The Earth Father

Getting the ticket early in the carpark, I used their toilet block. As I closed the door, piped music started and a recorded voice whispered: "Welcome to this toilet facility. This toilet is protected. You have fifteen minutes available until the alarm sounds. You will be warned when your time is up." The music continued, an insistent beat that slowly increased in tempo and frenzy as I struggled to complete before my position was broadcast to the outside world. It was unbelievable pressure.

Ann rarely has breakfast, so I ate alone - except for four German visitors, big in stature so they overhung their seats, and loud in voice and clothing, filling the room with their strident talk. When they finally left, a woman on the table next to me said, "Isn't it quiet?"

Ann at Glastonbury Abbey

Afterwards, we visited the Glastonbury Abbey ruins, the legendary site of the tombs of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere. The whole area was so quiet and peaceful even with traffic on all four sides of the walls. I bought Ann a figure for her room I called Gandalf, but was assured it was really Merlin. Ann is more Arthurian than Lord of the Rings, and in Glastonbury I was clearly out of place to bring up a rival to the mystic throne.

Waiting for Ann later in the Excalibur Cafe, I ordered a latte, forgetting that it is a vegan cafe. "Would you like hemp milk in that?" the barista asked. I made the mistake of choosing to experiment. If ever you are asked to choose hemp milk, take the coffee black. It tastes like old hemp rope, rough and unpalatable, and left its vile presence for the remainder of the day.

Glastonbury

Freedom,
is a Glastonbury wind
fuelling lost
hippie daydreams,
a magical mystery
brought from Arimathea,
Arthur with Guinevere
tables we all sit round
and, an awakening
touching souls
scarred by pain
cauterised
to soar again

Annie Elliott 

I have decided that, in the pantheon of legend, I am the Earth Father, though Ann says I am more like the Earth Grandfather. In this guise I sought a new leather belt to replace my cracked and fraying old one, but most of the shops in Glastonbury are so ethnicy and vegan that they shun leather goods, preferring to deal in wool, hemp and cotton. I did discover one leather shop, though their belts were standard plain leather and buckles rather than anything reflecting my new image. Needs must, however, before my pants fall down.

The Chalice Well

Vesica piscis cover at the well head

Glastonbury never fails to show a different face on every visit. At breakfast in the George and Pilgrim I suddenly remembered mid veggie sausage that I hadn’t paid the car park fee, due at 9:00. It was now 9:40. Ann went out with my purse and sure enough the warden was standing before the car writing down my number. Ann worked her magic and the warden even advised which machine to use as the nearest was broken! If I’d gone out I know I would have annoyed him and the ticket would have been enforced vigorously.

Yesterday we made our pilgrimage to the Chalice Well. Normally a place of quiet sanctuary and reflection and total peace, this time it had an air of busy worldliness. In part, this was because of the August holiday with many extra visitors and children running about splashing in the water, but partly too from a sense of change in the atmosphere. Some tents and marquees were up in the grounds, reflecting some secular use, while at the well head, usually the sanctuary of sanctuaries whose vesica piscis well-cover dates from 1919, some guy was doing a karma routine that included picking off flower heads to pull the petals and lay them in circles round his wooden beads. One white one had seven petals, interlaced with another flower's five pink petals, leaving a gross asymmetry. Someone had also fixed two old sweeping brushes wired to a branch above the well head, whose purpose I could not fathom.

Despite the distractions, there are quite sanctuaries with time for contemplation there. I had bought Ann a ring earlier in the day. Suddenly while sitting in a hidden nook away from the noise, some engraved writing became visible. We hadn’t been able to see it earlier in the shop or the sun.

The Cascade and Pools with Ann 

There too a stange dream was broken. I had dreamt of a mammalian bird giving birth to an egg, with an umbilicus emerging from the vulva to give life to the now external egg. Suddenly as we sat beneath the cascading red waters, Ann said "from here, that does look so like a vulva with its red-coloured slit. Sure enough, emerging from the slit the water flowed down a channel towards the  Vesica Piscis pools with their strange overlapping egg shapes, completely like the dream I had had.

Jerry the barber

We both had our hair done in Glastonbury too, unusually. Ann's included a gentle, relaxing head massage. I had an old-fashioned haircut, a simple short-back and side job with Jerry the barber. The place was decorated with pictures of motorcycles and curvatious blondes, and Jerry was covered in tattoos, and talked about his love of old American cars which he built into gleaming show-stoppers. I mentioned I'd been to Cuba, and it was as though I'd been to Mecca, for his dream was to visit there.

Glastonbury

Deja Vu

Walking in ancestors' footsteps
treading familiar paths
in a deja vu dream ‒
a fog-like haze of memory
that comes not from experience
but a collective unconscious
whistling on a breeze
finding its home in a whisper
a quiet mumbling
and silent recollection
of  an accustomed scene

Annie Elliott 

I am taking four days off work! Our first proper break for a while, and we're off to Glastonbury to stay at the George and Pilgrims' for some ethnicy peace. A 15th Century Inn, it was built originally for pilgrims to Glastonbury Abbey, though this was long since ruined under the "Reformation". The Inn doesn't take dogs, and with Ed away to present a paper to the British Association of Victorian Studies in Dundee ("Red-brick railway arches, tongues of fire, blots of smoke": The Renewal of he Gothic in the Railway Space of the 1860s), we have Rae and Malcolm staying over to mind the animals.

The day started badly when I broke a wine glass which splintered to every corner of the kitchen, taking ages to clear up, but finally the last shard was cleared. The dogs always fret when they see the cases packed, but Rae and Malcolm came on time and the dogs were delighted to see them. We went via the A303 hoping to see Stonehenge, but a few miles down it Ann decided we should see another camper van at Burnham-on-sea, so the sat-nav redirected us north to the M4 and Bristol. On the way came the breaking news that Boris Johnson has prorogued parliament. It only adds a week to the time parliament would be shut down anyway for the three-weeks of conferences, but you'd think from the urgent howls of protests that Johnson was cutting all contact with the continent! The opposition say he's stopping time to debate the issues - but they've been debating them for three years, and we're fed up with it.  One MP even claimed she'd made a special study of German politics and the rise of dictatorship. She was virtually calling Johnson another Hitler - it's unbelievable. We are delighted he's got the guts to go for it and get on with it.

A Norfolk Wherry Ale Van
on the road before us

Finally we reached Burnham-on-sea which looked a miserable place, with many glum faces, and a so-called pier that is an insult to a stump. The persistent rain didn't help, and the Camper Van was in poorer condition than the older version we had first seen in Suffolk.

HOT NEWS: My many readers have mentioned that they couldn't post comments to this blog. Though no bad thing in general, I like to listen to what others think, and I believe I have now fixed the comments button so it works! Please feel encouraged to use it as appropriate.

Bin day is sheep day in Hundon

We had our other two grandaughters overnight. Ann asked about one of their school friends. "Oh, she died..." they started to say, to great gasps of horror. "She dyed her hair," they added, completing the story. "She had red hair, but was bullied so much about it that she's dyed it brunette now." Yet another sad tale to add to the-tormented-life-of-gingers. One would think that schools ought to consider prejudice against hair colour every bit as demeaning as prejudice against skin colour, but they don't. For some reason, they seem to think it isn't real prejudice, or these children "can take it".

Putting the bins out

The behaviour of our neighbours has reminded me what sheep we all can be. Our dustbins are emptied on Tuesdays, so last night I put ours out, although no-one else in the road had, making me wonder if they would be collected a day late because of the Bank Holiday Monday. Later that evening, I noticed that everyone on the road had put theirs out too. This morning, everyone on the road still had full dustbins; clearly they had been right and I wrong, but they all copied me! More fool them.

My car is due its 80,000 miles service, so I thought I would treat it to the real deal and phoned Jaguar at Cambridge (our nearest dealer now) to book an appointment. You'd think just booking a service would be a sinch. I was put on hold, but gave up after 20 minutes. I then tried to book the appointment on line, as they boasted this was easy. It was not. The web site would not let me progress beyond entering my car reg, so I gave up on that too. Finally I booked with Suffolk Trade Centre up the road, who sold me the car. Charlotte, their super-efficient receptionist, answered the call on one ring and the car's booked in for next week.

On a lighter note, Sam told us about a plumber mate of his who regularly takes Friday afternoons off. A while ago, he had had a tattoo put on his arm, but the tattoo artist wasn't open at weekends so he went on Friday afternoon. Once he had the first one, he became addicted to them, and now has a body covered in tattoos, always taking Friday afternoon off from work then coming in on Monday to reveal his new addition. He used to go to a tattoo parlour on Mill Road in Cambridge, but Edwin told us it has recently burnt down - the second place there to do so. We immediately wondered if this was intentional arson; perhaps the Peaky Blinders have moved up market and started to practice their protection rackets in Cambridge.

Global warming comes to Hundon

Seeking the shade in Clare Wood

On a delightful walk yesterday through Clare Wood with our grandaughter and the dogs, making the most of each spot of shade in what was recorded as the hottest day on record for late August. Temperature records are certainly being broken world-wide as we race towards thermal Armageddon. We, like so many, have strong pluses in contributing to this with our cars and flights, but on the negative side of the balance we are three vegetarians, which saves something in the CO2/methane battle. Ironically, we enjoy the sunshine and warmth, and the milder winters, but this too is balanced by coastal erosion of some lovely sites, especially round our East Coastal areas such as Dunwich Church, now underwater. But on a more historical note, Saltburn used to have a Roman Lighthouse which was lost centuries ago, and the last ice-age only ended 10,000 years ago when glaciers stretched across England and sea levels were so low the North Sea was a crossing point to Holland; so erosion is not a recent phenomenon; just its fast pace is new.

The Hundon Summer Festival of Music

Last night I attended my third meeting of the Hundon men's group at the Rose and Crown, our local hostelry. I mentioned I could only stay an hour, as daughter Lucy was coming to stay with our grandaughter. We had a new member, Bob - the chairman of the local parish council. He had got the job when the rest of the council walked out. It seems they all wanted to stand again, but had to reapply for their positions. They put their applications in with the Clerk, who forgot to pass them on, so they didn't get them in before the deadline. Therefore there was no proper handover, and papers were everywhere to be found and sorted before he could pick up the threads. David congratulated him on his position, and said he had worked miracles: ,after waiting for years for the potholes to be filled, the day after he was appointed our road was resurfaced from the top to the bottom of the hill! Amazing.

Hundon Summer Festival at the Rose and Crown

Today Edwin and Lucy have gone to Ipswich to see Ed Sheeran. I walked round the fields with the dogs and our little grandaughter, and ended up back in the Rose and Crown, so had to stop for a quick drink in the beer garden. They were setting up the stage for a great musical event - the Hundon Summer Festival. This is clearly in direct competition with the Ipswich event - so Ed Sheeran, eat your heart out. We can stand in our garden and hear it.

Camper vans

Ann gives a van a critical scan

We have decided to think about considering the possibility of buying a camper van. You might notice a slight air of uncertainty about this decision, but it is a big step and a large outlay if we get it wrong, and we did consider it a couple of times before (see Buying a motor-home-1 and Buying a motor-home-2 and -3), but nothing came of it. Anyway, the upshot of our deliberations was a visit to a fine house in East Bergholt to look at an old van there. Old in years, high in milage, but in good general repair. Hence our hesitation and long discussions. We enjoyed our time caravanning in our youth (i.e. our 50's), and loved the boats we had, but feel that they are now too much hard work. We quite fancy the idea of the open road, and just trekking off at weekends as the fancy comes, and hence the new interest in camper vans. I will keep everyone posted about our progress or otherwise.