The village put on a fantastic Covid-safe alternative to the usual door-to-door ‘trick or treat’ on 31st October. The dark streets were full of carved faces in lit pumpkins, grim reapers, spooky window displays, a sinister looking character playing a Cello, ghostly ladies on stilts and people jumping out in front of passers-by. Pre-donated bags of sweets were handed out to each child from one collection point on the one-way trail around the village and it was a wonderful if scary, experience which was hailed a total success. However, we missed the whole thing because I was waiting for Boris to make his address to the nation, which was due to be made at 4.30pm but did not happen until two hours later, by which time the Halloween fun was done and dusted, or complete and cobwebbed.
So what did Boris have to say this time? Well, he told us officially what we had read in the news for days: that we are to, once again, go into lockdown, although schools, colleges and universities would stay open this time.
So as I’m sat here writing this, I am wondering whether this November blog should be entitled “nightmare before Christmas” or “Bleak midwinter”, both of which are comments in the Press following the announcement that the U.K. will go into what is referred to as Lockdown 2.
Covid 19 aside…… we were surprised to find that gravity hasn’t got the pull it used to have. Seeing as it has taken a good six months to ‘pull’ two children’s books and some sort of empty children’s plastic blackcurrant yogurt pouch from the back of the radiator on to the floor of the bedroom. It would have frightened me to death if it had happened on Halloween! It would have also been alarming if the books had been The Witches (by Ronald Dahl) and the Worst Witch (by Jill Murphy). As it was they were …The Lion Who Wanted to Love and The Wheels on the Bus. But still, it was a surprise to see them appear to say the least!
The autumnal leaves are falling but some delicate flowers on bushes are still thriving.
Because of Karen’s 60th birthday celebrations last Thursday I went down the hill to Longwell Green on Sunday to do the weekly shop, instead of my usual Friday jaunt. It probably wasn’t a wise move because it was the day after the official lockdown announcement, and I found that it was back to queues around the car parks of the shops like in March and April. 🙄
We were very lucky to be able to join in Karen’s celebrations last week, which included a socially distanced meal and an overnight stay in a country hotel near here. Such merriment of six people (plus Karen!) would now be illegal during lockdown.
On 2nd November, Courtney was finally able to fly out of New Zealand, some thirteen months after she first arrived. Australia had suddenly opened up its borders to New Zealand and so the second stage of her adventures can begin. We will now think of her when we see a kangaroo, which won’t be difficult as we have two in the village, like you do. Actually they are wallabies but ‘same same’ as they say in Vietnam.
On 4th November we were looking forward to finding out who had won the US elections. However, we had to wait a little longer because of the postal vote counting. We are delighted to say that Joe Biden is now president elect. I don’t need to say any more about that but it has to be documented as it is such excellent news for America, and I believe, the world. Roll on January 20th when he will be inaugurated.
It was a bright sunny day and we went for a longer walk. It was very calm and still and as we looked across the fields I could see the sunlight catching long thin strands which were floating gently and slowly across the fields towards us. I assumed they were strands of spider web and I could also feel them on my face. I couldn’t help but think that if we were to be eating an ice-cream they would stick to it without us realising. More on that later.
Anyway, as we walked on and turned into Rushmead Lane we were surprised to see so many cars (most of which were big 4x4s) driving along what is usually a quiet lane. We soon realised why there were so many people around. As we looked across the valley we could see horses and hounds making their way down the lane on to and through the fields. It was the Beaufort Hunt. I hadn’t seen it since I was a teenager. It used to be so exciting when I was younger, seeing the riders in their red jackets and hearing the bugle as they cantered along Green Lane, which I could see out of Nan Permial’s back bedroom window. The hunt also used to gather outside the Crown Inn at the bottom of the village, and the riders used to have a sherry before they set off. I felt guilty about feeling excited to see it now, as the hunting with hounds bit is illegal after all.
As we stood watching them John came along. John is a friend of Dad’s from when Dad used to deliver meat and pies to his ‘shop’ in Bath’s indoor market years ago. I’ve only ever met John twice before but I know more about him than anyone else I’ve met in the village this year. He is a lovely friendly man, who chats away and makes me seem quiet! Apparently he used to be a milkman before he met Dad. He then had a knee operation and now in his mid 70s he walks to West Littleton every day, a six mile round trip, to keep his legs strong. I know all about his son and grandson etc etc and this was from my very first encounter on the high street months ago. Anyway, as we all stood looking over the fields we somehow got on to a story about how John used to give free mis-shaped cakes and buns to a homeless man each morning who slept rough in the doorway of one of the shops he delivered to. He told us how he managed to secure the man a job washing up in a nearby cafe which led to him being offered another job with a builder and a room in a house. This man who had previously been sleeping on the street went on to live a normal life because of John’s thoughtfulness and kindness…. that is the very short story. Like I said John’s a lovely man. As we stood listening to him I noticed that, one by one, lots of tiny black bits appeared on the thin stands of hair across his forehead. It was quite distracting and I realised after a while that they must have been tiny black spiders from the ends of the strands of web that we had seen floating along earlier. Glen and I didn’t say anything but we had a chuckle on the way home. When we sat inside later we realised we too had little spiders on us…. money spiders I’m hoping!
Like the annual flying ant penominum, I assumed it was a special day where this happened in the countryside in certain weather conditions or whatever. However, I’ve since been told it’s just a normal thing that I’ve just not noticed before. 🙄
You need never feel alone in the village. Even if you walk on your own and don’t pass anyone, (unlikely) there are always the resident animals to go and say hi to. These little kunekune pigs always ‘talk’ to Glen; he has a way of snorting and grunting to them that makes them grunt back! They are funny little things, and it’s quite comical to watch. Glen ‘talks’ to the horses too, I call him Doctor Dolittle. As many of you will know, some of the harbour scenes of the Doctor Dolittle film were filmed in nearby Castle Combe.
There are three little kunekune pigs. I’m not sure which two these are but the three names are Peppermint, Spearmint and Apple Mint.
The wonderful Marshfield Facebook page, which keeps us all in the loop re all things village related, had a post this month advising that two saddleback pigs were out of their pen and having fun in the horses’ paddock nearby. The owners of the pigs eventually commented that the pair were now safely back in and apologised for any “pig related chaos”. I love this village. 😂
Most importantly, things are posted on the Facebook group on occasions like when Dotty the dog went missing which meant many villagers rallied round to help.
These beautiful horses are in the field adjacent to Green Lane. The grey one was looking up to the sky towards a hot air balloon as we walked by. This was last month and the day that Dotty the dog saw the same balloon and bolted from her owners in fright. I had written a whole detailed account of that day when we saw one of Dotty’s owners and his children, and how dozens of people walked the lanes and fields into the night to try to find her. I seem to have managed to delete it so all I will say is that Dotty eventually turned up on her owners’ doorstep at midnight, exhausted, muddy but safe. They posted a photo of her on the Facebook page and thanked everyone for their help, advice and kind words. It’s a community we are proud to live in/amongst.
So firework night did not go off with a bang, being the first night of the new lockdown restrictions. However, there was a loud thud as our first ton of logs were delivered on to the pavement ready for the long winter nights ahead. We had previously been using the unattractive, but free, nail ridden chunks of wooden pallets. An hour later and we had carried them through the house and stacked them neatly in the garden shed.
Remembrance Sunday was a dull wet day but there was still a large socially distanced gathering around the war memorial. It was sort of fitting that it was a wet, cold and damp day and was thought provoking on my walk home past the muddy pigs field. I thought about all of the young men in the First and Second World Wars who lived and marched over such terrain and didn’t have the modern wet gear that we all have now. Later, on the TV, people told of family members who pretended to be 18 to be able to go to war. One 16 year old had managed to enrol and after just one year had died in battle. I’m sure that he was just one of very many who did the same thing: not actually needing to put themselves in danger, but they chose to. What brave men they were.
We also remembered Rupert Bear that day. Apparently it was 100 years since he was created. He always reminds me of Dad. Dad always used to draw a good Rupert Bear when I was growing up and again for our girls when they were little. I am trying to persuade him to draw one for the blog, but as yet nothing has come forth!
So with the invisible enemy attacking us all over the world for the last ten months, spoiling our lives and testing our reserve we now have an extra thing to worry about. Following the terrorist events in France and Vienna, the UK’s terror threat has been raised to ‘severe’. No words.
I’m trying not to think about all the bad stuff!….. I thought this tree looked like it had been cut and blow dried!…? Just me then! 🙄😂
In the tree opposite was this discarded wasps nest. Which reminds me, we need to take another look in the loft to see if all of the wasps have now left!
So, Friday 13th, what more could possibly go wrong? The day started with torrential rain but the sun came out as the day dawned. Instead of bad news the day brought something a bit better. Peter Sutcliffe, known as The Yorkshire Ripper, had died. For younger people reading this he was a serial killer in the 1970s. I’m sure todays technology helps police find and prosecute such people but back then he was interviewed nine times during the course of the investigation but officers were unable to connect vital pieces of information within their piles of paperwork. Anyway I re-read all about his atrocious crimes and read that he’d had died aged just 74 after refusing treatment for Covid-19. It’s a funny old world, filled with love, joy, compassion…. and evil.
It’s life Jim but not as we know it! On 16th November there was some lighter news. An inventor has designed these high-tech helmets for Covid protection. Good luck with getting people to buy and wear those. It‘s difficult enough to encourage/convince some people to wear a small face mask to cover their mouth, and especially their nose, let alone encase their head and shoulders too. What is life coming to? Is this a glimpse into the future, Covid-39 and beyond?
On the 17th I read that even though Uber might be struggling, another taxi company are doing well and making lots of money! I read that there is now a business that flies astronauts to the space station. I wonder if they had to have Covid tests before they went there?
On the 25th Karen told me that Susie Dent (from ‘8 out of 10 Cats Do Countdown’ fame) tweeted that her word of the day was ‘spuddle’ (19th century dialect) meaning to be ‘uselessly busy; to fuss about whilst achieving little of nothing’. I had to laugh because I think spuddle describes how I’ve spent most days this last ten months.
On the 26th (sorry, I said it was turning into a diary) it was announced that our area would be going into Tier 3 once we come out of the national lockdown on 2nd December. It was also the day that the Marshfield mummers announced in the All Around Marshfield magazine that they would not be performing on Boxing Day this year, which is the first time this has happened since 1944.
Talking of spiders’ webs as I was earlier, this must be annoying for spiders when the weather causes it to be so damp that your ‘house’ doesn’t dry out all day!
On the 30th the Army arrived in Ashton Gate sports stadium. A few days ago I read on the Bristol Post newspaper website that Bristol would be the first city in the UK to start a mass coronavirus vaccine programme in the stadium……. in ten days time time!!! Ten days!? The various vaccines haven’t been officially authorised yet have they!? Apparently the Army will oversee tens of thousands of people given the vaccine every week. I should be happy and relieved but for some reason I feel anxious.
As I sit proofing this blog I’ve just read a post on the Marshfield Facebook group regarding the borders between us and nearby Bath and also Wiltshire who are in Tier 2 and Bristol and South Gloucestershire which only just places Marshfield in Tier 3. As if that doesn’t cause enough stress for some businesses in our area that can’t open. It has caused an on-line ‘disagreement’ about whether Marshfield is a town or a village. It reminds me that although everyone is there for each other when ‘the chips are down’ (or Dotty is lost) it doesn’t mean everyone agrees and gets on all the time. Marshfield is just like one big Christmas Day family gathering….. which we can’t have this year because of Covid-19.
For the record, Marshfield is officially a town but is of course known and loved as a village.
A great post. The animal pictures, especially of the cows and pigs, are brilliant. All the contemporary references, from Covid to the vaccines, and from Boris to Trump, give it a real historical dimension.
And I learned a new word: I will try to avoid being ‘spuddled’.
Yet again a brilliant record of life in Marshfield and we must compliment Glen on the superb photography.