Sun came. To the wood I went and immediately felt the lift in spirit. Collected dry wood for the wood burner. Instinctively wanted to share this day, and invited Bernadette for lunch. Les joined, and Paul and Adel and their full family came as planned. Barron Bigod cheese, rosemary bread, hot teas. Spring cleaned the green caravan while Bernadette and Les talked in the warmth of the cabin. Wood worm has left a fine dust around the sported Hornbeam I was saving for wood turning – is it too late to coat with wood preservative? This year I will work the wood, creatively. But first I must clear the space and make ready. No photographs taken! Dogs played.
The new wood wardens have earned their merit! I arrived first light to see the green polytunnel gone and all the chastisements kicked in – why didn’t I take more care, I was too unprotected etc. When I told Tess and Henry, Henry proclaimed:
‘No – it blew away last night, there were strong winds, so I got hold of it and put it behind the cabin. It is safe and undamaged’.
I learn a little of Henry’s extraordinary early life. Both parents of his father and fathers brother, died when their children were 12, but rather than being swept into a system of adoption or care, they remained on their farmstead, and looked after themselves, the neighbour keeping an eye on them. Henry’s father married when he was 40, had 12 children, 3 by his first wife who died in childbirth with polio, and 9 by his second. Like Tess, he is one of the middle ones. (Tess is more modestly one of 3).
Evening with Chris, Jo, Les (ohi Kali Bobjo)
What is your take on architecture today? Ventured Chris.
Is there anything you’ve built you are proud of? I ask more pointedly
No says Les, laughing, Nothing’
But then he qualified, and it turns out with Hugh Casson, he did a Nat West bank, WS Smith, and others still standing.
The downfall? The Architect/Builder fallout – when the builder disregarded the architect spec and detail to cut costs. And the Tony Blair introduced PFI (out of Public Private Partnerships).
Learned tonight that Scot was Scot of the Antarctic – the South and not the North pole – how did I miss that with all the Shackleton associations? Ammundson, we had to remind ourselves was the first.
And Chris’s father worked at Bletchley with Turing, playing chess with him, before continuing with the vein of Artificial intelligence at Edinburgh University. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Michie). Died in a car crash 2007.
Kaliwood 