Last night we agreed that the holiday letting we fancy booking is an apartment overlooking Aberaeron harbour. There was a glitch when Clare tried to book on-line, so I rang up this morning and was pleased to find the place was still available. The letting company Wales Cottage Holidays uses a simple payment system working on any 'phone with a tone dial keypad. It's good for those who are unable to pay on-line, and resembles the remote banking transaction system used in parts of Africa, where usable internet is scarce but landlines or more likely, Nokia type mobile phones are commonplace. We've booked for late June, to be on the safe side given that my op is at the end of May. We've visited Aberaeron before when holidaying in Ceredigion. It's a long wait, but something lovely to look forward to.
There were fifteen of us at St John's for the midweek Eucharist I celebrated this morning. Walking home with Fr Benedict afterwards, I discovered that one of his passions is the history of liturgical development. In fact, he's doing a PhD on early Christian eucharistic prayers, and how understanding them has evolved over the past half century. This was something I also found interesting when I was studying for ordination, so I look forward to reading his work when he eventually publishes it.
We had blue sky clouds and rain showers today, and fortunately not when I walked in the park after lunch. I got back at four in time for a Zoom session put on by the Welsh National Opera, reviewing the seventy five years of its life, celebrating its remarkable evolution from a small group of keen amateur singers and musicians, which held its inaugural meeting in a Crwys Road chapel at the end of the war, to a world class professional touring company with its own full time chorus and orchestra.
It was a delightful hour's watching with the WNO's archivist telling the story and former musical directors being interviewed, and telling anecdotes. The best true story was about a pioneering visit to the former German Democratic Republic, during the Cold War. Somebody joked about the need to omit punctuation from performance related documents, liberetti and technical schedules and notes, just in case the Stasi held up the documents, vetting them scrupulously for embedded microdots. The administrator took it seriously and to everyone's astonishment produced punctuation free paperwork. This occurred in the days before word processors. Imagine!
This evening we sat together and listened to Oscar Peterson, and Miles Davis albums, and I drafted the last couple of Rogationtide reflections for next week. In many ways listening to jazz takes me back to my youth as much if not more than listening to sixties pop songs. It's far richer and diverse musically than pop songs (few of whose lyrics I can ever remember completely) and like opera, has far more meaning for me. I'm so glad that i grew up in a family with such broad musical tastes. Dad was always contemptuous about the new wave of rock and pop music when I was growing up. I think I understand why now.
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