but schoolboys, and learns compassion towards the survivors. In the end he defies orders by helping the remnant return to Germany, when the majority of the platoon die in an accident.

It made me think about how painful and costly reconciliation of enemies can be, or between perpetrator and victims. Very suitable for the eve of Passiontide.

Recognising the nature of the forest

St Joseph's day today. The cold wind is still with us, and the sky heavy with cloud, but no rain. I went for an hour's walk, returned and cooked lunch for us, then went out and walked for another hour before tea. I feel the benefit of not taking the extra doxazosin. My head is clearer and significantly, much reduced joint pain and no pain the the soles of the feet. Slowly I feel, something toxic is leaving my system. The cure is worse than the ailment it seems. I'll wait until tomorrow to see what impact the change has on my blood pressure. If it's worryingly high, I'll re-start on a low dosage and see what difference it makes, but now that I'm beginning to understand the side effects better, don't like the prospect of having to cope with those painful symptoms again.

Confirmation arrived in the day's mail of the funeral I have the week after next, Holy Week. I called the lady I met yesterday to discuss the funeral service and make a suggestion that I think is appropriate to a service for a priest - place his  bible and stole of office on the coffin during the service. I'm sure the crem stall will be OK with this request. Later, I had a phone call about another funeral, also in Holy Week, on Maundy Thursday. It's at a time when parish clergy would expect to be gathering with the Bishop for the annual Chrism Mass. This year it'll be live streamed on Zoom I imagine, but most priests would regard the on-line attendance as obligatory under the circumstances.

This evening we watched another WOW film festival free web-streamed movie. This one was a German documentary called 'The Secret Life of Trees', showcasing an understanding of the natural life of forests which are not subjected to human 'management' and industrial logging advocated by German ecological advocate Peter Wohlleben. He speaks about the importance, not of us planting trees to help combat climate change but of re-wilding, letting a forest regenerate itself over centuries - its own natural pace. 

He argues that a virgin forest is one huge organism, not a collection of individual trees, because of the way root systems are interconnected, share nutrients and defend themselves against threats. Commercial plantations, use heavy equipment which compacts soil, reduces the amount of water it can hold, leading to whole stands of trees dying of thirst, up to 57% of plantations are lost like this. The book of the same title has been published all over the world, and has attracted widespread public interest, even though its arguments seem to make logging industry people nervous with the in-built call for change of practice to accompany change of perception and understanding of nature's inherent wisdom.

Seeing the world with honest clarity

After breakfast, I walked down to St John's to meet Mother Francis and be introduced to a lady whose father's funeral I'll be doing in ten days time. He was a teacher by profession who trained as a priest in mid life, working in school chaplaincy and later in a CofE Parish. It must be forty years since I last did the funeral of a priest who had once served in the St Paul's area parish where I was incumbent. It's rather a privilege to be asked to do this, though the reason is that the deceased was opposed to women as priests, which is why Mother Francis out of respect asked me. This is not a conviction I share, but I think I have some understanding of those who do. After all, some good friends and colleagues over the years were traditionalists. We shared the same spirituality and enthusiasm for mission and pastoral care, but agreed to differ on this issue, to live and let live.

As it's Clare's morning in school, I returned and cooked lunch, timed nicely just as she arrived through the door. The school has given her a covid self-test kit to use next week the day before she goes in again. If she tested positive she'd have to get a full test to ascertain whether or not it's a false positive, so we'd both have to go into self-isolation in between tests as a precaution. Better safe than sorry I suppose.

I walked to Victoria Park to take the St John's church keys back to the Rectory, then  walked on, out of the parish up to Ely Bridge, where there's now an access road into the riverside area formerly occupied by paper mills, in the throes of transformation into a new housing estate. It's not open to pedestrians or traffic yet, but what interested me was to find out if there's an old footpath along the river Ely. I've driven by many times, but never walked there. 

On the other side of the river is a turn of the 20th century row of terraced houses which may have been built for mill workers. I wandered along the terrace, facing the river bank, lined with flowering trees, and took a few photos. The terrace ends with the access road to a small industrial estate and a large RAF ex-servicemen's club. A curious location, I wonder why it was chosen?

Before starting the new batch of 2mg doxazosin, I decided to have a day's break, to see what difference it would make. My head has been clearer as a result. Recently, towards the end of my daily walk, the soles of my feet have started to hurt, but without any swelling. Tingling feet I expect when I exercise, a natural sign that blood is circulating properly. What I experienced was muscles in the soles of my feet burning painfully. The longer I stayed with the 4mg, the effect worsened. The day I stop, normal healthy tingling, but no burning pain. I now recall having had this side effect when I took high doxazosin doses before, but I mistakenly attributed this to the shoes I resumed wearing when the season for sandals was over.

I had an interesting chat with sister in law Ann about blood pressure this afternoon. As a medical ethicist it's a subject under debate she takes an interest in. In an effort to reduce incidences of strokes and heart attacks, medics have reduced the healthy norm of 140/80 down to 130/70. This may well be beneficial for the general adult population, but not necessarily so for elderly people, whose vascular systems age, and average blood pressure rises. If in older people it's artificially suppressed with medication this could have an undesirable impact on heart or kidneys, or result in fainting or dizziness. So maybe it's time to challenge the dogma that youthful low blood pressure is really such a good thing in old age.

We watched the second part of 'The Story of Welsh Art' on BBC Two Wales catch-up tonight. I hadn't realised how innovative Welsh artists were in the 17th-19th century, in landscape painting, the portrayal of working class as well as middle class people, and documenting the industrial revolution in paintings of the workplace. Seeing and representing realistically people and the land they belong to seems to have been characteristic of Welsh painters. 

There's an honesty of perception which art historians attribute to post reformation spirituality, a willingness to see things as they naturally are, not embroidered by myth or romantic sentiment. These artist were on a par with, if not ahead of their European counterparts, but hardly found lasting fame. The role of Welsh innovators is hardly acknowledged let alone celebrated in British art history. I hope this series of programmes may stimulate greater interest in this special dimension of our cultural heritage. Who knows, we may see some art exhibitions drawing attention to unsung Welsh masterpieces. 

Undesirable side effects

After a long and refreshing night's sleep, another Spring-like day to enjoy, and it's St Patrick's day too! I went to St Catherine's for this morning's Eucharist. We were the usual eight people plus Mother Frances. We chatted in the churchyard afterwards about how the past year had brought us back to value the scripture reading of the daily Offices, and how it enabled us to do without the frequent eucharistic diet we're used to, yet still feel fed spiritually. 

Francis told me that St John's now hosts a Russian Orthodox congregation on Sunday mornings, after the live streamed Parish Eucharist from there. St Luke's also hosts the Romanian Orthodox congregation that used to meet at St Dyfrig and Samson's. Somehow, covid closure and the long interregnum brought that to an end. Thank heavens Fr Edward Owen's appointment as Priest in Charge of Grangetown has recently been announced.

Mark and Fran phoned after lunch, gearing up to make a video artistic piece for Easter, using Fran's 'Nolli me tangere' icon and talking about it, with Mark playing a meditative piece on the viola. They've taken me up on my offer of videoing it, and the plan is to do this in St John's soon. That's be a nice challenge to do well. 

I cooked our lunch, and then went for a walk in a circuit around the Parish, taking in Thompson's Park and Victoria Park before walking down Cowbridge Road East to collect my prescription from Boots the Chemist. I spoke with the pharmacist about the side effects I've been experiencing from using the higher dosage of doxazosin. It's strange that the more physically well I feel with progress in the wound healing, the worse the side effects become. The last couple of days since speaking to my GP I started to regret having asked to continue with the 4mg dosage and have the extra 2mg dose supply to augment it if my blood pressure shoots up again. He agreed not to issue me with 4mg supply and take it back into stock. If I had taken it, not used it and returned it to the pharmacy, it would have been binned. I've got the 2mg and hope not to feel so groggy and not to have my blood pressure shooting up again.

Clare's morale has been boosted by having her ears cleared of wax and skin flakes which have reduced her hearing capacity significantly this past few months. She had to pay to get it done at a specialist clinic locally, but it's money well spent. We're not having to shout at each other across the noise of kitchen appliances quite as much now!

Rather than watch telly this evening I have been reorganising my recent photo archives to show Victoria Park, Thompson's Park and Bute Park separately from Taffside and Pontcanna photos. They don't all show a location, so it's better for anyone unfamiliar with the places but interested in the parks to have them grouped together.

Haircut time

How lovely to wake up to bright sunshine and a relatively mild temperature. The damson bush which Clare bought last autumn, to replace the apple tree that went to the church garden (and now flourishes), has the first tiny leaves emerging from even tinier buds. A sign of good things to come, hopefully. 

Having collected the extra medication prescription from the surgery at the end of my afternoon walk yesterday, I went to get the medication after breakfast. Boots didn't have the right kind of doxazosin slow release tablets in stock, so they must be ordered. I'll get them tomorrow. 

On my way there, however I called at Stavros' salon to book a haircut appointment. Already he's fully booked until next week. At that moment he was on the phone managing this and that, rather than cutting hair. He took one look at me and ordered me into an empty barber's chair. One of his team came and took my temperature and contact details, then in between handling phone calls, Stavros gave me his 'Clint Eastwood' cut. Last time he called it a 'George Clooney' cut. A most enjoyable experience - the buzz of a key family business at the heart of Canton's high street, getting back to normal with enthusiasm.

Mother Francis has asked me to officiate at the funeral of an elderly retired priest, who requested a male cleric. His daughter lives locally. I'm meeting the two of them on Thursday morning for a briefing This will be another 'first' for me.

I cooked lunch, and then did the circuit into Bute Park via Blackweir and Millennium bridges. Several groups of young men were practicing their rugby moves on the pitches over there. I'm not sure whether team training activities are allowable yet, but they continue un-policed. A group of ten youngsters were sitting by the riverside in quite a confined space, certainly not socially distanced. Perhaps they have all had covid and recovered, and think their immunity means they don't need to comply with the rules. It's a bit difficult to understand from my viewpoint.

We watched the first episode of 'The Story of Welsh Art' on BBC iPlayer after supper, covering its evolution from unique stone decorations found in Bronze Age tombs and Celtic crosses of the 8th-9th  century through to innovative portrait painters of the 18th century. A fascinating overview, from which I learned some new things to be proud of about our remarkable cultural history. 

Welsh art showcased

It's getting light earlier each day, but I'm still not taking advantage of this and getting up earlier, as I find it hard to get to bed before midnight. By the time I've finished my morning routines it's time for coffee and really I've not done anything extra. It's a pity that some of the more watchable TV shows, especially the news, are on quite late if you want to watch them live.

Anyway, before lunch I went for a walk in Thompson's park with my Sony Alpha DSLR. The buds on the magnolia tree by the pond are shedding their exterior cladding and revealing their light purple colour. The highest of the buds are already starting to open into full flower. That's happened just over the weekend.

I had a telephone conversation about my blood pressure medication top up prescription with a GP who is new, working part-time in our local practice. He gave me a good hearing and agreed to prescribe two lots of doxazosin of different daily dosages, so that I can vary the amount I take in an attempt to reduce the high systolic and minimise side effects. As it happens today has turned out to be a day with less intense side effects than usual, though I haven't bothered to check my blood pressure, just enjoyed feeling good.

Then, I went out for another walk down to the river and back, taking my Olympus with the telephoto lens, determined to make an effort to learn how to get the best results form it, as it's quite different from other long lenses I work with. Knowing one's equipment, taking the same subjects with different cameras is an experiential way of learning which works well for me, and gives me a basis for understanding the theory of lens optics better. But it's a slow job!

Before supper, Clare and I sat down with a computer, and filled in the digital census form together. We'd been in this house about a year at the time of the last census. It's strange that I can't remember anything about it. It must have been a slim paper form at that time, and maybe simpler. This time around it took somewhat longer to complete, half an hour altogether, despite saying "only ten minutes" at the outset. There are multiple choice questions about identity - marital status, ethnicity, gender identity - reflecting the preoccupations of the age, I guess. Glad that's out of the way now.

We watched an excellent edition of 'Fake or Fortune' this evening, about authenticating two works thought to be by Paul Gauguin. Recently, there's been a series of three programmes about Welsh art and artists on BBC2 Wales on Tuesday nights and the final one followed on from this on BBC Two Wales. I started watching late and re-started on iPlayer once I tracked them down. The presenter Huw Stephens who works for Radio Cymru/Wales is the son of Meic Stevens, renowned Welsh language activist and author. At 17 Huw was the youngest ever Radio One Welsh language presenter. He's well known for his promotion and documentation of Welsh music, and clearly enjoys talking about Welsh art as well. I look forward to watching the other programmes later in the week.

A policeman's lot is not a happy one

Surprisingly, there were only twenty two of us at the St Catherine's Eucharist this morning. Presentation bunches of daffodils for mothers were available on a takeaway table in the church grounds after. As the congregation are encouraged to clear out of the church as quickly as possible and not bunch around the main door, nobody hangs around on church grounds, but sensibly now, clergy hang around on the grass at a distance, where they can see and greet people departing. It's better than clergy hiding in the sacristy until the faithful have departed, but it still feels surreal, unnatural.

After preparing lunch, I went out for a circuit of Llandaff Fields before switching everything on to cook. For once, I got the timing right and we ate at the usual time, which was quite satisfying. Having had a good night's sleep, eight and a half hours, I didn't expect to fall sleep for an hour after the meal as well. I don't feel especially tired at any time and have no trouble falling asleep at night, but I sit down and doze off easily. Perhaps it's my age. The wind and the weather turned around midday, and it rained while I walked again later in the afternoon. There weren't as many people out in the park as is usual on a Sunday morning, but in the afternoon it was deserted, the car park by Cafe Castan was empty. The cafe closes at four these days and was already shuttered. Few takeaway consumers in the rain!

A Metropolitan police officer has been charged with the abduction and murder of Sarah Everard who vanished a week ago while walking home alone across Clapham Common. The whole story has not been told yet, and is of necessity sub-judice, but the vital role played by CCTV and residents' internet doorbell camera streams to track her movements, and alert investigators to the presence of the accused is already mentioned. The whole police force is naturally shaken and distressed by the betrayal of trust implied.

Women's groups then tried to organise a vigil on Clapham Common to protest about the persistence of violence against women. Covid safety rules banning mass assemblies were invoked, despite an assembly safety plan presented by organisers that would ensure social distancing, masks. The high court dismissed an appeal. The vigil was publicly cancelled, but this didn't stop a thousand or so women turning up with flowers and hanging around on the Common to pay their respects. A few started speech-making, people bunched together to listen in the absence of a public address system, the police deemed this was a public health risk, and started dispersing the crowd, meeting resistance, leading to some forceful arrests. Now there's a storm of media and political indignation and criticism of the police.

At various times over the past year, the police stood by when large crowds flocked to the beaches, and when people partied in Soho streets after the pubs shut, drawing criticism from the Home Secretary for not acting. The Home Secretary has endorsed last night's police action. I don't understand why no thought was given to a contingency plan to manage a spontaneous gathering if one should arise. There's been such strength of feeling all over the country, women and men needing and wanting to express grave concern about the persistence of violence against them. Did nobody think of this possibility? 

The police are good at erecting cordons (all that tape flapping in the breeze), cordoning the Common with supervised entrance points where people could register their presence with track and trace. Then a socially distanced entry and time slot for laying tributes, and leaving. It was reported people had taken flowers to the Common bandstand during the day. This could have stimulated 'What if?' thinking about handling affairs if numbers continued to grow and compromise public safety. Policing works by consent and trust. If these break down, from lack of information or poverty of imagination, things fall apart. 

Fear of covid is a persistent element of life nowadays. The insecurity it generates leads some to comply with safety measures while others deny and ignore them. And there's inevitably a confused grey area, where working out what is the right thing to do. It's complex and difficult. Police and other public servants, despite roles being specified in black and white terms, are trusted to occupy and act in the grey areas, and often without advice and support when they most need it. It's an unenviable position to be in. In the next week or so, debate about this sad breakdown of police - public relations is bound to be thought provoking. 

Maternal fiesta anticipated

Yesterday evening, after the central heating came on, we noticed that the stairs were unusually cold and with a draft of fresh air. We investigated and found that the south facing attic Velux window was wide open, with rain blowing in and one end of the bedroom carpet soaked through. The night before, the wind that buffeted the street could well have dislodged the catch of the window if it wasn't firmly closed as it should have been. 

So, the rain could have been coming in for forty eight hours, although I doubt this was actually the case, as we'd have felt the cold draft of air two days running. In fact we'd noticed the wind changed when we were outdoors. In the new direction, rain was driven directly into the room. What a mess! We wonder if there was enough rain to soak through into the bedroom ceiling below. Time will tell. 

Fortunately, we had a small electric radiator to help dry out the carpet, but now we have a blower heater as well, courtesy of Wales and West Utilities. We were given this to use last week when our gas supply was off all day and we didn't have to return it, as their covid safety protocols forbid this. Just imagine, if there are a dozen houses with gas supplies to change, that number of heaters is required to give away, adding how much? Another five hundred pounds to the cost of completing the job.

A good night's sleep, lie-in and pancake breakfast. Just after we'd finished, when Clare was in the garden hanging towels to dry, the doorbell unexpectedly rang. I was out of reach in the bathroom, and Clare had to run through the house to intercept the caller. It turned out to be a beautiful bright big bunch of flowers from the kids for 'Mothers Day' as they insist on calling it, despite having been raised to call tomorrow Mothering Sunday. How lovely of them to do this!

We went for a walk up to Llandaff weir and back in cold wind blowing clouds in, but bright sunshine nevertheless. Passing by the Cathedral, I think I got my first glimpse of the resident peregrine falcon taking off from the tower - not exactly a close view, hovering thirty metres overhead.

On my afternoon walk down to Blackweir, the playing fields were surprisingly empty and there weren't half as many people out walking as usual on a weekend. Then I remembered that Wales is playing Italy in the Six Nations Rugby Championship this afternoon. All normal activity is suspended when Wales is playing, whether they are in the Principality Stadium in the city centre or away. There may be few or no Welsh spectators present in Rome, so the digital pilgrimage has to make do instead. The score turned out to be 48-7 in favour of Wales. 

I've observed groups of anything up to a dozen youngsters together kicking a ball around or exercising together, and on one occasion, two full teams of youngsters playing rugby. Was this a permitted school practice game I wonder?

Today, the Welsh lock-down restrictions start to ease. Now it's possible for two people from a household to meet with two from another in a garden as well as away from home. We don't have to stay home apart from food shopping, medical visits or daily exercise, we can now travel up to five miles from home. On Monday we'll be able to get a haircut as well. I sure do need a haircut!

More travel journal transcription this afternoon. I've reached Orthodox Easter 1998 now. Clare took long phone calls from her girls, while cooking hot cross buns (without crosses on) glazed with orsnge blossom honey. We lost track of time andwere an hour and a half later than usual eating supper, due to early hot bun testing! Nothing much on telly, but it doesn't much matter when you have lots of other things to do. I think even boredom could be an interesting change in such circumstances.

Admiration for the poor

I went to the GP surgery after breakfast this morning for an 'official' blood pressure check. It's still higher than it should be though not as bad as it was last time I attended three or four months ago. Then I drove to Thornhill for the bi-lingual funeral I've been preparing for the past few days, after rehearsing Welsh texts a few times, to be sure to get the flow and emphasis right when reading to a congregation. I just don't get the amount of practice I need with liturgical Welsh to really develop me confidence, so I was glad to agree to take on this assignment. There were eighteen mourners and thankfully, I didn't stumble or mumble my words. I had an appreciative text message from the chief mourner later in the day.

I went out walking after lunch while Clare was having her little siesta. About an hour later, we met on the Taffside path and walked home together. I watched this week's episode of 'New Amsterdam' on More Four catchup. I thought number ten might be the last episode but there are another eight to come in series two. On US networks and streaming services series three is running, episodes made in the age of Coronavirus. Each week seems to spotlight different social and moral issues a big NYC public hospital has to deal with, so many of them poverty related. It isn't shy about portraying medical heroes as 'wounded healers'. It's my Friday tea-time treat now.

This evening I learned about  WOW (Wales One World) festival of international movies an annual fiesta that been running for some time. Clare heard about an award winning Argentinian film called 'Delfin' that she was keen to watch, and as it was available to stream from the festival website we watched it together. I didn't succeed in finding how to display the stream on our 'smart' telly, so we watched on a Chromebook. 

On my seven year old one with 2GB memory the display stuttered, so we changed to the two year old  one with 4GB and that worked fine. Strangely enough the old one streams most stuff from iPlayer or other TV channel streaming services without stuttering, and just occasionally latency at peak demand times. These must be designed to run on low specification devices. The WOW streaming applet needs more hardware resources to run properly. What can be streamed with average broadband these days is truly remarkable, but such variations in performance are inevitable.

Delfin is the name of the eleven year old boy who is the the subject of the story. He wants to learn how to play a wind instrument and improvises for himself a French horn, using a plastic hose and a funnel. For a local town fiesta he borrows the school's French horn and acquits himself well accompanying the singing of what we think is the national anthem. He sets his heart on auditioning for a regional youth orchestra in the regional capital 30 miles away. 

His widowed father lets him down so he hitch-hikes to the audition. He doesn't realise he needs to be able to read music to play in an orchestra, and fails the audition. He lives in a rural area where there are no instrument teachers and no music teachers. There's a glimmer of hope at the end when his father decides they should move to a city where maybe there will be some opportunity. It will be up to Delfin to make something happen for himself, his father doesn't have the same determination as he does.

The story is a beautifully told moving portrayal of rural poverty and what it means. It evokes admiration rather than pity for people whose lives lack security and stability. Best of all, for me this was an encouraging experience with a Spanish language move. Rural Latin American Spanish is spoken clearly and not nearly as fast as in the Iberian peninsula, so I could enjoy understanding fairly well what was said, and not being so dependent on the subtitles. So my Spanish comprehension getting almost as good as my French and this make viewing movies in those languages more pleasant and attractive.

Workaround

It rained quite a lot in the night and a strong wind blew. Doors not properly shut banged reacting to strong  gusts in our house and next door on both sides. Mid morning, the rain stopped the cloud broke and the sun shone through intermittently, but the cold wind persisted. Before lunch I transcribed another day from my travel journal, a day when I went on my own by minibus from Amman down to the Dead Sea. I must have forgotten to take my camera with me that day, as I have no photos to remind me of where I walked there. 

My memory of the journey is quite hazy, so I appreciated revisiting the trip with my written recollection. I took sixty eight photos on my Jordanian trip, and another thirty the week after when I visited Palestine and Jerusalem, so perhaps I ran out of film that week. They are all digitized now, but the digital quality, from scans made ten years ago isn't a patch on what's possible today. I'd love to make another trip the the Holy Land and Jordan if the pandemic passes and we are once more free to travel.

It was very cold and windy when I walked after lunch, which drove me to return home early, a couple of kilometers short of my daily goal. While I was out I had an idea about how to sort out a problem my sister June has in finding photos in her Google archive. She's using a digital camera that's so old that the CMOS battery in it no longer keeps information once the battery is drained. When it's been unused for a while and the battery is re-charged, the date needs re-setting, or else all the photos show a date in 2008. She has forgotten how to change the date, and in any case it's easy to forget that you need to keep on resetting the date every time the battery drains, which is often on a thirteen year old camera.

Photos with ancient file dates are automatically sorted and display a very long way down in the archive list. I had the idea of making a special album folder, and then searching for the 'lost' photos she needs and adding them. The album still displays inconveniently far down in the list, unless you include a photo with a current date, then the folder displays on-screed without the need to scroll. That'll save her some frustration, hopefully.

We watched most of a movie from 2008 called 'Hancock and Joan' about the melancholic comic genius Tony Hancock. Ken Stott, the actor who play the part strongly resembled him and imitated perfectly his characteristic voice and mannerisms. Then I went out again late evening for a brisk twenty minutes around the block under a sky that was clearing of clouds and revealing the stars. There wasn't a soul around, not even a night time jogger. If the pubs, restaurants, cinemas and theatres are all shut, there are few reasons left to be out and about. 

Blessing from a wedding

Heavy rain returned overnight and persisted all morning. The water level in the Taff was up by half a metre when I walked down there later in the day. I walked in full rain gear to St Catherine's for the Wednesday Eucharist which re-started today. There were eight of us present. It was good to hear the old Prayer Book liturgy recited again, even though I know it off by heart. 

Then, I transcribed a few more pages of my Jordan travel journal, about the day we visited Petra. I find it slow going because I used pencil, and the writing isn't high enough contrast to be easily read, due to sight deterioration because of cataracts. I need a strong lamp, but until I can shop for one in a real store, I won't trust shopping for this on line, I need a real life try-out first. For now I make do with a small LED torch. 

Before lunch I went out again to collect this week's veggies from the collection point in Conway Road. Our first cauliflower of the season, lifted straight from the ground this morning was in the bag. When we'd finished lunch, I stripped the cauli of its outer leaves, along with the  dark green leaves of this week's leeks, chopped them fine and pressure cooked them with veggie stock to make a green soup for supper. It was surprisingly flavoursome.

I was delighted to get an unexpected email this evening from Tatyana, at whose wedding blessing to Bruce I officiated in Montreux at the end of August 2018, just as the nightmare of my anal abscess was starting to give me a lot of pain and swelling. Making theirs wedding an Anglo-Bulgarian celebration was a challenge I relished, and I used lots of Slav Orthodox choral recordings to make her family feel at home. It was a big effort but it helped to take my mind off the pain. 

Tatyana was writing to tell me that they now have a baby boy, and she attached a photo of him, which gave me much good cheer. After the wedding she gave me a thank you gift, a CD of the choir she sang with in Bulgaria and a beautiful little Bogoroditsa icon, which has graced our dining room ever since I brought it home. It's rare to hear again from someone you have ministered to transiently, whether here locally or abroad. People appreciate the ministry a priest offers, but in helping them bond with each other in an act of worship, the officiant usually gets left out and soon forgotten in the emotions of the time.

Tonight, the final episode of a short series of unusual archaeological investigations. This time the subject was a cliff top site near South Shields which had been used on and off as a military installation since the nineteenth century until after the second world war. Among the volunteers on the dig were army veterans for whom military archaeology was part of their rehabilitation, and a local military historian. It's a great idea for a TV series, arousing much interest among local inhabitants. I'd enjoy more like this.

Partners in MIssion recalled

Another cold dry mostly overcast day. After breakfast and prayers, I resumed work on transcribing my Jordanian travel diary after several weeks inattention. It was interesting to realise how much detail of that trip I've forgotten. 

I finally received an email this morning confirming receipt of my messages about the incorrectly written cheque, asking me to return this to the funeral director at the crem. It turned out he'd not been briefed. The chapel attendant who briefed me on arrival I hadn't met before. She told me proudly that none of the staff at Thornhill had gone sick with covid over the past year, despite the throughput of hundreds of mourners daily. Kudos to the city's bereavement services team for staying on top of the Health and Safety demands in the work place.

When I returned from a funeral, I sent a message to the funeral arranger say I'd handed over the cheque, and received an email to say a new one would be in the post. I mention this in full, because it's the first time in decades of officiating at funerals that a glitch like this has occurred. All my emails carry my full name and contact details, so I wonder who slipped up?

This evening, I came across an obituary for Bishop Humphrey Taylor, who died on Ash Wednesday. I first met him when I was a University Chaplain and he became the national coordinator of Chaplaincy work in Higher Education in the early 1970s. He'd been a mission priest in Malawi, expelled by the authoritarian government for his pastoral work among prisoners. We met up again fifteen years later when I worked for USPG and he was a staff member, and then General Secretary of the Society. He went on from there to be Bishop of Selby until he retired. He was a quiet wise thoughtful man with a wry sense of humour, a passion for racial justice and he was a champion of women's ordination. 

His predecessor as chaplaincy coordinator, John Dudley Davies had been expelled from South Africa for witnessing against apartheid. He then went on to be Principal of USPG's College of the Ascension on the Selly Oak mission campus at the same time Humphrey was in charge. John later went on to be Bishop of Shrewsbury. Co-incidentally both had done national service in the RAF. I'm still in touch with John, in his nineties, still writing books with a cutting edge, and getting them published. I'm grateful to have served alongside both, and in their company to have learned what being a missionary priest means for today.

I also learned this evening that church marriage registration is going digital in May this year. No longer will clergy have the painstaking onerous task of filling out church registers in duplicate, with a spare paper copy to send quarterly to the Chief Registrar's office, and all for a pittance. This will be replaced by a form containing all the legally required details, which will then be sent for entry into a national digital database.

Records in their present format date back to the Marriage Act of 1820, and maintaining duplicate church registers was always part of the cleric's duty when solemnising marriages. Prior to that there may have been a separate parish register of marriages maintained, or else marriage entries were made, along with baptisms, burials and regular worship events in one grand service register. Ancient parishes like Cardiff St John the Baptist have records dating back to the restoration of the monarchy, still kept in a great fireproof iron document safe in the vestry. 

I very much regret that documentation of this kind becomes redundant in favour of an exclusive digital record. No doubt a signing the register ritual photo opportunity will persist, even if only a paper record is to be signed. I wonder what the carbon footprint is of a register which may have an active life of ten to fifty years depending on frequency of church weddings in a parish, and the combined carbon footprint of an equivalent set of digitized register entries, held on multiple servers in perpetuity? OK, let's say 400 years, as long as some current registers have been preserved. Just for fun, I have emailed the BBC Radio Four 'More or Less' programme team to pose this question to them. 

A time to buy

I woke up to mechanical commotion in the street this morning marking the end of gas main replacement work. Several lorries with tarmac and road rollers were filling in the excavation holes neatly, leaving the road and pavements with neat new black patches. It's a cold blue sky sunny day, with weather warnings for stronger cold winds later in the week. Back to the warmer thick pullover again for the time being. 

I wrote to my GP today giving an update on my condition and enquiring about a medication prescription. Two weeks ago I was supposed to have a telephone consultation with a pharmacology expert, but since it was cancelled I've heard nothing more, so I thought I'd report this and ask what's going to happen next.

There's a funeral tomorrow, for which I received the minister's fee cheque Friday last, but I'm unable to bank as it omits my surname, likewise the accompanying notification letter. I rang the given number at the time and asked the call centre dealing with me to pass on a message to the funeral arranger about this. Saturday I sent an email as I'd not been contacted. No response today either, so I rang the call centre again, and asked to be contacted. No response again which is rather strange. I hope everything else is in order regarding this funeral. It's unusual to have to deal with a call center about a funeral, especially when the handler seems to have difficulty in laying hands on the required information.

First Minister Mark Drakeford is being criticised for his candid remarks about Boris Johnson in last night's S4C documentary, something about being 'disrespectful' to the Prime Minister's office. Nothing about the disrespect shown by the Prime Minister by neglecting to consult the Celtic national governments about the measures in place against the pandemic. The past year has certainly stress tested the relationship between London and the regions. It really is time for re-assessment.

On my afternoon walk, I re-visited the same pussy willow tree on the riverside with another camera in an effort to get sharper close-up photos. This was my third effort. I can't figure out what I'm not doing right to get better close up images. It's lovely to see, day by day, tiny changes taking place in nature with bursting buds, leaves and flowers. Having the time to look in detail is a real blessing.

Big excitement this afternoon. Owain has been to see a flat for sale in a small co-ownership apartment block near where he lives. It's just about within his price range given his modest civil service salary. We've decided to help him out with the deposit. After all, the past couple of years we haven't been able to spend on planned cruises or holidays, due to my infirmity and then the pandemic, so we might as well put saved cash to good use. Confirming all this to the mortgage broker and the bank required writing letter, signing, scanning and emailing them to him, so that he could submit his offer as soon as possible given that there's bound to be competitors for the apartment. "If not this one" he says philosophically "There'll be another."

For the first time six months no covid deaths have been reported in Wales and the infection rate continues to fall. There's an air of optimism about restrictions being lifted, but realistically it'll happen slowly and carefully. Already we see people meeting in groups in the parks that don't look much like families bubbling. People are pushing boundaries and are unchecked by police. Instead of being obliged to stay home a five mile general travel limit is mooted. I suspect that it will get ignored but that a few unlucky folk will get stopped and fined. People are tired of restrictions and in good weather it's tempting to ignore them and take risks. Beingthat much closer to regaining freedom makes it all much more difficult.

The kind of leadership we need

We were on duty at St Catherine's this morning. Clare read the lesson and the Psalm, I stood at the door, greeting people, taking their names and contact details. We were thirty one adults and three children, and that included a few visitors as well as the regulars. I enjoy the aspect of welcoming people arriving. It's a small thing, but engages the pastor still within me. It was nice to get some positive feedback about my week's reflections too. 

Another cheering thing is the resumption of weekday services this Wednesday, with the familiar liturgical balm of the Church in Wales 1984 Prayer Book liturgy. I find its traditional hieratic language a wholesome complement to the contemporary liturgical creativity I advocated for much of my working life. We have some beautiful poetic modern prayers to work with, but risk losing the simplicity of Western liturgical ethos by elaborating elementary phrases and greetings, adding un-necessarily to its formality. Something akin to taking a simple elegant melody and decorating it with grace notes or melismata. It can enhance, but not necessarily so.

Pope Francis has been visiting the beleaguered Christian minority in Iraq this past few days, and such a memorable and significant visit it's turned out to be. A pilgrimage to the ancient Mesapotamian city of Ur, from whence Abraham, an archetypal person of faith, honoured by Muslims, Jews and Christians, went west to settle in Canaan. He visited the Shiite Muslim pilgrimage city of Al-Najaf for a conversation with Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani, something his predecessors sought to do, but didn't achieve. 

In his days as the Cardinal Archbishop of Buenos Aires, he became a personal friend of both the Chief Rabbi and Grand Imam of the country. They attended his installation as Pope and accompanied him on his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, so his latest achievement perhaps owes as much to his reputation for inter-faith friendship as it does to Vatican diplomatic effort. St Francis of Assisi is remembered for visiting Sultan al-Malik al-Kamil when his Egyptian forces were pitted against a Crusader army. Cardinal Bergoglio's choice of Papal name is an indication of a source of his inspiration as a world spiritual leader.

I walked around the parks after lunch looking for bursting buds to photograph, but the results weren't very satisfactory in producing decent close-ups, I don't know why yet. With more trial and error I'll get to the bottom of this. As I walked, I listened on my phone to a Choral Evensong broadcast from Christchurch Cathedral/College Oxford. It'd be better if I remembered to take a set of headphones with me. Background noise from road traffic or the waters of the Taff tumbling over the weir easily drown out the gentle sound of singing, audible when out in an open green space.

This evening we watched an excellent S4C documentary on the work of First Minister Mark Drakeford through the pandemic, which included interviews as well as footage shot during cabinet meetings. With an improved set of English subtitles, this bi-lingual programme really deserves be seen on UK wide TV, as it reveals the worst of Boris Johnson's leadership during the crisis as it happened. He's respectful and courteous towards a politician with whom he has nothing in common avoiding carping criticism. He does however express his exasperation at the unilateral approach to decision making taken by Westminster towards the Celtic nations. 

It's no wonder the First Minister is now bold enough to state publicly that the UK Union of nations is in effect broken, and needs re-thinking as a federation. I think he's right. It's a somewhat different approach than Plaid Cymru's advocacy for Welsh independence, which I think is unrealistic, as we don't have a long lived legal system and institutions as a foundation. These aren't easily grown. But who knows, we may have enough Welsh governance to make a start, which could be granted more self determination in a revised partnership with Westminster. Along with the SNP's push for independence, this could become a key issue in the three years before the next general election. Unless of course, the Tories rid themselves of Johnson and his cronies, and install a leader who understands the real mean and value of consultation, reconciliation and unity as leadership aims.

Census impending and lockdown easing notified

I woke up early and uploaded today's reflection before 'Thought for the Day' on the radio, then dozed off again for another hour. A beautiful, if chilly sunny day, perfect for walking, so after our Saturday lie-in and pancakes, we crossed over to Bute Park via Blackweir Bridge, and returned via the Millennium Bridge, enjoying the woodland area for the first time in a year, hearing a woodpecker, seeing an elusive wren and hearing several of them, in addition to robins and tits. I walked the long way round the length of Bute Park half a dozen times in the past year of bridge closure, but avoided the woodland trail because of the mud. After a few days without rain, well trodden paths are firm underfoot, no longer treacherously slippery, a pleasure to walk on again. 

It's good to hear that infection rates continue to decrease, apart from in a few hot spots. The sixth person to be infected with the Brazilian variant of coronavirus has been traced after five days of post-test tracing, made necessary because an incomplete track 'n trace form was accepted. Mercifully the person in question was conscientiously self-isolating and their contacts were identifiable, so nightmare scenario avoided. 

Our First Minister, Mark Drakeford is back in self-quarantine for ten days because he'd been in contact with an infected WAG official - apparently there's been a cluster of people with covid in their workplace, which says something about the fitness for purpose of government offices they inhabit.  Can they / do they really open the windows I wonder? Anyway Mark, who I believe has had the job, is setting a good example by sojourning in his garden shed again.

Our National Census letter arrived in today's post. It's an invitation to take the census questionnaire on-line, with an unique, house specific access code provided. You can request a paper version by 'phone, but are urged to save the government money by going digital. Refusal to fill one in carries a thousand pound fine. A measures to ensure that homeless people are included in the census are based around the range of social service centres and (presumably) mobile outreach teams which provide for them. It's important that the Office of National Statistics has as full and detailed picture as possible of people with no place to call their own.  

We've been wondering if an Easter family gathering will be possible, for an outdoor picnic if nothing else, somewhere between Cardiff and Kenilworth. Monmouth or Ross possibly, if we're allowed to travel that far by then. My birthday is on Low Sunday this year. We'll just have to see if the progress made in curbing infections is sustained. It's impossible to know, however much today's statistics may encourage, we have no idea what tomorrow's or next month's figures will be like.

We watched an interesting archaeology programme this evening about uncovering traces of Lenton Priory in Nottingham, which was destroyed after the dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530 - its monks were executed for treason, and its lands redistributed. The Priory area has long been covered by houses, so the excavations took place in residents' gardens. The modern ground level is two metres above the fragments of the buildings which were identified from an assortment of pottery, bones, a fragment of lead from a stained glass window, cobblestones from a pavement which ran along an external Priory wall. The site of a Lady Chapel extending beyond the sanctuary, also the site of cloister were also identified. On the basis of seemingly slender evidence, an educated guess can be made of what the place looked like, based on knowledge of 12th century Cluniac Benedictine monastic architecture. 

This was followed by an hour of classic laugh out loud comedy from Irish comedian Dave Allen, fondly remembered from fifty years ago. He often poked fun at Christianity, describing himself as a practicing atheist, and there was often a grain of truth in his irreverent mockery. This reminded me of our dear friend David Barker, Owain's godfather, who died thirty five years ago. He'd tell Dave Allen jokes, and would imitate Ronnie Corbett superbly. He was a lovely guy. We still miss him.

On tonight's news feed, intimations that if progress in suppressing covid contagion continues, hairdressers and some non-essential shops will re-open on March 15th. That's great news. I so much need a haircut!