Saturday 5 December 2020

Presents





Dear reader, 

My daughter Jessica always keeps me alert to any 'gull story' that I might have missed.  Do you remember a year or two ago there were lots of stories about the machinations of sea gulls and their nefarious ways? She saw this one in a letter to the Guardian newspaper from one Andrew Keeley who said the following: 'as any teacher who, like me, spent 40 years on break and lunch yard duties would tell you, the researchers in Bristol have discovered something we already knew ("Urban gulls target school break times for food, says report').

Daily, gulls would arrive on the neighbouring houses' rooftops just before the bell rang for break or lunchtime, anticipating pupils' food scraps once the had gone back into school.  The gulls did not bother to turn up at weekends or during school holidays.  The clocks going back in autumn and forward in spring used to cause them a problem, as the next day they arrived an hour early or late respectively.  But by the following day they had adjusted their internal clocks and arrived bang on the bell, confirming their super-smartness'.

If either Jessica or I see any more stories about the sea gulls I will keep you informed. 

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From Thomas Hardy, 1886, in Dorset,  December 7th

Winter.  The landscape has turned from a painting to an engraving:  the birds that love worms fall back upon berries: the back parts of the homesteads assume, in the general nakedness of the trees, a humiliating squalidness as to their details that has not been contemplated by their occupiers

                                                                                *


Presents

I don't want presents
tied and ribboned.
Encouragement doesn't wrap
well in green tissues,
praise in paisley boxes
or love in thick gold paper.
I don't want guilt
compressed into an envelope,
with cheque.

A parcel of thoughtfulness,
a parcel of interest,
a parcel of embracing,
a parcel of safety, were
the presents I hoped for
under the festive tree.
The presents I hoped for
which were not to be.

                                                                               *


With very best wishes, Patricia






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