November 2021 – Page 4 – derrickjknight

Before And After Sunset

This morning I posted https://derrickjknight.com/2021/11/11/a-knights-tale-62-appendicitis/ then set about starting the vast shredding of paperwork going back almost two decades that clearance of the vestibule cupboard that is to be replaced has prompted. I may be some time.

We lunched and caught up with each other at Tyrell’s Ford with Helen, Shelly, Bill, and Ron. My choice was steak, chips, onion rings, mushrooms, tomatoes, and peas. I had no room for dessert. I drank Flack’s Double Drop bitter. Jackie’s main course was turkey escalope, salad, and chips, followed by syrup madeira cake and ice cream; accompanied by Diet Coke. I won’t speak for the others, save to say that all the meals were enjoyed.

Jackie and I had to leave the sisters and their spouses to their coffees while we dashed back to Milford on Sea for our flu vaccinations.

Afterwards we drove to Keyhaven where I walked along the sea wall and we both took photographs as sunset approached.

I produced the first two images of a couple of sailboarders; the other two were Jackie’s.

I photographed a swan trying to discern its reflection in rippling water; Jackie focussed on me at the far end of the wall with the bird fishing in the foreground.

A couple walked on ahead of me while I concentrated on grasses in the landscape, a louring skyscape, and a skein of geese honking overhead.

Jackie photographed boats in the harbour and Hurst lighthouse in the distance; and, of course,

me in action

We both caught the sunset. Jackie’s are the last two with the rows of masts.

We returned via Saltgrass Lane where I pictured a further sunset to which Jackie turned her back to photograph the moon beyond a grass curtain.

As the sun lowered its sights another photographer and watchers were silhouetted on Hurst Spit.

We needed no dinner this evening.

A Knight’s Tale (62: Appendicitis?)

1973 was a bit hazy, but I think that must have been the year I found myself in Westminster Hospital because I would have been living with Giles. My crafty body/mind realised that I needed a legitimate reason to let go when I was desperately trying to hold everything together. It gave me what I am convinced was a psychosomatic appendicitis. The pain was no more than a niggle I would normally have shrugged off. I drove to the hospital, parked in the street outside, and presented myself. I was given the then welcome diagnosis.

The surgeon who removed the allegedly offending organ expressed puzzlement when he told me that there had been a “slight lesion” but otherwise it was in good order.

A day or two after surgery an attractive young nurse bent over me and said that she was going off for a few days and that she hoped I would still be there when she returned. Perhaps I should have been flattered, but I was ambivalently relieved when I was transferred to a convalescent bed, I think in a different building.

Just five days after the operation I had had enough, and discharged myself after signing the document stating that this was against medical advice. My car was where I had left it, giving another reminder of how times have changed. Not only would the car not have escaped removal today, but I would have had to park in hospital grounds and paid a fortune for the privilege.

I drove across London to what was now Jackie’s door and asked her to look after me. She did. Sadly, only for a short time.

“This Is Susan….”

One of the lessons we have learned while clearing cupboards for Kitchen Makers to replace is that cupboards can very quickly become dumping grounds for items we will never use again, but always think may come in handy one day. It is quite evident that anything lost in a closet for seven years probably will never see that day. We virtually emptied the vestibule depository this morning. Some of the contents will go to a charity shop, more was put out for the bin-men due tomorrow.

On yet another shirt-sleeves November afternoon, after we collected the Modus with its M.O.T. pass certificate from the garage, we drove out to Pilley to attempt to trace the crochet artist whose work on the letter collection box has been regularly featured on this blog.

On the way to the Community Shop where I would make enquiries, we passed the Boldre War Memorial Hall where a stream of crocheted poppies draped in the form of a bell appeared to ring a silent tribute to the fallen in World War One. Even the horses were remembered on the accompanying banner, and, as Quercus says in his comments below, in the purple poppies interspersed.

At the shop I met a flat refusal to divulge any details of the crochet artist who did not want any publicity. When I explained that I wanted the creator to learn of the world-wide complements she had received from my blog, I was told that her work had already featured in local and national newspapers, but she remained anonymous. I expressed every respect for her wishes but would like her to receive the message. Caroline, who was the guardian of an identity that was not even known throughout the village, readily agreed to convey this and took my name and phone number in case the lady concerned would like to talk to me.

She pointed out the rainbow in the window that the artist in yarn had made for the shop.

Driving further into the forest, as we were leaving Beaulieu we stopped in Twiggs Lane where I photographed

reflections in a stream that ran under the road.

Turkeys, geese, and chickens occupied a somewhat soggy farmyard in Beaulieu Road, Marchwood.

We arrived on home territory in time to press on to Ferndene Farm Shop where I stayed in the car as usual, and Jackie did the shopping. She returned with company.

While I was still seated, my wife stuck her head through the open driver side window and said “This is Susan….” “Yeeess….” was my quizzical response. “She reads the blog…..and she knew…..?” “Bryan Snalune”, added Susan as she poked her head through the window.

Well, I just had to disembark and join in the conversation.

Our new friend, a resident of Highcliffe, had also made a late-in-the-day trip to Ferndene. She had wondered whether it was me she had seen in the Modus. When, inside, she recognised Jackie, even masked, from her pictures in the blog that clinched it so she introduced herself. It also emerged that her cousin is Malcolm, the partner of Brother-in-Law Ron’s sister, another Jackie. As we acknowledged, it’s a small world. I didn’t mention that, in Balham, she must have been a neighbour of our late friends Wolf and Luci in Clapham.

We reminisced about Bryan, one of my favourite teachers, with whom she had worked during his headmastership. When Susan learned that he had died she looked him up on the internet and found him on the blog, which she has followed from that time.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s spicy pasta arrabbiata, garnished with her home grown basil, accompanied by Hoegaarden in her case, and the last of the Douro in mine.

Planning A Wedding

We began the day with a trip to The British Heart Foundation Charity Shop in New Milton, where we delivered the clothes, various ornaments, and nicknacks that our renovations had prompted us to give away.

Richard finished building the shelves in the airing cupboard, then began

removing the internal vestibule door he is to replace. This will remove the trip hazard that the frame of this door, once an entrance, has become.

This afternoon we joined the planning meeting at Lymington Community Centre for the wedding of

Barry and Karen, whose wedding I will be photographing next year.

Sunset was descending as we left the building,

and Jackie drove us down Lower Pennington Lane in search of a clearer view.

Later we dined on Jackie’s spicy chicken jalfrezi with tasty mushroom rice and light plain paratha. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Douro.

Renovation Progress

Richard of Kitchen Makers concentrated on two areas today.

First he cleared the inside of the airing cupboard and built a frame for the new door;

then fitted the frame, showing how out of true the original one was, and

set about building a new set of shelves.

He also removed the hall cupboard in preparation for tackling the vestibule.

This afternoon I posted https://derrickjknight.com/2021/11/08/a-knights-tale-61-soil-and-heating-from-battersea/

Jackie produced a fresh batch of pilau rice, onion bahjis, and paratha to accompany a second serving of her delicious Chicken Jalfrezi this evening, with which she drank Hoegaarden and I drank Azinhaga de Ouro Tinto Reserva 2019

A Knight’s Tale (61: Soil And Heating From Battersea)

A period of stability was to follow when, for a little more than a year from early 1973, I shared Giles’s flat in Claverton Street, S.W.1.

This was a rented basement in a Pimlico terrace. The enclosed back yard was a small area of concrete. There was no real sunlight. Nothing grew there. The elderly woman next door, however, enjoyed a wonderful ferny garden in what appeared to be rich soil. One day I asked her how she had soil when we had concrete. “Oh, I’ve got concrete underneath,” she said. “I put the earth on top”. “Where did you get it?”, I responded. “From Battersea Park”. She replied. “How did you get it here?” was my next question. “In my handbag”, was the answer.

This wonderful woman had trekked backwards and forwards – it must have been for years – carting bags of soil trowelled up from this London Park situated on the other side of the River Thames. The journey across Battersea Bridge would have been about a mile and a half each way.

Opposite our flat stands Dolphin Square, ‘a block of private flats with some ground floor business units ….. built between 1935 and 1937. Until the building of Highbury Square, it was the most developed garden square in London built as private housing. At one time, it was home to more than 70 MPs and at least 10 Lords.^[1]

At the time of its construction, its 1,250 upmarket flats were billed by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as the “largest self-contained block of flats in Europe”. To an extent, their design has been a model for later municipal developments.^[2]‘ (Wikipedia )

Across the river from this block stands

Battersea Power Station. (Pinterest)

‘It was one of many power stations built beside the Thames. Essentially, there were two reasons for siting them beside the river. Firstly, they were initially coal-powered and the coal could be transported by sea and then up the Thames for easy delivery. Secondly, the power stations were built beside the river to provide them with a plentiful source of water cooling. Instead of just dissipating the heat from Battersea Power Station into the Thames, from 1950, the hot water from the power station was piped under the Thames to provide hot water and heating for the flats at Dolphin Square. All that came to an end in 1975 when the power station was decommissioned.’ (https://knowyourlondon.wordpress.com/2021/02/24/dolphin-square/)

A Sunset Seagull Squabble

We spent the morning packing up clothes and other items we won’t use again and storing them for charity shops or recycling outlets. One of Richard’s next projects is the entrance lobby. I also emptied a cupboard which is to be removed from there.

After lunch I posted https://derrickjknight.com/2021/11/07/a-knights-tale-60-i-come-a-cropper/

Later this afternoon we visited Mudeford for

the sunset.

Suddenly the air was rent by the screeching of squabbling seagulls, prompted

by a gentleman flinging food for them.

When satisfied, they soared towards the lowering sun or paddled at low tide.

Another photographer focused on the sunset, missing inland scenes.

Rows of masts stood out against the darkening skies while the rippling seas attempted to drive the light inland.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s spicy chicken jalfrezi and savoury rice, with onion bahji’s and a plain paratha, with which she drank Hoegaarden and I finished the zinfandel.

A Knight’s Tale (60: I Come A Cropper)

Towards the end of 1972, I spent a short period alone in another of Tony’s properties, this one in Gillespie Road, near Arsenal’s then football ground. One weekend at that time I returned from visiting Matthew and Becky to find my Ford Corsair concertinaed. Its front and back had each been pushed in a bit. Apparently there had been an attempted murder in which another car had been used to run down a pedestrian. Things had got rather out of control and the murder weapon plunged into the car parked behind mine which was shoved into the one in front.

My readers are probably hoping that the story would finish there. No such luck. There was more. David Hignett, one of the social workers in my Southwark Area Team, with Pat Benge at his side, offered to tow me in his very solid Volvo, to Raynes Park which still housed my garage. We set off after work, and drove at a rate of knots through London from north to south. The chosen route took us into Chelsea’s King’s Road. In the ’70s, this was the place to be noticed. I certainly was.

David drove at a good thirty miles an hour, and didn’t seem to slow down for bends. As we turned left into King’s Road, the towrope became entangled around my nearside front wheel. When we stopped at traffic lights I alighted from my car and waved to my friend who repeated the gesture. Pointing to the underside of the vehicle I crouched down and began to tackle the rope. The lights changed. Off David sped. I leapt to my feet and started running. Between two motors tied together. The one following had no driver.

Fans of Stephen Spielberg’s 1971 TV masterpiece ‘Duel’ will know that it is possible to be chased by an apparently driverless vehicle. There was no question about mine. It was driverless. The driver was running down the road in front of it.

Naturally, I yelled a bit at David. Pat screamed at him to stop. He did. My Corsair didn’t. I turned to see it bearing down on me. Bracing myself for the impact I caught my car in my hands by the front bumper and actually managed to stop it. Unfortunately the front of the Ford also caught my leading leg, ripped it a bit, and my trousers even more.

As I limped to the kerbside after we’d all come to a halt, I might, I thought, have been justified in being disappointed that no-one in the crowd that had now gathered seemed inclined to offer sympathy or concern for my health. They were all looking for the film crew. After all, why else would a young man wearing a brown velvet suit come a cropper in such an unlikely manner?

For anyone who is actually concerned, I simply suffered a little bruising, with my bones intact.

Published by derrickjknight

I am a septuagenarian enjoying rambling physically and photographing what I see, and rambling in my head as memories are triggered. I also ramble through a lifetime’s photographs View more posts

Setting Ducks Into Flight

This morning we began filling the new wardrobe, which meant bagging up for disposal many clothes we will never wear again.

Afterwards I posted https://derrickjknight.com/2021/11/06/a-knights-tale-59-about-the-children/

This afternoon we took a drive into the forest. Our first stops were at Pilley, where

the lake is beginning to recede once more, and

rippling water lines the edges with autumn leaves.

The crocheted letter collection box on Pilley Hill now prepares for Remembrance Day.

I called in at the Community Shop to find out who was the creator of these adornments changing with the seasons. Unfortunately the man on duty didn’t know, but advised me to call in during the week.

I settled for photographing cattle, calves, and walkers on the other side of the street.

Although one patch of blue sky separated clouds along the road to Hatchet Pond, louring billows, pierced by Jesus beams hung over the water, where pair of swans and their cygnets set a paddling of ducks into flight.

This evening we dined on oven fish and chips, peas, pickled onions, and chilli cornichons, with which we finished the Jurancon white wine.

A Knight’s Tale (59: About The Children)

Jackie had stayed at our home with the children.

The next few years saw me trying to settle somewhere in which I could accommodate the three children at weekends and holiday periods. Michael stayed with his stepmother until there was no hope of reconciliation. First I visited them and took them out.

From Lolesworth Buildings I moved for a few more months to stay with Jill in Blackheath. I remember the flat, at the top of Shooters Hill, but forget the address. The sequence and chronology of the next few months is a bit hazy, as was I, but I had a fortnight in a flat in West London belonging to a work colleague in Southwark Social Services Department and a month or so once again with Tony in Gillespie Road, near Arsenal’s former football ground in North London. A period of stability sharing Giles’ basement flat in Pimlico lasted a bit more than a year.

After spending some time with friends Tony and Madeleine, Jill, a work colleague, gave me the Blackheath room. It was spacious and could accommodate a thick piece of foam rubber measuring 6’6″ x 5’6″ that I had tailor made so that Michael, Matthew, and Becky could share it with me at the weekends – two of us at the top and two at the bottom. That makeshift mattress was to serve for another 34 years. When I set up home with Jessica I had a wooden bed built around it. Only when I left Lindum House and returned to London, where it was too large to fit into the Hyde Park Square flat, was it replaced.

I was to be even more grateful for the Blackheath room and that mattress before I moved on, because for period of six weeks I suffered my one and only bout of bronchitis and hardly left it for a month.

During the time at Blackheath the children and I visited that village where donkey rides and Guinness were sampled.

Sometimes we went down to the Thames waterfront at Greenwich, which would be unrecognisable today. Smoke still billowed from Battersea Power Station and cranes were still in service.

As all my readers will know, music is a powerful trigger for joy or sadness. Jackie and I were fans of Tom Paxton whose Croydon performances we attended. From the day of our parting I was never able to listen to the singer/songwriter until we were reunited. One real tear-jerker was “About the Children”. It is perhaps just as well that the video of this was unavailable for me to add to this post.