Spring, perhaps

I have thought about this blog a lot over the past two months. Easter has come and gone and we have spent two weeks in Vence. There has been snow and rain and last Saturday morning Judith's husband finally died at home. He had spent a week or two in a hospice but wanted to come home for the end of his life. I am working extra shifts, as are some of the other staff members. 

We left for France on April 6th, two years to the day after our daughter's funeral.  I took the little picture of her as a new-born, an original picture in a little frame. In the cold weather I kept this under my pillow, remembering how she hated to be cold. I have continued to do this. the weather was disappointing; it rained for four days in a row. We went to Antibes on Friday instead of Thursday and sat inside the restaurant. The journeys there and back were trouble-free. The weekend of April 27th to 29th we spent in Winchester. After our Friday morning walk we returned home, finished our packing and went to the Royal Hotel. This is in the centre of Winchester and was originally the bishop's house. Dan played bridge and on Saturday morning I went to see the Gerald Scarfe exhibition in The Gallery, which is in the public library in Jewry Street. I enjoyed it. He is undoubtedly very gifted, although I know nothing about art. I met Dan for lunch and then he want back for more bridge. I went to our room and read; I started using the e-reader again when we were in Vence. Dan is going to buy me a Kindle Paperwhite for my birthday. I have already got his birthday present. He found a new Stetson cap in the Chapellerie in Antibes. This replaces the one that he left on the train when we last went to the Albert Hall. 

We have bought our tickets for the events we want to see at the Hay festival. The How The Light Gets In festival will be back at Hay but we were disappointed last time and do not want any tickets this year. Afterwards we shall spend two nights at Pound Farm and meet the new canine additions to the family. I shall, of course, be glad to get home. Dan has booked our bed and breakfast accommodation. Our friends have bought a caravan which they will use. 

My poor, sick old uncle lives on, although one could hardly call it living. I have a bottle of wine for Sandra but forgot to take it when she was actually working a shift. This week or perhaps next week we shall see her. Yesterday, when I was working in the charity shop, a woman came in who used to work at Steep House. She was surprised that he is still alive. He does not answer when we speak to him. He is like a little husk.  

There is no news of our son. I doubt that we shall ever see or hear from him again. A man at the Probus Club, who is Dan's vice-chairman, is estranged from his daughter. He thinks that in four or five years Neil will return and want to be our son again. I do not agree. He is gone for ever. Dan will not have him back. 

I have been in a lot of pain recently. I am trying not to take Co-codamol. I have run out of the Voltarol patches that we buy in France. My neck is sore and I have been taking Ibuprofen; that is really cheap. My doctor prescribes strong Co-codamol but I do not like to ask for too much. There is a little arthritis in my left ankle and foot and that is the side where the sciatica strikes. Old age ain't no place for sissies. 

Two years on

So long since I last posted. A lot has happened. I am still working at the charity shop and Judith's husband is still alive. It is not easy for her. He is refusing to have carers because of his privacy and dignity. She is going to explore the possibility of engaging a Rosemary Foundation nurse or a bed in The Rowans Hospice. He is increasingly disabled and is at times not altogether compos mentis. So hard; they do not deserve this. 

Last weekend we went to the Isle of Wight to stay with our daughter's godmother and her husband. It was Mothering Sunday on our last day there. I had forgotten this. Of course, there was no card from my son. Anne did not get any cards either, but two of her daughters and her elder son phoned her and her younger son sent a text message. The night before we went to the theatre in Shanklin to see Russell Watson. It was enjoyable but there was too much amplification for a relatively small theatre. We lunched out on Saturday at a pleasant pub in Brading. We walked on Sunday morning to Sandown Bay and got the bus back. It was a very pleasant break. 

It has been milder after what was called The Beast from the East. It was not as beastly as forecast but was pretty bad. There was snow and sub-zero temperatures. We are fortunate that we live so centrally. We stocked up with food and stayed in, not walking on Friday morning as usual. We managed our Sunday visit to the nursing home. He has shrunk; he seldom acknowledges us. We sit and drink tea and eat the chocolate éclairs that I like so much.  How much longer can this go on? I have paid for his funeral and decided on the music. When we go into the chapel it will be the Morriston Orpheus Choir singing Swansea Town. During the slideshow we shall have Cleo Laine singing Bill. As we leave the chapel at the end of the service it will be Glenn Miller playing Moonlight Serenade. 

In an hour or so it will be two years since I last spoke to my daughter. I wish, I so wish, that we had gone to her that night. I wish I had phoned her first thing in the morning. I miss her every day. I have her baby picture in a little frame; during the intensely cold spell and more recent cold nights I have taken this into bed with me, tucking it under the pillow. She hated being cold. 

Tomorrow we are going to London. We shall take the train there and back (and pray that the snow that is forecast will not be sufficiently heavy to cause delays) and visit Churchill's wartime cabinet rooms. Then we shall go to a concert at the Albert Hall with our friend Jim and his sister and brother-in-law. If there is time we shall go to the V&A before the concert. We have a box with some women from Dan's bridge club.  Afterwards we shall dine at the Union Jack Club, which is conveniently near Waterloo station. I think it will be a good idea to check that trains are running before we dine. 

Post-Christmas Gloom

How long it is since I posted in this blog. I have been busy; since Robin Nettle was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, I have done some extra shifts in the charity shop. It has not been easy. Donna is not coping well and constantly nit-picks. She takes every opportunity to wrong-foot me and Ethel is finding the same. However, just before Christmas she did apologise and told Ethel just how difficult she is finding it all. 

We had an enjoyable weekend in Shanklin from December 1st to 3rd. My friend gave me a navy blue Laura Ashley overcoat, which I have had dry-cleaned and also had a small repair made. I wore it when we went to France for Christmas. We went out on Saturday and Sunday and saw Yarmouth and one or two other places. The Isle of Wight is a pleasant place. 

We went to the Probus Christmas lunch; very nice food, most of the company was good but we were seated on the same table as a very opinionated woman. Dan is going to be elected chairman at the end of this month and so we shall be on Table 1 for the next two years. I hope we can choose whom we sit with. We also had the Walking for Health lunch at the same pub; better company and the same meal. The following day we took off from Gatwick for our holiday. 

We spent Christmas at the flat in Vence. It was very pleasant and we were lucky with the weather again. It rained on Wednesday and Thursday after Christmas but was pleasant enough when we walked up to lunch at La Farigoule on Thursday December 28th. We only had one other meal out. We had come back from Vallauris, where we were chasing up some parts for our kitchen, and we parked at the Leclerc supermarket. We had quite a shopping list. Dan suggested that we have lunch out and I suggested the Restaurant les Baous, very nearby. We went and had a most enjoyable lunch. I could not finish  my pizza so asked for and was given a box to take it home in. 

The picture is of my father's youngest brother. There were four brothers, of which my father was the eldest. All three of his brothers predeceased him. One died in infancy. The youngest died in 1954 at the age of 36. The other died in Melbourne, Victoria, at the age of 65. It is the youngest whose picture heads this post. He had no children but was married to a very sweet woman who stayed part of our family after he died.  She married again and had three children, two sons (one of whom was stillborn) and a daughter. Her second husband was absorbed into our family and made a speech at our wedding. Since my mother died Ruby has continued as my friend and confidante. Lately I have noticed that she is getting deaf. Today we took her out to lunch. On our way to collect her we stopped at my youngest brother's house to drop off some watercolours that my late aunt wanted him to have. He said that he had spoken to her on the phone and she was "hard work". Yes; it is true that there is a degree of confusion. I think that he is exaggerating but the problem is there. I was planning to get in touch with my eldest brother's first wife with a view of taking Ruby to see her. Ruby is only four years older than Gaye and they used to be good friends. When I mentioned this and Ruby said "Which one is that?" I realised that I must abandon that idea. Gaye has multiple sclerosis and is very frail. Perhaps she, too, is slipping into dementia. What a cruel condition that is. 

Tomorrow is the first day back in the charity shop for me. I am not looking forward to it but needs must. I do not feel that I can leave while Judith is struggling with her husband's ill health. She was very kind to me when Katy died.  In the evening we are going to see some friends as it is the husband's birthday. Despite my resolution about presents Dan has bought him a bottle of Armagnac for his birthday. His wife's birthday is next month. It still rankles that I am not worth a present; a share in someone else's second-hand kitsch or nothing at all is good enough for me. I shall rise above it. 

My old uncle lives on, although one can hardly call it living. I have asked the manager of the home to let me know at any hour of the day or night if he dies. The next hurdle will be his funeral; I have planned a cremation (his wish) and a simple service in the chapel where my daughter's service was held. We shall see. 

Tired and stressed

I have been doing extra shifts at the charity shop and I find that I cannot do this the way I used to. I am working on my own behind the till most of the time and the deputy manager, who is in charge while the manager takes time off because of her husband's illness, is not good at dealing with people. She is constantly criticising and complaining. At the end of the shift there will be fulsome thanks, which in no way reduces the irritation of the obstacle course which she sets for the volunteers. I have been thinking quite seriously of giving up volunteering, but until the manager's situation is clearer I do not feel I can do this. It is only a few weeks to Christmas, when we are going away, so I shall grin and bear it. 

We had friends to dinner last Saturday. It was the second time we had entertained in our new dining room. It was a pleasant occasion. We drank the last bottle of my birthday champagne and ate fish, chicken, lemon posset with fruit and cheese. The others drank other wine with the meal, but I did not risk it. Only fizzy wine seems to agree with me nowadays. I gave the couple some little gloves for their grandchildren. 

We are hoping to go to Shanklin before Christmas. I have the same little gloves for two of my friend's grandchildren and would like to have them by Christmas. I shall never, ever have grandchildren of my own and so I like to give to Anne's. She has five children and eight grandchildren. Often really good toys and clothes come into the charity shop and I buy these; I get a good discount.  If my son ever settles down and has children I know that he will never let us see them. My heart aches for him. He must be so lonely and unhappy. I have unblocked him on Facebook again, but there is no activity. I suspect that he calls my mobile phone from time to time; there are anonymous calls that are in the block log. Next January it will be six years since he chose to fall out with me. I never, ever thought that it was a serious rift. Now I know different.

We are going out on Saturday night. I do not like going out at nights nowadays. It is not far; just to Lavant Street. The friends who came to us last week will be there and the husband of the other couple we socialise with. His wife has gone with a friend on a bridge weekend. The numbers will be made up to six by their next-door neighbour, the widow of a man who worked at IBM at the same time as Dan. She is pleasant and good company.  I shall not drink much alcohol. 

We are walking tomorrow. The next two Fridays we shall not; Dan has a hospital appointment on December 1st and is meeting and lunching with the personnel of the local Citizens' Advice Bureau on the 8th. He has been project managing the move from a building near the Festival Hall to the library. On Tuesday it is the monthly Probus meeting. Four weeks from today we leave for Vence. I am worrying, of course. The M25 may be closed or choked with traffic. It may snow and the airport may be closed. We may have an accident; the flight may be late or cancelled. I hope not. I enjoyed our Christmas last year. I would like it to be as pleasant again. 

 

Thoughts of Christmas

I have not blogged recently. I have done a few extra shifts in the charity shop. Fortunately Mondays have been shared with the person I like working with; Ethel, who has become a friend. We laugh together at some of the things that customers say and at the behaviour of some of our fellow volunteers. We have named one person Brown Nose and another Herr Flick. The shop  manager is in a difficult situation at present. Her husband has been diagnosed with cancer. The tumour is pressing against a lung and originated in the bones. He is going to take what she calls the shrinkage drug. 

Last Wednesday I did not work  because my old friends came up from the Isle of Wight. Owing to various operations (theirs and mine) and family issues, this is the first time we have seen them this year. They are the first people to be entertained in our dining room.Dan outdid himself with the meal and I opened a bottle of my birthday champagne for Anne and me to share. I seldom drink so much; we followed the champagne with a bottle of Prosecco. She brought me a belated birthday present; a beautiful lead crystal jug. Dan received a jug too, but his is silver. I was able to give her some toys for her grandchildren and a Portmeirion quiche dish for her kitchen. Like me, she likes Portmeirion goods.  

We have decided to spend Christmas in our flat in Vence again. Flights are booked already. The old-established airline Monarch went out of business a few weeks ago and we wanted to be sure of getting a choice of flights. I am looking forward to it and hope that we are as lucky with the weather as we were last year.  It will give us a chance to enjoy our new kitchen. We have to get a door and a plinth from Ixina in Vallauris to complete the job. 

Last Thursday we went to the Yvonne Arnaud theatre in Guildford. We took friends with us to see The Wipers Times. It was excellent. We don't go to the theatre at Christmas now. We always took Katy on Boxing Day or soon after Christmas because she loved live performances.  Dan used to get cheap tickets for Monday evenings at the Kings Theatre in Southsea; we took both children to see Bonnie Langford as Peter Pan. I remember Katy leaning forward as the curtain went up, eager not to miss any of the play. I miss her. I always shall. 

Dan has been too busy to go on the Alice Holt Forest walk. Today he was at the Citizens' Advice Bureau in Petersfield, helping to manage the project of moving the bureau to the library. Next Tuesday it is the Probus lunch and the talk is about the Severn Railway Bridge disaster of 1960. One more monthly lunch and then it will be the Christmas dinner. 

Today I was on the Southampton Heritage Photos page on Facebook. I saw a comment from someone whose maiden name I recognised. We were at junior school together. I hope to chat with her on the Internet. She was not a particular friend but I remember her as a pleasant person. I wonder if she has kept in touch with anyone from that school.  I have not; I moved away from the Southampton area in 1975 and shall never go back. I am too happy here in Petersfield. I think it's the best place I have ever lived and I never want to move. Dan feels the same. I feel pleased that he has such a good social life now. Learning to play bridge and joining the walking group were my ideas but they have worked out well for him. He shoots clay pigeons, plays petanque and is president of his bridge club. I think he will be chairman of the Probus club next year. 

I shall blog again soon. I am still taking painkillers. I found that Boots no longer sell the caplets I prefer but Tesco pharmacy does and I got some from an online pharmacy. They help me sleep. I use heat patches for my arthritic neck and bought another woollen shawl last week. I am growing old, as we all are. 

A Precious Picture Rediscovered

When our beloved daughter died it was comforting to have pictures of her on display.  The saddest thing was that I could not find her baby book, with her new-born picture in. I asked my husband's sisters to search the house where their father lived but nothing could be found. Today my husband was sorting out some old pictures that were in a box that used to be under a chair in our bedroom. Some of these came from my late aunt's house (the wife of the man for whom I took responsibility). She had kept the copy I sent her when our baby was born. It has been scanned and is now on the little marble table with the other pictures. 

It is some time since I have updated this blog. We have been to France, where we had our kitchen renovated, returned from there and taken up our usual life. Dan has been playing petanque and bridge and I have been doing extra hours at the charity shop. Last Thursday we celebrated our 49th wedding anniversary. We decided to go out for lunch rather than dinner as Dan had the AGM of the bridge club in the evening. We lunched at the Turkish restaurant in Bakery Lane. We enjoyed our meal; the food and service were excellent. We forgot that we had theatre tickets for the week before last and have decided to put all our appointments in our Outlook calendars. 

I enjoyed the last Probus meeting. The speaker was our chair person's boss at one time. He is a very important government archivist and he was very interesting. At the end we were each given a handout, photocopies of prints of Domesday book pages and a few other things, including the table of heights and weights to calculate the drop for judicial hanging. The next meeting is not until the very end of the month. One more meeting and then it will be the Christmas lunch. 

We have visited the old man twice since our return from Vence. The first time he managed a little chocolate. On Saturday he did not seem to be responding at all. Yet still he lives on. I wonder how many people will come to his funeral when he finally dies. I have planned the funeral, although I do not think that his family will like what I have planned. I think that his niece wants hymns and prayers. There is no point in doing this; he had no religious faith when he was cogent. I want my aunt to be remembered as her funeral was such a depressing affair. My youngest brother's wife has been very ill with kidney problems, supposedly caused by medical negligence in diagnosing a skin rash. I doubt that he will attend. Perhaps my niece will come, as she was not able to get to her great-aunt's funeral because of the weather.

We walked on both Fridays and are glad to be back in the routine. We are considering joining a Tuesday morning walk at the Alice Holt Forest. Dan will still be able to play petanque in the afternoon and I shall be able to visit the nursing home. 

I shall write about our kitchen renovation in my next post. 

Another June

We arrived home yesterday afternoon after a very pleasant break. We had a good journey to Hay-on-Wye last Friday and found our bed and breakfast accommodation quite easily. We are very pleased with the Old Radnor Barn and have booked a room for next year. It is very difficult to get accommodation in that area when the Hay Festival is on and I was lucky to see this one on Facebook. We met up with our friend Sabine and as our Friday night event had been cancelled we went to the Sun Inn, a pub/ restaurant that Dan and I discovered on our first visit to Hay in 2014.

We enjoyed all of the events we booked. My absolute favourite was the first one we saw, Another Man's Shoes. This was delivered by the daughter of Sven Somme, a fisheries scientist who played a very active part in the Norwegian resistance in World War 2. He escaped from the Gestapo and managed a long walk (and sapling vaulting exercise) to the Swedish border. His daughter had his shoes, kept by a woman who sheltered him. He exchanged them for a pair of mountain boots.

Gary Kasparov is an excellent, energetic speaker although Stephen Fry did not ask him the questions that would have interested Dan. Fry also talked to Peter Singer, the third most eminent philosopher in the world. Perhaps we shall be vegetarians in a generation or two; I shall certainly look up charities on Effective Altruism. Michael Rosen, who was also talking about his children's books in other events, entertained us all on the subject of Emile Zola's escape from Paris with only a nightshirt wrapped in a newspaper.  I now see some of Jane Austen's characters in another light and shall explore Colm Tóibín's books. Simon Schama was as entertaining as ever and has put on a fair bit of weight. The only disappointment was the talk on the Society of Friends. The speakers included Sheila Hancock and Tracy Chevalier. It was interesting but not as good as we thought it would be.

Our bags were searched each time we entered the festival site and there were armed police in pairs and we saw three spaniels with policemen; sniffer dogs, I suppose.  We said good bye to Sabine on Sunday night and on Monday morning we set off to Pound Farm. Angela, my niece, and her husband are kindly taking some presents to my great-niece and nephew in Waltham Massachusetts. We had a pleasant stay and met Rose, the Romanian street dog who has been rescued. Cari found her in the shelter where she volunteers. Rose is about nine years old. The Miles family has had Rose spayed and her blind and infected eye removed. Her coat is glossy now and she has gained weight; she is affectionate and came on a walk with us and Dolly, Cari's Cavalier spaniel. On Tuesday Glyn took Dan for a spin in his Morgan. I think that they both greatly enjoyed  that. They are both very enthusiastic about cars. Glyn has parted with his Harley Davidson motor cycle.

On Tuesday night we went in Glyn's new Porsche to The Inn at Welland for a delicious meal. When we left they gave us presents for our forthcoming 70th birthdays. Angela reminded me that next time we go there will be a new Vizsla puppy; Angie has her name down for a bitch from a recently-born litter.

Preparing for Hay-on-Wye

The eyestrain is still a problem but I am coping. I have an appointment with my optician for Saturday June 10th. We shall see.

After the suicide bomber in Manchester security has been stepped up at the Hay Festival.  We cannot take my little pink rucksack to carry our waterproof trousers and hats and other things we may need. The weather forecast is good on the whole with only a little rain on Saturday. It will be hot for a few days, cooling down on Monday when we go to Pound Farm.

Yesterday I did my morning shift at the charity shop and then we went to Gunwharf Quays. We had a very pleasant lunch outside the Old Customs House and then went looking for wide-fit sandals. We did not find these so went to Whiteley. No luck there either, so we came home and  ordered them online. Dan went to take eggs to Sabine and to discuss our plans for meeting up at Hay. They did not know of his father's death. The funeral is set for June 8th. It will be simple, I hope. Two granddaughters who are close in age will contribute. Lucy will read a poem and Hannah will play the piano; I wonder if they mean play the organ. Neither of my children will be there, of course; our darling Katy is dead and we have not tried to find Neil to tell him of his grandfather's death. He mentioned once that he had "messaged Dad's family". I wonder if they will inform him; perhaps he was telling the truth when he wrote that, perhaps not.

I visited the nursing home on Tuesday afternoon. He had fallen asleep holding his beaker of tea. It had soaked into his shirt and a young female carer said that she would get a colleague and change it for him after I had gone. She would have done it right away but I mopped him up and waited for him to wake up. He did not, so I drank a cup of tea and went on my way. Dan had gone for his Tuesday petanque game.  I walked home via the Lidl supermarket but could not find frikadeller. One day, perhaps.

I meant to take a set of keys to Flat 18 so that the friends who live there can collect our post and put it on the dining table. I shall do that first thing in the morning. I have had my meal and want to go to bed soon. Most things are packed; just the bag that contains my skin care products has to go in my overnight bag. I am vain, I know, but Dan likes me to look smart and cared for. I have always taken care of my complexion.

We have an event to see tomorrow afternoon so must not leave later than 11 am. I have an alarm set because we usually walk on Friday mornings.  I have decided to get out one of my late aunt's rings for my great-niece. I think she will have to have the size altered, but I hope she will like it. We shall meet her new rescue dog and the six guinea pigs. We must find the pet shop in Hay and buy dog chews; we usually do this.

I am listening to an old favourite by Mary Higgins Clark. I have some new books from the Hampshire digital library to listen to. Extra books next month because it is my birthday.

Looking forward to Hay-on-Wye and Pound Farm

Last night I drank a half-bottle of rather nasty Prosecco from Morrison's supermarket. I think that I am better off without alcohol. I felt very headachy this morning but it isn't too bad now. I must try to do without Co-codamol as it is addictive. I alternate prescriptions from the doctor with over-the-counter tablets. I have been  busy today with a few chores. Dan has the gun club tomorrow and I shall do the ironing. We visited the nursing home today and I shall go again on Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon. On Monday we shall go to Whiteley for my follow-up appointment with the eye surgeon and thence to Southampton General to visit Dan's father. I shall buy him some orange chocolate. It will put a little flesh on his bones I hope.

We walked yesterday and it was very pleasant to be with the other members. Several people were not there because they had gone to see the rhododendrons at Exbury Gardens. We had coffee and biscuits as usual and then set off home. I collected my Austin Reed trousers from the dry cleaner and bought some low-calorie soup from Waitrose. We are very well-supplied with shops in this little town. There is Tesco, Marks and Spencer and Waitrose. I am a great yellow-sticker fan; I always eat ready meals on the nights when Dan goes out to bridge.

On Thursday we shall be packing to go to the literary festival at Hay-on-Wye. This will be the fourth time we have gone. We have bed and breakfast this time. Last year we had a tent and I was cold and miserable. I could not face such a thing again and it is very difficult to get bed and breakfast accommodation in Hay when the festival is on. We shall arrive on Friday afternoon and leave at lunchtime on Bank Holiday Monday. Then we shall drive to my niece's home to stay two nights. We shall meet Rose, the one-eyed Romanian rescue dog that has been adopted from the animal shelter where my great-niece volunteers. There are also six guinea pigs. Things have changed since the above photograph was taken. The dogs are Gizi,  the Hungarian Vizsla, Maddie, the boxer and Dolly, the Cavalier spaniel. Gizi and Maddie are both dead, Gizi from a heart attack at seven or eight years old, Maddie from cancer. There has been another Vizsla, a savage-tempered bitch called Hebe. She attacked Dolly once with the intention of killing her and was then segregated from the little spaniel. She was shaping up well as a gun dog but after an encounter on the Malvern hills with a boisterous Ridgeback, she became vicious and unpredictable again and it was decided that euthanasia was the only solution. I think that Angela is searching for another Vizsla; she likes to do her research. The weather forecast is good for  both Hay and Dymock but we shall take our Wellington boots all the same. We enjoy walking the dogs.

Coping and continuing to function

I am home for a few hours as I have agreed to work the afternoon in the charity shop. I went in as usual, taking the box of biscuits that I bought in Leclerc. I stayed for an hour or so and then came home via the health stores where I buy most of my breakfast cereals. I also visited some of the other charity shops in the town.

Yesterday Dan went to Alresford to play petanque as usual. I did not visit my aged uncle as my left eye is still sore. Around 5.30 Dan's cousin and his wife arrived. We had a very pleasant meal together at the local ASK Italian restaurant. Philip is a very eminent professor of astronomy. We have visited him in La Palma, off the coast of Tenerife and Cape Town, where he was leading important projects. He and Anne have twin sons. It was good to see them and catch up on their travels and activities.  Anne is a scientific programmer and they met when Philip went to NASA. She is an American from Dublin, Pennsylvania. We have an invitation to visit them in Oxford.

I had my second vitrectomy on Monday afternoon. It went well. I was not so heavily anaesthetised this time and conversed a little with the surgeon. During cataract surgery one is conscious all the time and can make conversation with the surgeon's team. I am now washing my hands more times than Lady Macbeth in order to carry out the regime of eye drops. I have antibiotics four times a day for a week and anti-inflammatory drops four times a day for four weeks. When I go out I wear dark glasses. The pupil of the left eye is still a little dilated, making the vision fuzzy.

I have some emails to which I must reply. One is from my cousin in Melbourne, one from an old school friend and the other from my friend Adele. She and I met in Kingston, NY in 1974. Our respective husbands were both assigned to the IBM plant in that little town in the foothills of the Catskill mountains. We would have got on well together however we had met and have been firm friends ever since. Adele separated from her husband in 1976 and has not  married again. She has come close to it twice but remains single. At my daughter's funeral my three oldest friends were present; one from schooldays, one from civil service days, one from IBM assignment days. I value them all.

The weather is getting warmer. It has been very cold during our absence in France. I left the warm quilt on our bed and am glad that I did. I think that I shall change it next week. Tomorrow is chores day; ironing and polishing the silver. My dining room is going to be complete sometime in the summer. I am looking for a little table for the living room and for lamps for the dining room. There remains one room, the smallest (or smaller) bedroom, that needs a new oak floor. Dan uses it as a study/ office. It still has the rather horrid carpet that was there when we bought the flat. This, too, will come to pass. Patience.

Home again

We arrived home last night, a little before 9.30 pm. On the outward and return journeys we got the ferry before the one we had booked. I have done most of the unpacking and some of the laundry. We visited the old man in the nursing home; he ate most of a chocolate iced doughnut and drank some tea. I shall not see him again until next Saturday as I have my second vitrectomy tomorrow.

Friends invited us for supper, which was eaten in their garden. We brought back cigarettes and Armagnac for them. One of them has given up smoking. His wife is resolved to do so but their business is so busy at present that she is smoking to help deal with the stress. I sympathise but I am fond of her and would like her to give up that habit because of the long-term health risks. While we were there her neighbour dropped in with invitations for all four of us to her fiftieth birthday party in September. It will be in the upstairs room of a local restaurant. We shall go if at all possible. If our daughter had been still with us, I think that she would have invited her as well. Katy loved a party.

Emmanuel Macron has been elected President of the Republic of France. We watched very little television last week because of the coverage of the presidential elections. Marine le Pen makes the dreadful Theresa May look almost human. Macron is, I suppose, the lesser of the two evils. We shall see. Our car was searched at Calais last night, by young French soldiers with formidable guns. One traveller, obviously annoyed at having his car searched, asked the young man if he was old enough to carry a gun. The soldier replied "I do not speak English". He was quite dead-pan. I admire his panache.

I shopped for clothes for my new great-nephew when we were in Vence. I bought a little two-piece outfit of denim trousers and top and a little blue-striped T-shirt. They are bigger sizes than the baby needs now.  My niece is going to visit her cousin and his family later in the year and will take the gifts with them. I have a silver articulated fish that belonged to my late aunt and shall send that to the new baby's sister.

We shall return to Vence towards the end of June. Before that we shall go to Hay-on-Wye and to visit my niece.

I am tired; time for bed. First I must lay the table for breakfast.

Two weeks to homeward journey preparations

I have just had a lunch of low-calorie vegetable soup, a brown finger roll and a bar of chocolate marzipan. I must start ironing and continue cleaning. Most of the packing is done. We leave circa 5 am tomorrow. I  have just read on Facebook that the snow fell low on the Alpes-Maritimes last night. I am wondering how our journey on the Route Napoleon will be on Saturday. We must shop when we arrive in Vence. We are taking a few groceries but most shops close on Sundays in France.

I like the apartment we have in France but I am happiest of all here in this little market town. We have a very pleasant, roomy flat in a central location with easy access to everything we need. We have got to know a lot of people. We were overwhelmed by the number of people who came to our daughter's funeral last year. Dan is vice-chairman of the Probus club and chairman of the bridge club. He plays petanque and shoots clay pigeons. We are happy here and I am always glad to return. On Thursday May 4 I shall wake up, shower and have breakfast and then put the suitcase on our bed. I shall start packing, just as I do here for the outward journey. Around midday we shall walk into the town and have lunch at La Regence. It will be another early night. This is the day I shall  be looking forward to; I shall  be fretting to come home, albeit silently, from Monday of that week.

The journey is a long one. When I have had my second vitrectomy I shall offer to do some of the driving to and from Dover. I drive so seldom now. I have renewed my driving licence and I think that my vision is good enough apart from the floaters. Dan is not a patient passenger so I like to leave the job to him. I do not drive fast enough to please him and I am nervous about overtaking. I think that perhaps we shall go out into the country together and I shall practise a little while before I start driving on town roads and motorways.  

Tomorrow night we shall stay at the Ibis Hotel in Besançon, the town where Victor Hugo was born. It is a fortified city and has a lot of history. I would like one day to stay a few days and look around. We have tried a lot of different towns and hotels for our stay-over, but this hotel and this town are what we like best. The restaurant is very good. The only problem we ever encounter is sometimes at breakfast time. There are coachloads of oriental people. They are not Japanese; those people are very polite and besides. one cannot mistake a Japanese face. If we do not go down to breakfast very early these travellers appropriate all the food. They take petits pains and croissants, yogurts and fruit and put them in their travelling bags. The restaurant and kitchen staff are very kind to us and bring us food. It does not always happen. The latest in the year we have stayed at Besançon was in  2015. We had delayed our trip because Katy had an oophorectomy on September 26. She stayed with us for two weeks after the operation. We came home in early November. The day we left Vence we drove up into the mountains and parked in the square in Castellane as usual. Everything was closed and shuttered; it was cold and misty. We travelled on and had lunch at the Courtepaille near Voiron. I doubt that we shall drive down that late in the year again.

Yesterday we visited Dan's father. He is very confused; dementia is gaining a hold on his mind. He is incontinent now. Dan found him some snooker to watch on the television and we had a cup of tea because there was fresh milk. The house is dirty. We still feel Elizabeth's absence greatly. I tried to make him understand what caused Katy's death but he is very deaf and will not use a hearing aid. He will not long remember what I said anyway.

I must email the manager of Steep House to let her know that we shall be away. I have reminded her of our cell phone numbers. I am still smarting from the television business. I know that is petty and foolish but I would have expected the woman to familiarise herself with my uncle's state of health before suggesting that I bring in a television for him. I shall bring the carers the usual large box of biscuits. I know they like their sweet things to eat in their tea breaks. In the last few years I have provided a lot of those.

Memories and preparations

It is a week since I made an entry in this blog. It has been a fairly busy time. Both mornings in the charity shop there were few staff members. I have not phoned the dentist but I did make a hair appointment with the agreeable looking blonde woman in the downstairs hair salon. We shopped in Havant again and on Good Friday morning we walked with our WFH group. It was good to see the bluebells and wild garlic on the other side of the A272. The weather was pleasant although there was a cold edge to the wind.

I miss my daughter so much at Easter. Three years ago she stayed with us for the Easter weekend because she was so ill. We went to her flat on Maundy Thursday and called the paramedics; Katy was in bed and could not eat or easily walk. On the following Tuesday we took her to her doctor who telephoned the Queen Alexandra hospital and arranged for her to be admitted. She did not want to go; she burst into tears and cried that she hated going to hospital. We took her to medical assessment and they put her on oxygen straight away. The following day she was transferred to the respiratory ward where she stayed for three weeks. At one point it was feared that she had lymphoma. She came to stay with us for the weekend after she was discharged from hospital. Fortunately the lymphoma tests came back negative; it was just a particularly severe infection that sent her lymph system into overdrive.

Tomorrow I shall start getting things ready for our holiday. I want to change the bed linen before we leave and have as much done as possible. I shall not feel like housework for a day or two after my eye operation and shall not visit my aged uncle on the Tuesday afternoon.  We saw him yesterday and he ate a cream slice and some chocolate buttons. I have got over the resentment I felt over his niece telephoning the manager of the home about a television set that would be no use to him. I am sure that she and her daughter meant well and were just thoughtless. She would not remember the article from the Daily Mail that she sent me. It was about surgery for age-related macular degeneration. Mr McLean, consultant ophthalmologist, opined that it would not be suitable for him, partly because of his age and because it would probably not be successful anyway. The manager of the home wants me to see her about a "care plan". I am mystified about this; the residents' needs are obvious and the fees are steep. Surely no planning should be necessary over and above the routine organisation of such an establishment. The present manager is not too bad. The excellent Marion Flett left a few years ago. Her successor, one Tracy Katterns, was not up to the job and I made many complaints to the head office because of problems. It is so tiring, forever complaining. The present receptionist is sour-faced and unhelpful, although not as obnoxious as the person who worked for the dreadful Katterns.

I am still taking Co-codamol to help me sleep. I still do not want to get up in the mornings but I always do. I keep going. I have been alone behind the till at the charity shop the last two mornings I was there; Ethel was not well again. On Wednesday there were few members of staff there again. I coped; I enjoy the work. I suppose that it is necessary for me to do this or I shall become a complete recluse. I am rather relieved that my intolerance of spectacle correction does not allow me to play bridge now; I doubt that I could put up with the politics of the bridge club and I could not  meet the exacting standards of some of the people we know. It was my idea to learn and the benefits for Dan have been immense. He has made many friends and has new activities. It was because of the people we met playing bridge that he joined the Probus Club. His chairmanship of the residents' association her in our block of flats led to his playing petanque twice a week. I am glad for him; I am not much company some times. I enjoy the walks but I am being excluded now from the tougher ones with our friends. I cannot  manage the hills so easily.  I spend those Sundays alone unless someone is free to collect me and take me to lunch at whatever pub they have decided to visit for lunch. I do not mind this. I can catch up on domestic chores and listen to my IPod or watch an old film on television. The Sunday walks will begin again in June.

Almost April

Dan has gone to the Heath to play petanque. I am listening to an audio book from the Hampshire digital library. I have not visited the nursing home this week. Last night my uncle's niece, who is also his next of kin, telephoned from Swansea. She visited him on Sunday and subsequently telephoned the manager. It was suggested that Bill should be given a television. I know that the current manager has not been there long. I know she is busy and has not got the easiest job. However, she should have looked at my uncle's record before making that suggestion. He is registered blind/ severely sight impaired. When he first lived at Steep House he used to monopolise the television in the top lounge; he watched Sky News all the time. I would intervene if I was there and put another channel on. He would sometimes watch the TV in his room but in the end he could no longer follow the programmes. Before it got too difficult for me, I used to read the paper to him and  now Sandra, the head of activities, does that. Some days he is receptive and some days he is not. He did remember who Patricia is; he said she was his brother's daughter, which is true. Her father was killed in the war and she was brought up by Bill's parents. She is more like a younger sister than a niece.  When I was finally able to get in touch with her I wondered if she would resent me, but that has not happened. She lost her husband in 2009 and a few years ago her son died suddenly; I know how that feels. Bill was still cogent when Bryan died but could not take in the death of his great-nephew.

It is two weeks to Good Friday. I shall not have to work in the charity shop on Easter Monday, which will be a pleasant break. The following Friday we shall be leaving for Vence and I shall not be in the shop again until  Wednesday May 10th. I shall enjoy the break. There is much work to do in the apartment; I must get the big curtain down from the patio door to the terrace and wash it. There will be bedlinen to launder. Dan will rake up pine needles and olive leaves and we must entertain whichever English neighbours are there. I love that part of France. We shall go to Antibes for lunch and leave our car in the park and ride carpark. The shuttle (navette) used to be free but now costs a euro. We always walk back through the Vieux Port and look at the yachts. I used to buy presents for my two children at one time. Then Neil went to the Midlands and we seldom heard from him. When he came south again I used to  bring him gifts from holidays again; at the end of 2013 I stopped giving him presents at all. He never thanked me and Dan resented it. Neil had his 40th birthday two days after his sister's funeral, which he did not attend. I sent him a text message. It hurt me that I could not celebrate this birthday with him. I think that he is a deeply unhappy and troubled man, but he does not want my love or help.

I must compile a shopping list as we are going to Tesco. I also need to buy breakfast cereals from the shop in Lavant Street. We shall walk tomorrow and there are things that need doing here; I must sort out the linen chest and take the bedlinen that we no longer use to the charity shop. Our friend Sabine, whose opinion Dan values, agrees with me that the room where a new oak floor has just been laid should be a dining room and not a bedroom. I have always wanted that; when we bought this flat my father-in-law was eighty-two and his wife was eighty-one. His health was not of the best and we did not expect him to live as long as he has. They used to stay with us at Christmas and other times, when we took them to the theatre. Elizabeth was a good, sweet person and I think a true Christian. Katy loved her so much and Elizabeth returned her love. I miss them both.

Bearable Probus Club Meeting

I went to bed early last night but did not sleep until after midnight. Dan went to his Monday night bridge session and I took my small Bose device and iPod to bed. I am listening to Jodi Picoult's Salem Falls. It's a good novel, about an attractive teacher who has been falsely accused by a teenage girl of statutory rape. After a short spell in jail he happens upon a small town where he gets a menial job, working for a woman who blames herself for her daughter's death from meningitis and behaves as if the child is still alive. That strikes a chord. I hope it all ends happily for both protagonists.

The matter of false accusations is a serious one. The most notable one recently was that of Mark Pearson, a commuter who possibly bushed against an actress in Waterloo Station. She made the most preposterous allegation against him and the Crown Prosecution Service decided that it was "in the public interest" to prosecute him. It has been suggested that this was because of the soap-opera cast member's "high profile". Does this mean that the same allegation brought by a factory worker would have been ignored? I firmly believe that there should be absolute anonymity for both sides in cases of sexual assault until a safe conviction is reached.  The accuser in the Pearson case was named on the Internet and had to close her Twitter account down. What a horrible woman she must be, to lie another human being into the dock. It could have resulted in a prison sentence and his having to be on the sex offenders' list for a number of years. I wonder if, had her victim been convicted, she would have waived her anonymity and presented herself as a "brave survivor of sexual assault".

I did not visit the nursing home because Dan was not able to come to the Half Moon with me. He was delayed showing a double glazing fitter around some other flats, so I got a lift with the chairperson. I always take cake and sweets and would have had to take these into the pub. I shall buy cream slices and go tomorrow afternoon when I finish at the charity shop. I hope that whomever I work with tomorrow is congenial and that Judith is in a good mood. I shall buy the little tea light lamp and take it to Vence together with the umbrella stand. I shall bring the tall bread basket back for the charity shop, unless our friends want it for their kitchen showroom.  I am looking forward to going to Vence, although I know that I shall start fretting to come home when I have been there a few days. I am always relieved when the Wednesday before our Friday departure comes. I start tidying and ironing and on Thursday morning I put the suitcase on our bed and start to pack. I am happiest of all here, in our flat in the little town in Hampshire. I am not a very sociable person.

When we are in Vence we have to entertain our neighbours from the top floor. She is a very talented artist and he is good company. They have invited us to Sunday lunch and we had a drink in their flat at Christmas. We must return their hospitality this time. They spend time in Brisbane as well; I think that is their main home. I have cousins in that area and one day we plan to visit them again. But for our son and his troubles, we would have spent our wedding anniversary there in 2013. We shall give Nessie and Jeremy good food and wine and provide Nessie with an ashtray. I wonder if Yvonne and Ron will be upstairs too. Yvonne was suffering from a sarcoma on one arm the year before last and Ron had gone through heart bypass surgery. We are lucky to be so fit and well. I was a sickly child but a healthy adult. My daughter's death was because she inherited genes from my father's family; my poor baby suffered from respiratory infections from very early childhood. She died of chronic interstitiary pneumonia, which caused cardiac arrest. I love her and I always shall. I hope that there is a safe, warm heaven where she is with her step-grandmother, Elizabeth. I have no religious faith but I so want to believe that is possible. She deserves heaven and Elizabeth was an angel in human form.

Mothering Sunday and British Summer Time.

Years ago I worked on the Phonads section of the Portsmouth daily paper. Part of my job was booking family announcements; births, marriages, deaths and all of that. It was not the easiest of jobs at times because people can be so difficult. It was a personal affront if their advertisement was got no response. Customers would never admit to  making a mistake; they would waste time by telephoning to complain that their advert was not in the paper. Very often their mothers would also have scoured the paper and not found the relevant ad.

There was often real distress to deal with; a stillbirth or the untimely and unexpected death of a young and apparently healthy adult. A year later there would be an In Memoriam notice. I used to talk to the customers and tell them that they needed a year to adjust; they must live through all the landmarks of the year before they would fully accept their loved one's death.  I believed what I was saying. My daughter died one year and five days ago. I still miss her just as much and I still carry the same guilt that I did not go to her the night before she died. I shall always regret that I did not phone her earlier on the day she died. I have to live with the thought that I might have got to her earlier, phoned an ambulance and she might still be alive. I think of her every day. She has left an enormous gap in my life. There is so much that I regret; I was not the best of mothers. I love my children but did not know how to mother them. I could not give them what I did not get from my own parents. I wanted to explain things to my son but he would have none of it. I doubt that I shall ever see him again. It will be his birthday soon. I wonder if it will hurt that there is no message or present from his parents; I know that it hurts me not to give, but I do not know where he is.

It is a slight benefit that the charity shop where I help out does not sell Mothers' Day cards. There are Easter Eggs and sweets for sale but I can bear that. It was not too busy this morning and I was relieved to find that the man I expected to work with was not there. I do not think that I shall get on too well with him; he is full of his own importance and I am a mickey-taker. My Monday morning co-worker phoned to say she is ill and I shall probably do her Friday morning shift as a man is coming to our flat about window repairs and we shall not be walking. If I find myself working with the ultracrepidarian bletherskite, so be it. I can cope and Fridays are very busy. Why, oh why must people observe a meaningless pecking order in voluntary work? It can be so enjoyable if one's co-workers are congenial. There is no pay or promotion to be gained so there is no point in jockeying for favour.

The tree outside our living room window is white with blossom. On Sunday morning the clocks go forward an hour; we shall lose an hour's sleep but it will not get dark so early. The shops are full of summer clothes. In Vence, where our flat is, the temperature is 15° and there is heavy rain, thunder and lightning. We shall go there soon; the plan is to leave here on Friday April 21st and take the ferry from Dover to Calais or Dunkirk; probably Calais. We shall overnight at Besancon and arrive in Vence on Saturday afternoon. Last year we left on our son's 40th birthday, which was two days after Katy's funeral. It's a good thing, perhaps, that Easter is a moveable feast.

Still functioning socially

Yesterday we went to London with a friend and that friend's brother-in-law. I managed very well with the help of my iPod. The three men talked on the train and I listened to an audiobook. We went to Carluccio's at Waterloo station and had a cup of coffee together while we planned what to do before going to the concert at the Royal Albert Hall. I found Jim's brother-in-law a very pleasant person and got to know him a little.

We looked at my pocket-sized maps and guide books and decided to go to the Victoria and Albert and then to the Science Museum. The tube journey was not too bad; there was the usual argument about which side of the underground we needed to be. I even got a seat without too long a wait. Mindful of the unfortunate Mark Pearson I tried not to brush up against anyone and was a little timid at the barriers but I found that young people were very pleasant and polite and stood aside so that I could go and present my Oyster card to the machine.

The V & A is a wonderful place, even better than expected. The Art Deco exhibition that I had expected was not running but there was a great deal to see. I have always loved jewellery and feasted my eyes on the collection there. Jim jokingly asked if I was going to steal any but I reassured him that I sell or give away jewellery now; I have more than I need and the insurance premiums are prohibitive. It was an easy walk to the Science Museum but we did not see very much, just the space travel section. We shall return one day and see this place properly.

We had an expensive snack in the Royal Albert Hall. I stuck to fruit juice, partly because alcohol does not really agree with me nowadays and partly because I refuse to pay £14 for a glass of champagne. We went to our box and found that the ladies from Dan's bridge club had brought a cornucopia of food. We nibbled and I drank a glass or two of Prosecco. The security men had allowed the ladies to bring this in after a little pleading.

The concert was wonderful; an exceptionally good tenor, an excellent soprano and a superlative choir. The organ was everything an organ should be. The band and the orchestra fulfilled our expectations. One had to queue for the loo rather a long time, but one cannot have everything.

I thought of my daughter all day. I do think of her every day and blame myself for failing her. The four of us talked of my son when we were dining at the Union Jack club. I found I could bear it; I even managed to speak of his cruelty when his sister died. He could not blame me for her death more than I blame myself. I still love him and would take him back into my life but I do not think that his father will ever be able to forgive him.

We caught the 9 pm train home and met the bridge club ladies in the same carriage. They were had obviously enjoyed their evening and were laughing and joking among themselves. I listened to my iPod again; a Robert Bryndza  novel from the Erika Foster series. We said good-bye to the two Jims at the station and walked home to our flat. The iPod accompanied me to bed as it always does. I have two of these excellent devices, one for fiction and one for non-fiction. I can no longer manage print books and even my e-reader has had to be put in a drawer.

Dan is going to the gun club today. I have some chores to do and this afternoon we shall visit the sick, purblind and demented old man for whose welfare I am responsible. I must buy some custard tarts as he might enjoy one. There is still chocolate left to feed him with if he does not want the cake. Poor old man; none of it is his fault.

I must go to bed early as I have a follow-up visit to the eye surgeon tomorrow. It means I shall not be at the charity shop where I help out until Wednesday.