I’m taking further steps to clear the barns, I’m glad to say, and hope that I can clear quite a large space in the next few weeks, having already sold the tractor and the two Morris Minors. This evening, I’ve paid all the bills and finally worked out how much gas the Aga burns daily, which will enable me and Roses to share the bills fairly accurately. I have more paperwork to do tomorrow, but will have Zerlina and Gus most of next week, so don’t want anything left over by then – though I’ll have evenings from Tuesday onwards. There always seems to be a backlog of work though, I wonder how I’ll ever catch up with it all.
It’s been a good week, however busy – to the extent that I haven’t blogged, even though there were things I wanted to write about. The most interesting day was Wednesday, when I was interviewing Year 11s – they are all given a mock interview, it being part of the process of preparing them for applying to university, jobs and apprentices and so on. I met fifteen young people and it was most interesting. Some of them are so mature and clear-sighted, it’s quite remarkable, and there was something to like in every one of them. It’s noticeable that many of them, particularly the ones who seem to be particularly happy and confident, have a very good relationship with their parents. Several referred to the influence one or both parents have on them, and to the advice and support of an elder sibling. It’s rather lovely. I went over to Al and co for supper afterwards and that was a delight as well. By the time I got back, having been out of the house for rather over 12 hours (though I dropped in quickly to feed bantams and tortoises), I was sufficiently tired to go straight to bed.
Last night, I wrote up several of the interviews before going to sleep and then woke at 6 this morning. I am finding it quite difficult to persuade myself of the necessity to get up of a morning unless there’s a pressing reason for it, I am quite able to lie for a couple of hours. In this case, I listened to the radio until I felt revived enough to finish the writing and I was near the end, by about 9 o’clock, when the phone rang. It was my sister-in-law, telling me about her recent very nasty operations. “I’ve looked at Hell three times in the last month,” she told me briskly, “and I’m not ready to go there yet.” The second call was someone wanting to make an appointment this afternoon and the third – I receive few phone calls normally and three before I’d even got up is unprecedented – was someone asking me to propose her for a committee job. So it was after ten by the time I was bathed and dressed and I could only be glad that no one had called and caught me in my scanties.
The funeral this afternoon was uneventful, though the bearers seemed to be ages getting ready to leave with the coffin afterwards and I felt rather self-conscious, piping away on my clarinet. I had given the matter some thought, having planned to play the chorus twice and then, if necessary, play the verse and then the chorus again. In fact, it was chorus, chorus, verse, chorus, chorus, verse, chorus, chorus before the last person left. I played the last one loudly and finished with a flourish. I was heartily glad I wasn’t playing it on the organ, anyway.
I’m going to take the programme for the Aldeburgh Festival to bed with me and have a browse. I look forward to moving nearer to Norwich in due course, but I do regret that I will be too far to want to go to concerts at Snape regularly any more. Even the 40 minute drive is a bit tedious on my own, and doubling it will probably be out of the question. Still, there has to be a roundabout to go with the swings, doesn’t there?
Be my Valentine! MMMMWWAAHH!
Mwah, darling! XXX
Maybe, when you get to the Norwich=y area you’ll meet a Snape concert goer who wants company…
Yes, perhaps I will – and there are lots of things on in Norwich, which I used to go to. I’ve lost the habit. Snape is special enough to make the effort for, at least from here.