Recalling times past

A good relaxed night's sleep and when I woke at seven and looked out of the window at first light, Venus was shining brightly in a sky that was turning deep blue, a wondrous sight. Then after breakfast, a walk to St Catherine's to sit in the congregation for the Candlemas Eucharist. I didn't want to dress up and sing in the choir, just be on the receiving end. Apart from holiday weekends I've had a service to take every Sunday since last summer. It's good to be idle end for a change.

We had lunch early and then went for a walk through Bute Park. It was bright and sunny but very cold. We noticed that tree surgeons have been at work in the past week or so clearing some storm damaged trees in the woods. The most notable tree that has been removed, however is one beside the riverside footpath past the cricket stadium. For the past five years that I can recall it has inclined at a very steep angle from the bank below the path and right over it. It hasn't borne and leaves for a long time. If it had, I suspect one of the increasing number of storms we experience would have brought it down. But no, 

I have often walked that way these past few years, to check after a storm. This afternoon, it was gone, and most of it had been cut up and taken away, only its twin stumps remaining. These now seem a little more upright in the ground than they were when bearing several tons of timber. How the tree was never uprooted, with its roots embedded in a slope is hard to grasp. Certainly now, the path is safer than it has been for many years.

I wanted to break in the shoes I bought last week, and wore two pairs of socks, but this made them uncomfortably tight on my left foot, so I took off the thinner inner sock when we were out in the woods. Although I recall putting it in a jacket pocket, it must have fallen out some stage on the rest of the walk. It's the second thing I've lost in just a few days.

When I went shopping to Aldi's on Friday, I think that when I was putting on a laden rucksack, I lost my Casio digital watch, caught in the strap and breaking off my wrist. I didn't notice at the time, since I often go without a watch these days. Its strap was too thick and not long enough so it didn't feel totally secure, but I didn't know what to do about this. Over forty years I've owned four of the same Casio digital watches, run them until they finally died, except this last one, lost forever. I went back to Aldi's Saturday evening and nothing had been handed in. Ah well, I've still got the analogue faced digital watch my sister June gave me some time ago.

After supper I spent another hour scanning some more strips of film negatives I'm slowly making my way through before disposing of them - some from a retreat with the Anglican Sisters of the Ascension at Montauroux in the Var, others from a New Year family holiday ski outing to Ovronnaz in the Valais, back in the mid nineties. 'Prasada', the Sisters community house closed ten years ago and the remaining women re-located to Devon. It's rewarding me to happy recollections of times past, even if the photos aren't all that marvellous. Pictures of me with cropped hair, clean shaven, and with a salt 'n pepper beard and Clare with longer hair than she ever has it now. Different phases of life.

Then I watched the last three episodes of the French family drama 'Beyond Appearances'. The tragedy of an unexpected suicide resolves into a strangely happy ending by a circuitous route, which explores the concealed depths of family relationships and the dynamics that prevent people from flourishing. Quite well written I'd say, and worth watching.