Or a half-aunt, anyway.
Amanda Sophia Mary Fisher, born early Saturday morning after a protracted labour, 6lbs 11ozs. Fisher because Simon is a feminist. All are doing well so far, it seems, though the proud parents were reported to be a little hoarse after so much singing of birthing chants. Still, at least they worked.
I’ve had a piece printed in the Gruaniad’s Saturday mag. Am very proud. (Not paid for it, sadly, but it’s the prestige that counts – plus the chance of sharing my moans with a rather larger audience than usual!)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/mar/12/what-really-thinking-woman-with-me?INTCMP=SRCH
For the first lot of snow I was in London, where the local news was full of tales of villagers in leafy Kent and Surrey complaining that they’d had no fresh milk or bread for 2 days (like they don’t have freezers? Like they didn’t know that snow was coming?) and why hadn’t the council gritted their cul de sac for them.
Back down in Devon now, the local news prog tells stories of stoicism and resilience and communities taking care of each other. Interesting. Even if this apparent difference is not as true as it is made out to be, it’s still interesting that the different areas feel the need to tell such different stories. And of course these things over time become self fulfilling prophecies. I’m glad I live in Devon.
What I wish they’d ask the whingers, instead of sympathising with them in criticising the local council, is “would you really be prepared to pay £x extra on your council tax every year just to e
nsure that every single cul do sac in the area (not just yours) gets gritted?”
Personally, I spend so many days anyways being too ill to get out – or too ill to safely drive, which comes to the same thing here – that being snow-bound feels not too different from usual, just prettier and more birds to watch.
I love this point in the run-up to Yule, when every snail mail post brings a reminder that someone somewhere in the world has been thinking nice thoughts about me. Even with the village snowed in, there have been hand delivered cards instead. It’s not the cards themselves of course, although I’ve had some very beautiful ones, so much as the messages, moments of connection with someone I might not otherwise have contact with. Somehow this gets forgotten, as if the point is in the object rather than the greeting. That’s why I never see much point in giving cards at work, to people who you can say your ‘happy christmasses’ to in person. It’s also such a good opportunity to get your ‘thankyous’ in to everyone who has done something nice for you during the previous year.
Today I had a brilliant day, tramped through the slush to the post office to post my final parcel, and then up to a friends’ house for lunch. Almost no cars in the road, but so many people. I spoke to more neighbours today (familiar and unfamiliar) than I have in the last half year, I think.
Surely this is how Christmas should be? In the valley in Canada where my father lived, the days before Xmas were the best bit, with neighbours and friends calling round to deliver cards and gifts, and staying for a drink and a gossip. Here everyone gets so busy in their frenzy of consumer spending they’d be horrified if someone just called by for a chat. Which is the great advantage of being snow-bound in a village without shops.
Last year I wrote about how I also think this would be a good time of year to leave old hurts behind, talk out the year’s gripes and resentments so that we don’t carry them with us into the new year. A sort of feedback amnesty. Someone who’d read that did get back to me in agreement wanting to clear the air over things I’d said which had hurt her (which was good) 
but not knowing how to raise the matter. Having thought about this, I realise now that it should be the other way around. Not ‘what have you done that upset me, so we can lay it to rest?’ but ‘are there things I’ve done which upset you, which we could clear up and leave behind?’
We’ll see.
It’s also been a great few days for birds. The poor things are so cold and hungry they’re coming much closer and trying all sorts of new food opportunities. I’ve had a wren inside my bedroom, a starling trying to perch on a fat ball (unsuccessful) a pheasant in the field behind me, thrushes and dunnocks and redwings and goldcrests and suchlike that I’ve had to look up in my bird book to identify. And having run out of peanuts for them (how can you stop squirrels stealing them?) I tried them on some cannabis seeds, which the tits absolutely loved. I might point out here that the seeds were originaly acquired for nutritional purposes not narcotic ones, but were a bit too crunchy for my liking. In Greece they cook with them regularly, and also feed them to their pet birds, so they are a standard item in grocery shops, which can be a bit of a surprise at first.
Smooth snow is a great way of seeing what’s been happening, who’s been where. I found a single set of animal tracks, like a large cat or smallish dog, or fox perhaps, leading from my garden gate straight under my garden shed door. But not coming out again. Interesting.
So anyhow, I’ve spent quite a lot of time these last few days leaning on the handy heater below my back window staring out at the wildlife outside. Which surely also is how this time of year should be.
Happy solstice tomorrow to everyone, and I hope your festive season is more full of people than of things.
So the climate talks were a great success, we see. Everyone agreed that there is a problem and something should be done. Everyone agreed to more talks next year. And everyone agreed there should be a fund to help poor countries cope with the effects of climate change (not to prevent it, just to deal with it). Wonderful. What more could we have hoped for?
I’m gutted (so to speak). Hastings will not be the same without it.
Great video though.
I came across this word recently and realised that it’s ages since I last saw or heard it – years, probably. Sadly, I doubt that this is because expediency has fallen out of fashion but more probably the opposite: that expediency is now so commonly the basis for decision making that people have forgotten that there could be any other.
What a world we live in.
Just as one neighbour whose garden I’ve been minding – ie eating (courgettes, lettuce, green beans) – comes home, another goes away (tomatoes, flowers, green beans). It entirely makes up for my own lack of skills in growing veg. And then there’s all the wild stuff to forage from the hedges - blackberries, nettles, elderberries. I love it.
It also seems that as the economic climate gets worse, it becomes more respectable to sell things by your garden gate. So a wander round the village with my purse can additionally yield eggs, chutneys, flowers, green beans. (The entire village is awash with green beans this year. You literally can’t give them away, but I’m not complaining, I can eat them every day when they’re properly fresh and sweet, and not get bored.)
This is of course all particularly useful as the nearest shop is over a mile away, and I have no room in my cottage for a freezer. So foraging for fresh food round about is a great resource and pleasure, even if it’s just a few nettles for soup.
Life wasn’t like this in Camberwell.
Having lost my laptop along with my job I’m now trying to update my previous computer, including needing a flat screen monitor that will fit on my desk. So I put out a request on freecycle, and yes, now I have one. Freecycle is so good, it never lets me down. Anything electronic that I’ve needed, there’s been someone happy to give me one. I’m so grateful.
What’s interesting, too, is the people you meet. You’d think it would be all ex-hippies and Guardian readers but it’s not, it really is all sorts. And another plus is how collecting my various items from people has taken me to all sorts of corners of S Devon that I’ve never been to before.
I know they say that you should aim to offer as much as you request from it, but I’m not so sure. It seems to me that there are loads of people, especially around here, with too much stuff already, and others of us with too little, and this is a good way of redressing our socio-economic differences. And every autumn I always offer my year’s collection of empty jamjars, which are always snapped up by someone about to make jam or chutney, so I do my bit.
Is there anywhere in the world that freecycle doesn’t work?
PS For anyone who’s not come across this brilliant scheme yet, it’s a series of local yahoo groups where you can give unwanted items away, and put in requests for things you need, anything at all. All for free, in the interests of keeping unwanted stuff out of landfill. How brilliant is that? Find them at www.freecycle.org, then select your nearest group.
Again, I find myself reading a letter, totally agreeing with the first paragraph, have funny feeling, scan down to the end and it’s signed ……. ‘name and address witheld’.
Was definitely me who wrote it, and I had truly forgotten. But then, I’ve been away in Greece, which is never a place that does my cognitive functioning many favours. Good for lots else, though.