Gentification

It's strange how it's possible to wake up from what felt like a disturbed half-awake nights sleep, feeling groggy and realise that you've slept longer and better than usual, at least according to the sleep monitoring feature of my smart watch. I'm never sure how accurate it is. Sometimes it appears to fail to account for several hours of time in the small hours spent in bed in which I have no recollection of being away, or tossing and turning. Truth is that it's often a struggle to wake up fully and get going in the morning, and I lose a lot of daytime hours just getting started. I don't understand why.

I helps if I have to get going for an engagement outside home. This morning after breakfast, I was on duty celebrating the Eucharist at St Catherine's again. Bishop Rowan turned up, ready to celebrate just after I did. I think he'd not read his rota correctly. He's on duty next week! Four months into a double vacancy in full time ministers an element of chaos can creep into routine organisation. This morning a ministry rota in print in the sacristy informed me of a change in Christmas services I was unaware of. 

This meant that I had to make changes to information already published on-line later in the days. We don't meet to check out the details, we just presume everyone else is equally diligent in doing so. And we aren't. Always there's too much information. It's due to a church management culture which presumes bigger is better and that much more efficient. But, when a unit of organisation is enlarged so does its potential to harbour flaws. When will we ever learn that small is beautiful - when 'small' takes communication and connectedness seriously.

There were eight of us for the Eucharist. After coffee and chat, I collected the weekly veggie bag from Chapter Arts centre on my way home. Clare was already cooking tofu burgers for lunch when I arrived. After lunch, I took an assortment of parcels and letters prepared by Clare to the Post Office for mailing, and bought stamps for mailing out Christmas cards. The cost of this was eye-watering!

While I was in the queue inside the Post Office, I received a text message to say that my repaired jacked  was ready for collection. The tailor's shop is just around the corner from the Post Office, so I was able to collect on my way home. Pleased to have it back with new sleeve linings and be able to use it again. Then I went for a walk in the park, and discovered that the work on reshaping the carriageway  on Penhill Road is finally complete after six and a half months. The job seemed to be been completed two months ago, but traffic cones remained in place, and there was no sign of further work taking place. The cones must have disappeared early this morning, or yesterday. 

At the end of my walk, I saw a bus actually using the bus lane for the first time. The work on a 500 metre stretch of road is said to have cost a million pounds, to speed up the passage of buses leaving the city centre. All other traffic occupies one lane in each direction. It seems to flow more smoothly than it used to. Possibly the imposition of the 20mph speed limit and lane restrictions is an improvement on a situation in which congestion could be generated by cars and buses changing lanes to get through the lights at the top of the hill. The road feels much safer to use now than it used to now that it has better defined road markings.

The other thing that's happened over the past few days is that work has started on renovating the large Victorian house on the corner of Romilly Crescent opposite the Gospel Hall. It's been empty for several years. Last year a number of large trees near the end of life were felled on site, arousing local feelings. Fortunately the agreed Local Authority Planning application includes reinstatement of younger trees in the garden. Excavating machines were clearing space where the front garden had been, to allow vehicles to access the site when I was passing bay. 

One of the workers noticed that I'd stopped to look and came over to chat with me. The house exterior is to be restored to the way it was meant to be, The building was converted into apartments decades ago, and renovation is likely to continue this, if not redesign the layout, to accomodate more dwellings. Sussex House, on the opposite corner  of the junction underwent a major re-vamp a couple of years ago, sub-dividing a grand mansion into apartments, and restoring its facade. It looks good and the work just started will also improve the look of the neighbourhood when it is completed in a year or so from now.

I spent the evening getting started on an edition of Sway to cover the the first half of Christmas-tide, embracing two Sunday's worth of information, to give me a week's respite from production. I certainly need it! I keep recalling my father's advice: "Whatever you do steer clear of working in any production industry."  Now I know what he had to endure for forty years of his life in mining. Working at keeping people informed and understanding in an ever changing environment is  a production industry much like any other. Serves me right!