Very cold now, and high pressure. Still have a heaviness in my chest that may be the result of my cold or may be something to do with the car crash. Either way, it’s not stopping me doing things, though there is some coughing involved.
On Friday I met a second cousin I didn’t know existed a fortnight ago. I heard from her daughter first: her name was Stella, and she brought shocking news – almost everything I had on my family tree on my mother’s side was wrong. Admittedly there wasn’t much to start with, and a lot of it had been guesswork, based on the fact that my grandfather was a gardener. But it was a bit of a surprise.
Stella didn’t tell me that.She just told me about our DNA, and then brought her mother to see me. Her mother’s name is Alison, and her middle names are “Miss” and “Marple”. She has constructed a family tree that puts mine in the shade, mainly because it’s right, and mine isn’t. I had thought my grandfather came from Brighton by way of Cambridge, but in fact his family have been Norfolk people for generations.
Alison’s grandfather was Cecil, my grandfather’s brother. Cecil was about 18 years younger, and so Alison is quite a bit younger than me. She and Stella were both charming, and we spent an hour talking about the family. I have since sent her some photographs, and I aim to revise my tree drastically, with help from what she has discovered.
In the evening I drove to Halesworth for the Swan poets evening. Hit a pothole at a fairly early stage and almost went back in case something bad had happened, but I ploughed on, and it seems OK. Read three poems: quite a good evening, not too long.
The next day I went to Carrow Road with Dot because she had three spare tickets, and it was sunny. And lo! A miracle happened, and Norwich City won. They have a new loan player called Duda who is excellent, and a Bournemouth player had to handle his shot to stop it going in. Red card, and amazingly Pukki scored the penalty. We had someone sent off to make it fairer, but still managed to hang on. As always, we should have scored more.
On Sunday I led the church service, and all went well. Did a little walk with Dot afterwards. Today I have walked a bit again, partly to accompany her to her Richard Rohr evening, but also to the post office. She will be back soon; so I had better start cooking.