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