The "Right" People

Cottages

 Dear reader,

In England from about the 18th century onwards the development of industry led to the development of weavers' cottages and miners' cottages.   Fredrich Engels cites ' cottages' as a poor quality dwelling in his 1845 work: The Condition of the Working Class in England.

A cottage, during England's feudal period was the holding by a cottager of a small house with enough garden to feed a family and in return for the cottage, the cottager has to provide some form of service to the manorial lord.  The cottage would have been built cheaply from locally available materials in the local style, thus in wheat growing areas it would be roofed in thatch and in slate-rich locations, such as Cornwall, slates would be used for roofing.  In stone-rich areas, it would be built in rubble stone, and in other areas, such as Devon, was commonly built from cob.

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The cottage I lived in this market town was built in the 17th century.  Although it was very "quaint" it was something of a nightmare to live in.    It was always very cold because the windows didn't fit and we weren't allowed to change them, (heritage) and the mice loved it.  Now if one thing you may have picked up from reading my blog over the years it is that I can't abide mice.    Also the stairs were a trifle dangerous and as I got older found them difficult too.  Yes it did have roses round the door but where I live now is, in every way, much more pleasurable.

                                                                                    

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From Francis Kilvert  January 12th 1873 in Wiltshire

'When I came out the night was superb.  The sky was cloudless, the moon rode high and full in the deep blue vault and the evening star blazed in the west.  The air was filled with the tolling and chiming of bells from St. Paul and Chippenham old Church.....I walked up and down the drive several times before I could make up my mind to leave the wonderful beauty of the night and go indoors.'

 From James Woodforde  January 14th 1790 in Norfolk

'The season so remarkably mild and warm that my brother gathered this morning in my garden some full blown primroses'.

 

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The ‘Right’ People

 

I nearly didn’t come

to see this house

            on an estate.

 

My cottage in Market Street was old.

Two hundred years old.

It was damp, it was cold

mice pattered about

and the east wind blew

through the small windows.

 

It was dark even in the summer,

but it was smart

in the ‘right’ part of town

and the ‘right ‘ people

asked us for dinner.

 

Now we live in the suburbs

not in the ‘right’ part of town

and not the ‘right’ people

living here.

 

But I found they were my people,

the “right” people for me

everyday people, kind and funny.

 

The house is warm,

no mice patter

no damp creeps up the wall

the car has a place of its own.

 

If I hadn’t come to see it

fearful of an estate

I would have never known

where people like me lived.

 

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With very best wishes, Patricia

 

January Weather

                                                                               Primroses

 

Dear reader,

I am putting up 'January Weather' again this week.  It is one of my favourite poems and I don't think Christmas week was a good place for it.  Everyone was busy and my blog suffered!! Two weeks ago I had 2,000 hits on the blog and last week 3. Only 3.  I can never tell how the blog  is going to work, or whether you readers like the things I write about or not.  Obviously some pieces you like better than others but I have no way of telling which these are going to be.

I was telling my daughter Jessica who has just started to teach dance as a free lance, that constancy is the answer. And she must believe in herself and what she is offering. As many of you know I have been writing this blog now for eight years and I just have to believe in myself and be reliable in putting it out every week.  I left school when I was 15 years old with next to no qualifications.  But over the years I have taught myself, read many books on diverse subjects and happily went to the Open University for four years. 

Try reading 'January Weather' again and I hope you enjoy it, this time, as much as I did writing it.

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From Samuel Pepys   January 16th   1660 in Westminster

'I stayed up till the bell man came by with his bell just under my window as I was writing of this very line, and cried, 'Past one of the clock, and a cold , frosty , windy morning.'

 

From Katherine Mansfield   January 20th   1915 in Buckinghamshire

'A man outside is breaking stones.  The day is utterly quiet. Sometimes a leaf rustles and a strange puff of wind passes the window.   The old man chops, chops, as though it were a heart beating out there.'

 

From Richard Hayes  January 21st   1762 in Kent

'As mild a day as though May. N.B. I saw a spotted butterfly - brown in colour.'

      

January Weather

 

 

 

We know from recorded history,

that in St. Merryn

a hundred years ago,

there blew great winds

and the sea was smoking white.

 

We know it was warm in Kent,

where the thrushes thought spring

had come, and piped away.

And primroses were a yellow carpet

in North Norfolk,

or so the parson wrote.

 

We know of cutting winds in Hampshire,

of icicles and frost, and

in Skiddaw on a mild day,

a brown spotted butterfly was seen.

We know that hungry church

mice ate bible markers, 

hungry people died of cold.

 

And we know that this dark winter month

had days of snow, that wild clouds

gathered in the sky unleashing icy rain,

churning up the plough.

 

And yet, again, we also know

the sun shone in that distant year,

it was warm enough to push through

early snowdrops, and Holy Thorn.

Light was glimpsed, here and there,

all life struggled for its moments.

 

 

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With very best wishes, Patricia

 

 

                                                             

January Weather

 Dear reader,

There are many stories about thrushes including the Hermit Thrush, the Song Thrush and the role of thrushes in The Lord of the Rings.

In the Oneida Indian Nation's story of the Hermit thrush the Good Spirit gave the birds the ability to sing after noticing that the birds were listening to the beautiful songs of man.  However, one thrush felt shame after cheating and hid in a tree where he remains to this day.Sometimes he can't resist singing and when he does the other birds fall silent in awe. 

The Song Thrush's scientific name, Turdus Philomelos, comes from the Greek character Philomela, who was turned into a singing bird after having her tongue cut out. The song thrush has also been featured in several cultural works including a poem by Robert Browning and another by Thomas Hardy.

The thrush is a symbol of hope.  The song thrush brings the message of survival and our basic needs in life, a home, family and people around us that care. 

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From Dorothy Wordsworth   1802  December 30th in Cumberland 

'We ate some potted beef on horseback and sweet cake. We stopped our horse close to the hedge, opposite a tuft of primroses, three flowers in full blossom and a bud. They reared themselves up among the green moss. We debated long whether we should pluck them and at last left them to live out their day, which I was right glad of at my return the Sunday following, for there they remained uninjured either by cold or wet.'

From Francis Kilvert   1871 December 31st in Wiltshire

'At five minutes to midnight the bells of Chippenham church pealed out loud and clear in the frosty air.  We opened a shutter and stood around listening. It was a glorious moonlit night.'

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January Weather

 

 

 

We know from recorded history,

that in St. Merryn

a hundred years ago,

there blew great winds

and the sea was smoking white.

 

We know it was warm in Kent,

where the thrushes thought spring

had come, and piped away.

And primroses were a yellow carpet

in North Norfolk,

or so the parson wrote.

 

We know of cutting winds in Hampshire,

of icicles and frost, and

in Skiddaw on a mild day,

a brown spotted butterfly was seen.

We know that hungry church

mice ate bible markers, 

hungry people died of cold.

 

And we know that this dark winter month

had days of snow, that wild clouds

gathered in the sky unleashing icy rain,

churning up the plough.

 

And yet, again, we also know

the sun shone in that distant year,

it was warm enough to push through

early snowdrops, and Holy Thorn.

Light was glimpsed, here and there,

all life struggled for its moments.

 

                                                                       *

A Happy New Year to you all,  Patricia

 

 

The Oxon Thomas Hardy

 Dear Reader,

Isn't it astonishing how quickly the year goes by?  So it is Christmas time again and I thought I would put one of my favourite poems of Thomas Hardy up on the blog this week. I hope you like it.

I am really feeling much better now except for a hacking cough which apparently won't be gone until the spring reaches us again.  There are so many horrible things going about it seems including filling the hospitals with flu victims. I dress each morning with the weather in mind because it can be hot one day and cold the next.

The poetry muse left me when I was ill, my mind a blank.  But, with luck, after the New Year I shall start again with some new material.   I hope I will be able to do this because it is not easy to produce good poetry or indeed any poetry!

I am still bemused by the people who read this blog.  In eight years I have never worked out who it is and why they read it.  For instance in the last two weeks I have had over 300 readers from Singapore.  Why would people in Singapore want to read it?  And also several from Hong Kong.   Well it is lovely that you do whoever you are and thank you for your support.

Have a very Happy Christmas and may 2025 bring you all the joy and happiness you could wish for.

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From Dorothy Wordsworth  1802 December 25th in Westmorland

'It is today Christmas Day, Saturday 25th December 1802.   I am thirty-one years of age.   It is a dull, frosty day.'

 

From Francis  Kilvert  1870 December 25th in Radnorshire

 '.......intense frost.   I sat down in my bath upon a sheet of thick ice which broke in the middle into large pieces whilst sharp points and jagged edges stuck all round the sides of the tub like chevaux de frise, not particularly comforting to the naked thighs....  The morning was most brilliant.....the road sparkled with millions of rainbows, the seven colours gleaming in every glittering point of hoar frost.'

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The Oxen

by Thomas Hardy

 

Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
   ‘Now they are all on their knees,’
An elder said as we sat in a flock
   By the embers in hearthside ease.

 

We pictured the meek mild creatures where
   They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
   To doubt they were kneeling then.

 

So fair a fancy few would weave
   In these years!  Yet, I feel,
If someone said on Christmas Eve,
   ‘Come; see the oxen kneel

 

‘In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
   Our childhood used to know,’
I should go with him in the gloom,
   Hoping it might be so.

1915

 

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With very best wishes to you, Patricia

Presents

 Dear reader,

My parents didn't really "do'" Christmas.   They went to stay with friends and at thirteen years old I copied them.  I went to stay with my school friend Karen who lived in Derbyshire.  She lived in a beautiful house with a lake in the grounds, where in fact I caught my first fish, a small trout. Her parents were extremely kind to me and treated me as one of their own.  Her mother did a stocking for me and I was given lots of presents.  

But I have always had a problem with presents.  My mother didn't ever give me a wrapped present and my father certainly did no such thing.  But they weren't the presents I wanted as you will see if you read the poem.  Being loved and cared for by someone kind and generous are life's presents, they need no wrapping paper.  Better perhaps with simple brown paper and plain ribbon. Love is the best present you can give anyone, simply that.

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From Gerard Manley Hopkins  December 9th 1868 in Surrey

'Honeysuckle out and catkins hanging in the thickets.'

From Nathaniel Hawthorne  December 11th 1855 in Lancashire

'This has been a foggy morning and forenoon, snowing a little now and then, and disagreeably cold....At about twelve there is a faint glow of sunlight, like the gleaming reflection from a not highly polished copper kettle.'

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Presents

 

 I don’t want presents

tied and ribboned.

Encouragement doesn’t wrap

well in green tissue,

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. 

 

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Perhaps it is a bit too early to wish you all a very happy Christmas.  But I do.  And I hope lots of love is spread thickly in your direction on Christmas Day and that you have a lovely time.

 

 

 

With very best wishes, Patricia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

Leaving

 Dear Reader,

I feel much better today with the cough nearly gone. Although I have had cancer twice and other operations I didn't realize just how horrid it was feeling ill, unable to think or sleep or breathe.

Enough said.  Thank you all for your good wishes.

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A short piece of news today which I thought worth recording.  

 

A female king penguin in Britain's only breeding colony for the species is actually a male.  Keepers discovered this rather vital piece of information after EIGHT years.  

The true sex of Maggie, now renamed Magnus, was uncovered after staff at Birdland Park saw the bird attempt to mate with a male penguin.  Keepers sent one of the penguin's feathers for DNA testing and the results revealed that Maggie was in fact a male.

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From Nathaniel Hawthorne   December 11th  1855 in Lancashire

'This had been a foggy morning and forenoon, snowing a little now and then, and disagreeably cold....At about twelve there is a faint glow of sunlight, like the gleaming reflection from a not highly polished copper kettle.'

 

From Gilbert White   December 13th  1774 in Hampshire

'Ice bears: boys slide.'

    

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Leaving

 

The day she left

her heart hammered

tears streamed down her cheeks

 

the rain beat against the car windows

an east wind blew

the road was black ribbons.

 

She took a small suitcase.

It held a red skirt, two shirts, underclothes,

two cardigans,  a duffle coat

and three favourite books.

 

After twenty years of marriage

that was her spoils.

 

Oh, and the kettle.

 

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With very best wishes, Patricia

 

 

 

 

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When my dad came home

 Dear Reader,

I have had a chest infection, antibiotics which I very badly reacted to and a feeling of burning in my hands.  All very unpleasant.  I saw that Queen Camilla had had a chest infection and that she thought it was not easy to get rid of.  No it certainly isn't.  My cough lingers on and as soon as I think it has gone it comes back.  

I have been very interested in the Assisted Dying Bill.  I will not be having a good death at all.  One quarter of my lung has gone with lung cancer operation, and this does not spell well for breathing or anything else.  So I was thrilled that perhaps we will get the go ahead for choice in how we die.  Surely that is the right thing to do, give us the choice.

I am sorry that this has been such a dreary post, I will make amends next week I hope.

 

 

 

 

So just the poem this week:                                                                              *

 

When my dad came home

 he nodded off

in the old armchair,

any time,

forgot everything,

could name no names.

 

Tobacco smoke from woodbines

filled the house,

he drank malt whisky,

came home unsteadily from the pub.

 

He talked of cricket, he whistled

and hummed old country and western songs,

rocked in the rocking chair

and potted up red geraniums.

 

He ate junket and white fish

had headaches,

and he wept sometimes.

 

But we were good friends, my dad and I,

night times he told me stories,

and tucked me into bed.

I never asked him about the war,

and he never said.

 

                                                                                  *

 

With very best wishes, Patricia