January 2021

 

Amazing sunset over Cheltenham

I have tried, a couple of times, to write a new blog, but the words wouldn’t flow, so I gave up, put it to one side and hoped that inspiration would strike when I wasn’t thinking about it. Unfortunately, inspiration has been in short supply, but I will endeavour to write a little something to entertain you.

I am still in lockdown, in Cheltenham, with my Mum, as I feel that we are each benefitting from the company and the time spent together. Mum was called for her first Covid jab on the evening of 13^th January, so we duly made our way to the Cheltenham Fire Station where a team of friendly, and very helpful, volunteers made sure that we negotiated the system with the greatest of ease.  All the fire engines had been relegated to the outside area at the back of the fire station but had to be brought back in at night so that they could be kept in readiness for any emergency. I hadn’t ever considered this, but they have to be kept at an ambient temperature so that iced or misted windscreens aren’t an issue, if they get a ‘shout’ on a cold, frosty night, so the vast indoor area was surprisingly warm, as we awaited our turn. At the end of the session, all the vaccination positions and all of the chairs, etc, have to be cleared away completely, to allow the engines to return! What an undertaking!

Mum likes to go out for a daily walk although, as she is now using a four-wheeled walker, we are a bit constrained as to where we can go. The pavements around here have been dug up for gas/electricity/water so many times that they are really rough and uneven and the tyres on the walker are solid (to prevent punctures), so that Mum’s upper arms get a thorough work out from the vibrations, and the noise is so loud that chatting whilst walking is quite difficult! We decided to see if we could find a more all-terrain style walker on the internet, but hadn’t realised how many different ones there are, but very few of them have pneumatic tyres or suspension, so we’ll just have to shake, rattle and roll our way around the neighbourhood, I think. Although we are limited to fairly short walks on pavements around the area, we entertain ourselves by looking for signs of spring in people’s front gardens, and have been rewarded by sightings of snowdrops, mini-daffodils, hellebores, coloured primroses, violas, little irises, aconites, crocus, wallflowers, spring snowflake, mahonia and winter box. These little treats delight us and help to lift our spirits.

Paw prints in the snow

Another lift to our spirits has been brought by the wildlife that continues to come into the garden. One morning we had six sightings of foxes, three going in one direction across the lawn and three coming back again! We also realised that they were three different foxes – Greater Bushy Tail, Lesser Bushy Tail and Mangy Tail. GBT saunters across the lawn, taking his time and showing off his lovely coat and glorious brush; LBT is much more nervous and trots across the lawn with nose lowered to the ground and never pauses, and poor old MT might stop and sniff around the base of the bird feeder, but soon makes for the safety of the border and the hole in the fence. The other, snowy, morning I went out to feed the birds and happened to glance over the fence into the neighbour’s garden. As he is elderly, and not much of a gardener, the bottom section of his ground rarely gets disturbed and I spotted GBT asleep under the conifer tree. Luckily, I’d taken my camera out into the garden with me, to photograph the tracks across the grass, so was able to put it on full zoom and take a couple of photos before he lost his nerve, stood up and trotted away under the far fence, away from prying eyes.

GBT watching me, watching him!

I realise that I hold very different views on wildlife, depending on where I am located! Because I know that there are no chickens around here and no young lambs, I really enjoy seeing the foxes, whereas, back home, I would be feeling quite differently about them. It’s the same with squirrels – I love seeing them in Mum’s garden, but I know that they cause an awful lot of damage to trees and are really vermin. Is this very hypocritical of me?

We also get a fair range of wild birds to the feeders, which I have managed to keep replenished while I have been here, and we have signed up for this weekend’s Big Bird Watch for the RSPB. We took part a few years ago and, during the hour that we chose to observe, hardly any birds came to the garden at all! On a normal day we might see sparrows, dunnocks, robins, blackbirds, black caps, chaffinches, coal-, great- and blue-tits, long-tailed tits, magpies, jackdaws, crows, seagulls, wood pigeons, and very occasionally, a pair of jays. We are keeping our fingers crossed that they don’t desert us at the weekend.

I have taken myself off for a couple of longer walks, on my own, but have mainly kept to roads as everywhere is so muddy at the moment. I went to post a letter in the village the other day when, suddenly, the clouds cleared away and it turned into a glorious sunny morning, so I just kept on walking and found myself in my old, childhood haunts on the other side of the village. Some changes have taken place – some new houses, the pub turned into a dwelling and both the local shops long gone, but a lot of it is still easily recognisable and I indulged in some nostalgic moments, remembering walks with both of my childhood dogs and with our ‘gang’ of local children. I was gone for an hour and a half and Mum had begun to wonder what had happened to me!

For much of the time, we have stayed indoors as Mum has the majority of her shopping delivered by kind neighbours, who got into the habit of placing Mum’s order with their own, during the last lockdown and have continued doing it during this one. This means that I have managed to finish the blanket that I was knitting to go in my camper van (should I be able to travel anywhere in her, ever again!), I’ve knitted a pair of socks for my daughter and a new ‘infinity scarf’ to add to my collection of saleable items. I have also, finally, painted Mum’s shower room so that it is now virtually complete – I just have to fit and paint the doors for the under-sink cupboard that I made last year. At some point we need to buy a chrome towel rail and put up a couple of hooks for bathrobes, etc but that is not urgent. Having almost run out of things to do, I found myself eyeing-up Mum’s dining room this morning, over breakfast, and thinking that perhaps I could decorate this room while I’m here!

As I have no urgent need to rush back to Somerset, I am thinking of staying here until at least the middle of February, as any gardening chores for my clients can be left until the end of February or even into the beginning of March and I have no farm sits booked until the end of March (if this allowed to go ahead). However, we are running out of ways to entertain ourselves and I have even succumbed to playing Rummikub with Mum. At this rate I shall end up playing her at Scrabble and, as my family knows only too well, I don’t ‘do’ board games!

Stay safe everyone, and stay positive, if you can. x

Snow scene