Walking with Australians

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Diane Jackman Lee reads her poem out at the end of the poetry-art workshop at Dragon Hall. Completed work on board.

My talk at St Luke’s on our relationship with Creation went well after a slow start: the group of 8-10 were eventually persuaded to be responsive, and actually got very enthusiastic about my paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer from the Aramaic, which made a good ending. Came away feeling quite pleased after not knowing quite what to expect.

Other things that turned out well: Roger came round to deliver a birthday present for Dot, and I had a brief chat with him about the dodgy radiators. As a result tried a couple of things that didn’t work but then had a determined go at bleeding them (I had tried before without success). After quite a bit of spillage one worked; the other didn’t. Not to be thwarted, I then had a go at removing and refixing the valve cover that adjusts the heat and managed to get it back on properly. Result: two working radiators, and I’ve now cancelled the engineer’s visit.

And I was relieved to find only two people on the Paston walk this morning – a couple of western Australians who knew nothing at all about the Pastons and not much about Norwich. So it was easy for me, and even St Peter Hungate opened for our visit as promised. Not sure about the Paston Week as a whole: attendance has been sparse and the organisation a little inaccurate at times. I expected far more to be on Rob’s walk, which started two hours after mine today, but he only had one person!

Yesterday before helping the re-enactors to set up at Dragon Hall I managed about 90 minutes in the city, paying in cheques, booking theatre tickets and dropping in a poetry book for Keiron in the hope of getting a little publicity. I also managed to buy a birthday card and something else for Dot. After the Dragon Hall set up I met Dot at the supermarket to stock up for the Evetts’ visit next week.

This afternoon I arrived home to find Phyllis Seaman visiting with a birthday card. Afterwards (and after Norwich lost 1-2 to Arsenal) Dot and I had a game of table tennis and then cleared the garage so that we could get Dot’s car in next week. So a few toys made the return journey to the loft.

Chasing the Dragon Hall

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A quiet corner at the Dragon Hall private view

A productive day today. Finished off the talk on Creation that I’m giving at St Luke’s tonight, plus an outline of the sermon I’m giving on Sunday. Also laminated the walk sheets for Saturday and completed a Gift Aid form, which I was suddenly able to access via Firefox, having failed for weeks on Safari. I’ve also suggested some hymns for Sunday, read the meter and rang British Gas to fix an appointment for them to look at our two dodgy radiators. And it’s still only 4.37pm! Of course I did have to give Lucy’s talk at Dragon Hall a miss, but I have heard it before.

Also I’ve been on Paston/Dragon Hall business for the last couple of days, running an art/poetry workshop with Annette. Most of the poetry part was on Tuesday, and we had only two people taking part – one of whom had done it before at Oxburgh (but liked it so much she wanted to do it again), and the other was on the Dragon Hall staff. I think they would have cancelled it, but because of an administrative error they had booked Diane Lee (née Jackman – hence the error) in twice. So it was pretty relaxed: I took them for a walk round Norwich, calling in at the Castle Museum, where my friend Anna gave them (and me) an amazing insight into a picture called The Paston Treasure. Oh, and they did write a couple of poems.Yesterday I was there for the start and finish, but left Annette to it for the rest of the day.

The Paston Week at Dragon Hall started on Monday evening unless you were one of the select group setting up the exhibition on Sunday afternoon. I was: Diana and I took control of the exhibition boards, and the result was, I have to say, pretty good – largely because Diana is a primary school teacher and is very good at practical stuff like setting up displays. However, I was very supportive…

The private view on Monday was a huge success: guest of honour was Sir Henry Paston-Bedingfeld from Oxburgh Hall, and I introduced the new poetry book. The five of us read a couple of poems each, and I snuck an extra small one – Magic – in at the end. The audience was very appreciative, and Sarah from Dragon Hall did a great job organising refreshments and indeed everything else. Lucy didn’t make it, unfortunately, because she was pretty tired out after “appearing” on radio with Sarah earlier in the day.

Earlier in the day too I had paid another visit to St Augustine’s Hall, this time to help Tony install a light. Pretty straightforward, this time, though I had to wait while he went and bought one. Fortunately the weather this week has been good, though cooler.

The other major event in the past few days was of course the concert by Adam Cohen at the UEA. Dot recovered enough to go (she is still not 100%), but it was annoying to have to stand in a queue for a quarter of an hour after the time the concert was supposed to have started, especially as we’d bought tickets in advance. On the plus side, Adam came out and had a brief chat while we waited.

The LCR was set out in cafe style – informal – and the whole event was quite intimate, with AC laughing so much at one point that he was unable to sing one song (Like a man). He was backed by Mai Bloomfield on guitar and cello (not both at once) and a multi-instrumental guy. The sound wasn’t brilliant, but he came over well and sang just about all the songs on his latest album as well as his father’s So Long, Marianne. Mai Bloomfield did an opening set that was sweet but not extraordinary.

I think they were both a bit bemused at the quietness of the audience. They wouldn’t have been if they were sitting where I was, with a guy behind talking incessantly all the way through. Good, though. Very glad I went: I bought the CD afterwards. Whoops. Just remembered to remove it from my wish list on Amazon.

Lured into all sorts of fascinating byways

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Site of one of the Pastons' Norwich houses – in Elm Hill

Taking “busy” to a new level. Next week will be full of Paston-related events, and I have made the mistake of agreeing to lead a group at St Luke’s on Thursday and do the sermon there on the following Sunday. As I have also had to prepare a walk round Norwich taking in all of the Paston sites, and a poetry workshop for Tuesday, you might guess that I am up to my eyes in research. I’m also trying to keep the Paston website up-to-date, which will become even more demanding next week.

After being lured into all sorts of fascinating byways while researching the Pastons in Norwich, I eventually had to get my head down today and produce a plan for the walk with historical details as accurate as I can manage them. I found a few errors in the odd printed source, which was quite satisfying, until I realised there were probably far more errors in what I had written. Still, there are no Pastons around now to challenge me, though there will probably be some local historians prepared to have a go.

Having more or less completed that by lunchtime, I spent the afternoon finishing the Thursday talk on our relationship with creation. There is an almost infinite amount of material available for this, of course, so the challenge was to reduce it to something practicable. Not sure I’ve achieved it – yet. At the end of the afternoon I felt I had to leave the house, so I went for a walk up to King Street to check a new fact I’d discovered. It was pretty chilly, but the fact was spot on.

All this has not been made easier by the fact that Dot has been quite unwell since Monday. She stayed in bed most of Tuesday, so I had to look after the Tuesday Group. Since then she’s been dragging herself to various places and coughing and spluttering around when she’s at home. I can do without catching it, but I hate to see her in that state. I’ve not been feeling well myself, but I don’t think it’s the same thing: I’ve been feeling a bit virusy. Is that a word?

Yesterday, to exacerbate the whole busyness thing, I had to be at the church hall most of the morning to entertain the man who came to give us a quote on a new heating system. While I was waiting, I picked up some litter, brushed some leaves and mended a ventilator guard that had come away from the wall. After rushing home I had to hasten up to Dragon Hall to listen to Lucy brief the DH volunteers on facts about the Pastons. Fascinating stuff, but it got very cold after the first hour. Lucy and Diana (who was driving her) came back for a cup of tea.

On the bright side, we have new handles for our kitchen cupboards. They were fitted on Wednesday morning, quite early, by a resourceful guy who filed them down to make them fit, and left us with a supply of tape to replace worn bits on shelf edges – after fixing most of them himself. Our new fridge is being widely admired.

Paston poetry book published

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Missed the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival this year, but wrote a poem over the weekend:

EXIT GRANDCHILDREN, STAGE LEFT

Empty dens in the garden,
bear on the stairs

 The speed of darkness has been exceeded
and candles lie where they have fallen
under the newly cut hedge

The cars and bricks have been returned
to the garage, and the beds
remade, redirected, resolved

The prince and princess have gone,
heading for hallowe’en
and we are in winter already

But we all remember
that trick of the city night:
lights like puppets dancing
strange circles across the sky

magic, like a roundabout,
reflecting, returning

Caught glimpses of fireworks as I drove to North Walsham on Saturday to pick up some copies of Another Country, the Paston poetry book that contains five of my poems and was designed by David. In a totally unbiased sort of way I can say that it looks very good. It will be launched next Monday at the Dragon Hall private view.

North Walsham again on Sunday to see Jessie for tea and mince pies after a quickish visit to a packed Sainsburys to buy flowers for the cemetery. Not very nice weather: intermittent drizzle. Earlier I had preached at St Augustine’s and we had a bring-and-share lunch which turned out to be better than I had anticipated at the point when I realised that about 50 per cent of it was couscous. Actually the version of couscous that included meat was quite pleasant, and there were rolls and cheese, which can never be a bad thing.

On Saturday morning I paid a brief visit to the church hall for the reinstatement of the window and discovered the Rainbows in situ, which of course meant I had tracked down Cheryl, our elusive cleaner. She has promised to send me a list of people hiring the all, but I’m not holding my breath. I also noticed that our new sign contains a mis-spelling of the word “spiritual” (sprirtual, no less), which is pretty annoying, especially considering that the person who provided the PDF for the sign people is perfectly capable of spelling “spiritual”. As he is now in Palestine, I can’t hit him. Just as well, probably.

Brown bin full of fallen leaves

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Oliver in his den in our garden

Not exactly a seamless move into autumn. We had our hair cut in preparation, and then bought a fridge, while wondering where the extra hour went. The first brown bin full of fallen leaves was left out on Monday, and now the road is covered with golden confetti. I have just taken Joy to the dentist’s – and fetched her again. Bit of an ordeal for her (the dental work, not my driving).

Dot went to London on Sunday and stayed with her colleague Barbara at David Coomes’ place in Walthamstow. Handily, this was five minutes from the school in Waltham Forest where they were doing a day’s P4C on the Monday. Kristine was absent in Kabul (some people will do anything…) but DC made them welcome. My radius has been much narrower over the past few days, the highlight being a visit to Paston to see Lucy and obtain some exhibition material that could be photographed for publicity for the Dragon Hall event. I should mention that I had to tackle a vampire on Hallowe’en, but only a small one: Phoebe, from two doors down.

Also on Monday I had to open the church hall for repairs and found myself assisting guy who was replacing a broken window, checking the starter on a light bulb and repairing some guttering. The heaters have also been serviced in my absence, and I was surprised to hear that two are broken. We knew about one of them, but the other was working very well on Sunday, so I can’t help being suspicious. Now there’s a big debate about whether we should install a better heating system.

In other news, Ian Fosten dropped in the 42 poems submitted for the Waveney and Blyth competition, from which I have to select a winner and four or five commended. Boot-on-other-foot situation. Dot has gone off for lunch in the city with Becca from NYFC, followed by a meeting with Anne, and I have a long list of things to do, largely because I’ve spent much of my time this week (a) preparing a sermon for Sunday and (b) preparing a one-day session on our relationship with Creation for a St Luke’s group. Also taking antibiotics for suspected infection in the lower abdomen area, but I think that’s on its way out. Either that or I am.

Vegetables get together

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Princess with no pea, but a small racing car

Started the week by picking up my oversized trophy for winning the second division Dons chess tournament last year. I had forgotten about it until Greg said it was waiting for me, and this seemed an opportune week to get it from the club, so that I could impress my grandchildren. It worked quite well, which is what is nice about grandchildren – especially ours, of course.

I seem to remember a short intervention by the piano tuner on Tuesday, but the next major event was driving down to Caddington on Wednesday to see David and the grandchildren. We stayed overnight after having a go on Oliver’s new Scalextric, then brought Oliver and Amy back to Norwich on Thursday. We called at Waitrose and then Auntie Ethel’s, then had lunch before going to the Puppet Theatre. Not exactly what I had expected (a puppet show), but some superb storytelling by the Storybox Theatre’s Rod Burnett. Ok, there were a few puppets involved, but not the traditional kind. It was called The Pea, the Bean and the Enormous Turnip, and the children loved it. I was impressed too. Afterwards Oliver (with a little help from Amy) created his own show with some impressive scene changes and lighting, not to mention script. At last – a used wine box with a useful function.

Yesterday we took the children up to John Lewis’s for clothes shopping. Amy bought a lovely fairy princess dress (part of her birthday present) and some shoes, among other things. Oliver said he wanted an electric guitar for Christmas. Hmmm. Afterwards we ate in the cafeteria, and Dot spilled quite a lot of milk, but did not break anything. In the evening at Prezzo’s, after David arrived, the waitress broke a glass quite spectacularly, but didn’t spill anything. Hope they never get together. In between these two events, the children – with help from Dot – created spectacular dens in the garden.

Today David and the children left early to travel north and meet Vicky at the Leicester East services on the M1, from where the children would travel on to a Hallowe’en party at Nottingham, with David returning to Caddington. Dot and I had our hair cut by Linda and listened to Norwich City getting a last-gasp draw with Blackburn at Carrow Road (3-3).

From Iolanthe to Nonington

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Dot in new top outside Farthingales.

A long weekend – at least if you measure it in miles. Total: just under 500. It started on Friday, as so many weekends do. Rob picked up the completed Paston poetry book, Another Country, on CD to take it to the printers. I have heard nothing since, so I assume that all was well with it.

Dot had been at Dickleburgh in the morning, so there was bit of a rush at lunchtime. We eventually left at about 2.30pm for Banbury, and after negotiating a hold-up in Riverside, we enjoyed a trouble-free journey. I was particularly impressed by the new junction of the A421 and the M1, which had been complete chaos last time we were in the vicinity. Got a bit lost in Banbury, but arrived at the Riches’ abode before 5.30pm. Fred was already rehearsing for his role as Lord Chancellor in Iolanthe, so we had tea with Sue and Marjorie, Fred’s sister, with her husband Pat, who had also travelled from Norfolk for the evening’s performance.

I love Gilbert and Sullivan, so Iolanthe, in Banbury School theatre, was a treat, despite the heat. Really good performance by the local operatic society, and Fred was excellent: really good acting and a great performance of a couple of difficult songs.

On Saturday we headed south on the M40, then anti-clockwise round the M25, stopping for a very acceptable lunch (fish and chips for me) at Clacket Lane services, where a girl called Donna was holding the restaurant together (and probably not getting paid much for it). Good service should be much better rewarded. Dot bought a kind of furry top and we headed ever south-eastwards, taking the M26 and M20, before switching to the M2 and A2. Dot had driven to Banbury, and I drove this time: it was again a very pleasant journey in glorious autumn sunshine.

We found our way to the tiny village of Nonington and our B&B establishment, a beautiful old house called Farthingales, run by a very solicitous guy called Peter. Nonington is the home of Pat and Barry Clayton, and we were there for their ruby wedding celebration that evening in the village hall. We walked from Farthingales in the sun to the village hall down a country lane and decided that maybe we’d take the car in the evening, though I couldn’t see where we’d park. I needn’t have worried: cars lined the narrow village street, and we joined them.

It was an enjoyable do, with some good music – mainly from a duo on guitar and accordion singing 6os songs. Much better than it sounds. Lots of family and neighbours present, of course: the only people we knew apart from Pat and Barry were Rob and Sue Bushell, with whom we sat and talked (when we could hear each other). Nice curry and some free wine. The B&B was really nice, with a huge private lounge-cum-dining room, and the breakfast yesterday was first-class.

An easy journey up the M2 and M20 got us on to the A20 without touching the M25, and we arrived at the Hendersons’ in Eltham at around 10.40am, which meant we could see Maryta’s sister and brother and their spouses before they left with Maryta’s father, Joe. They had stayed the night after a party the previous night for Maryta’s 60th. Unfortunately Joe and Holly had left even earlier. We had lunch with Paul and Maryta and looked though a book on the school to mark its centenary on the Eltham site – partly designed by Maryta. The book, that is. Not the site. We left for home when Paul took Maryta to work and arrived before 6pm. Happily the Humax had recorded Norwich City’s epic 1-1 draw at Liverpool. Watched what is allegedly the last episode ever of Spooks.

This morning the accountant has been here with Dot and Barbara.

Resolving discrepancies in the Gospels

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Amy much earlier; today she is seven!

What a lovely day! A bright, crisp blue sky, it’s Amy’s seventh birthday, I’ve hung out the washing and Another Country is complete. David sent me the final PDF this morning, and I have burned it on to a CD ready for Rob to pick up tomorrow. Nice to meet a deadline – thanks to David, who has really made the book look good. We shall have to make him an honorary Paston trustee…

The temperature has certainly dropped, but when the sun it shining it’s hardly noticeable. All right, it is noticeable, but not objectionable. Quite marked in the evenings, though, and we’ve been out the last three evenings. On Monday we went to the Cathedral to hear a lecture by Cambridge Professor Colin Humphreys, who has done some in-depth research on the events of Easter week, resolving apparent discrepancies in the Gospels. Fascinating stuff: he has established that the Last Supper was on the Wednesday and the Crucifixion on the Friday, with much of the Thursday taken up with the trial. The actual date of the Crucifixion was April 3, AD 33 – at 9am. None of this may seem to matter much, but it is encouraging to see that apparent discrepancies can be resolved if you accept the rather obvious fact that people writing at the time knew more about how things worked at the time than we do. A key factor in this is that different calendars were in use, for example. Prof Humphreys is a scientist, and he was assisted in his work by an astro-physicist, among others. His book is called The Mystery of the Last Supper.

The lecture was very good, but even more entertaining were the attempts made beforehand to get the technology working. At one stage nine cathedral clergy and lay people were clustered round, trying to make a laptop communicate with a projector. It proved beyond them until a young lad in jeans came forward and solved it almost instantly. He should get a cathedral post – a canon, perhaps.

On the Tuesday our group met at the Archers’ house on the other side of the city. We gave Ian a lift, and I walked up to his house (about a mile) to give myself some exercise. Invigorating. David cooked jacket potatoes, Vick supplied sublime pears in cider, and Bridget took the evening off at the theatre with David Essex. Some people have no idea…

Last night we were at the Cathedral again – this time in the lovely Westron Room at the Hostry – to hear poet Anthony Thwaite speak about the King James version with special relevance to poetry. Some interesting stuff, much of it autobiographical, but he rather marred his argument by comparing the KJV with the New English Bible all the time and not mentioning (till questions) the NIV, which is a far better modern translation. The NEB, in fact, is pretty awful, and the Dean, who was in the audience, pointed out afterwards that it was not used in the Cathedral at all. The Dean also made some good points about the importance of using language that was familiar to the audience. I have the feeling that my mother or one of her friends knew Mr Thwaite some time in the past (he is 81), but I didn’t pursue it.

Fieldwalking: too many explanations

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The starting line, with one person hanging back...

Autumn is on its way: chillier times forecast for the rest of this week. But we’ve been fortunate over the last few days, when we’ve had a lot of sun and warmish weather. The Paston poetry book is on its way to being completed. I have got just about everything to David, and I’m pretty excited about the way it’s looking. It’s involved quite a lot of work, but it should be worth it. After delivering early versions on CD to Rob and Lucy, I took one to UEA to give to Caroline on Thursday, had a chat with her about it, and in the evening we were able to duscuss her reactions (and everyone else’s) at the Paston trustees’ meeting.

That set me up nicely for a visit to Coventry on the Friday, with Phil driving. Really easy journey over there in glorious weather, and the meeting went well, all of us agreeing on maintaining the status quo. Andrew again seemed very well; we took him to buy some jeans at Matalan afterwards, and then for a very good meal at Fridays, followed by a trip down Memory Lane – the lane in this case involving Beanfield Avenue, The Chesils and certain parts of north Coventry which I did not know before or during our visit there. Yes, we got lost – but not seriously, and Andrew was actually able to guide us back towards the end. He was in good form.

During the trip we just avoided a nasty accident when a car pulled out in front of us: Phil managed to avoid both the car and a crowd of women on the nearside pavement, which was quite an achievement. Later, as we were about to enter the M6, another car shot round from our left and in front of us. The slower the speed limits, the crazier the drivers. Happily, Joy was praying for us. The journey home was not bad, though we had to detour around Elveden as usual.

On Saturday Dot and I went fieldwalking in Paston as part of the latest project. I suspected this might not be my cup of tea, and it wasn’t – but I’m glad we gave it a go. It was another lovely day, and it would have been nice to spend longer than the ten minutes or so that we devoted to actually finding artefacts. Richard Hoggett, who was in charge, was if anything too thorough in his preparation and said the same things several times. But a lot of it was interesting. On the whole, though, I am not all that enthused by bits of things from a long time ago: there always seems to me to be too many possible explanations for things being what and where they are, and the ones settled on are too random. (Dot managed to listen to the Norwich City game while fieldwalking: we beat Swansea 3-1.)

Sunday was a quieter day after another child-friendly communion service, though we did manage to lock ourselves out of the hall after Elizabeth bolted the kitchen door and the Yale-operated main door slammed shut. Had to fetch the Yale key from the vicarage , but no real problem.

The band played on

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An eagle, not a griffin

It’s a soggy October midweek, and I’m just back from Paston, having delivered a CD containing the Paston poetry book file to Lucy, and dropping another off at Rob Knee’s house in North Walsham. A third will go to Caroline at the UEA tomorrow. Meanwhile David is having a look at it to see what he can do to improve it. I’ve already mistaken a spread eagle for a griffin, so that was a good catch (Lucy). Bit nervous about how it’s all going to come together, especially as Lucy doesn’t seem to be able to find the ISBN numbers she has lying around somewhere.

Spent most of Monday and part of yesterday putting the book together, which proved a bit easier than I had anticipated. Had time to clear up some leaves yesterday afternoon, and in the evening we nearly went to the cinema, but H predictably turned up for our Tuesday Group, not having picked up the cancellation message: she was going to come to the cinema with us, but she walked so slowly that we put her on a bus instead and went home to watch three episodes of Battlestar Galactica. I know it doesn’t make an awful lot of sense, but it did at the time. Rather like the query to a wire payment via Lloyds to America for one of our church speakers: it took them eight days to realise there was a problem (which I think we’ve just sorted). Taking eight days to spot a problem doesn’t make much sense either.

Sunday was our big day: it marked my out-of-church debut as a singer in a band, all miked up and with spotlights and everything. The band was Dot (violin), Phil (guitar) and myself (vocals and guitar), and we performed three of my songs – Man in the mask; As soon as it stops raining; and The band played on – at the Seagull Theatre in Lowestoft  as part of their regular “New Words, Fresh Voices” event. I had taken part in this as a poet, but thought I’d give the singing a go after Ian Fosten, the owner and compere, pleaded for more music. Predictably, there was only one poet on Sunday: the rest was music. I didn’t feel we were outshone: the first two songs went really well, and Dot and Phil were really pleased to have done it. As was I, of course. Our band doesn’t have name, but Phil suggested Normal for Norfolk! He is keen to do more, which has to be good.

I’m now feeling better after getting really tired at the end of last week, when an awful lot seemed to be going on – a lot of it on the computer (poetry book) and preparing songs for Sunday, as well as writing a new song which we didn’t use! On Thursday there was a meeting at Dragon Hall about the November Paston event, as a result of which I now have a fairly clear idea about what’s happening when. Except the children’s art/poetry workshop, but I have connected Annette with Sarah to discuss this between them. I’m not usually that good at delegation, so something of a result.

In the afternoon Hilary and I went to Bridges – which is now on Magdalen Road, and not Charing Cross, as I thought – to pick up a bag of Adrian’s poetry books which were going to be thrown out. I’ve had a look at a few but been rather disappointed so far.

Friday was also busy. Dot and I had lunch with the Kibbles at Prezzos, which was very pleasant, but it overlapped slightly with the visit of Rob Knee to make some decisions about the Paston book. Worked out all right, though, and Rob and I were pretty much of one mind, which was good.

Have arranged to see David and the grandchildren over half-term; so that’s pretty exciting. Now to decide what to get Amy for her birthday.