few words, two books, lights

A few words can go a long way. Here is Jane Austen writing to her sister Casandra, as it happened on 20 November 1800, about a ball which she had attended:
"Mrs Blount was the only one much admired. She appeared exactly as she did in September, with the same broad face, diamond bandeau, white shoes, pink husband and fat neck."

One of my favourite and one my least favourite Victorian novels are being broadcast by the BBC. They are Dombey and Son, by Charles Dickens, on the radio; and Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell on the tv. A couple of years ago I ploughed through Dombey detesting more and more its tendentious plot, sentimentality and cardboard characters. I read Cranford 50 years ago and was delighted then, as I am now, seeing it on tv, by its humorous, accurate picture of small town life.

Coming home in the rain, I walk over the reflection of street lights which shine mournfully on the black road and red brick pavements.

squirrel, daft, expression

A squirrel runs down the steps of the fire escape opposite. It is as though the steps were constructed for its use.

People must think I am daft as I pick the plane leaves from the pavement of Mount Pleasant and make them into a small bouquet. Why am I doing it? Ah!

"I'm going to peel a pomegranate," I say to Heidi. Then I think it sounds like one of those expression that form like crystals in the language. To phrases like "run the gauntlet", "pop the question", "jump the gun", perhaps one day will be added "peel the pomegranate". What would "peel the pomegranate" mean? Getting down to the nitty-gritty, reducing something to its basic elements, I suppose.

swearing,window display, wet and dry

The BBC, I see, has been censured for a serious breach of guidelines. Apparently the word "fuck" was broadcast three times between 14.50 pm and the end of the Live Earth Show. Someone must have been listening and counting carefully.

In the window of a shop, which has been vacant for a few months, two women delicately paint the window frames and sills, as though they are performing an intricate mime.

From the dry, I watch the rain falling outside, and the drops collecting on the window.

jolly lady, ironing, pruned

There is a jolly, grey haired lady who sits most afternoons outside the Grove Tavern with a large glass of red wine and a cigarette. She is seldom, if ever, alone and is clearly popular, with other drinkers. She has taken to waving to me as I pass, which I take as a compliment. Today I respond to her wave with a cheery, hullo, as I pass. It is good to see life being enjoyed.

Ironing is my favourite chore. Heidi likes it too, but, while her hip is gaining strength, I have the privilege of the domestic iron. I love the smell and feel of a stack of freshly ironed clothes.

They were sawing away at a tall oak in the Grove the other day, pruning it, presumably of damaged or infected branches. Now it looks more like a piece of sculpture than a tree. One branch bends up and forward to look like a giant sea horse. The trimming of the end of the branch even looks like the frills at the front of the sea horse's "nose".

coteries, plane, valour

For years I thought how good it would be to belong to, or at least to be close to, a coterie. This morning it occurred to me that in a way there is one all around us. If you are a blogger and people visit your site and you visit other sites regularly, a group begins to build, as comments are exchanged, common lines of thought and interests developed. It may not be Bloomsbury or the Algonquin Hotel, Montmartre, or Chelsea in the time of the Pre-Raphaelites. But in the age of the global village, it is almost something better, more open, freer. So Clare, Lucy, Tristan, Tall Girl, Marja Leena, Dave, Lucas, Rashmi and many others ( and all the links stretching out from your blogs), think: the world is weaving round those observations and photographs, something is taking shape, to which one day a name may be given.

The plane leaves on the pavement of Mount Pleasant are enormous. They lie separately on the pavement like green and gold stars. Today, I see a child in a push chair holding one by its long stem as though it were a toy. But it is something better.

As I walk in Calverley Park, I hear from a neighbouring church, this bright and crisp afternoon, the just discernable words of John Bunyan's hymn:
He who would valiant be,
'Gainst all disaster...
...We know we at the end
Shall life inherit.
Then fancies flee away!
I'll fear not what men say
I'll labour night and day
To be a pilgrim.

home, animal eyes, design kindness

A walk with Heidi, this crisp afternoon, the sun low in the sky, the shadows of trees reaching elegantly across the leaf strewn grass. This is her first day home after her hip replacement operation. She becomes more agile every day.

In Kathleen Raine's collected poems, I note the lines:
" ...Shapes I had seen with animal eyes
Crowded the dark with mysteries."
I have been thinking a lot about animals recently. I believe, along with the philosopher John Gray, that we are part of their kingdom, that human beings differ from other animals only in having an over developed brain. Your brain's too big. That's our problem. We're a bit like the dinosaurs who became too clumsy for comfort, or the shells of their eggs too thin, for the young to survive. To see "with animal eyes" is, perhaps, how we should see if we are to understand the past and even the present.

The kindness of designers: we are running out of the paper dust bags for the Miele vacuum cleaner, which we have had for many years. In order to be sure that I buy the right replacements , I go, as I have done in the past, to the box, in which they are supplied, armed with scissors to cut out the label indicating the model number. I find that the frame, which surrounds the numbers was, in the last box purchased, perforated for easy removal. I slot it neatly into my wallet. This little piece of thoughfulness gives me disproportionate pleasure.

overheard, hands, chilly

I overhear a woman's voice in the train. It is like a stream bubbling over pebbles. She seldom stops talking and seems proud of her carefully modulated voice, and of the little irruptions of gentle laughter, which underline the irony of an anecdote. She is sitting behind me and talking to a woman friend. I hear only snatches of her monologue... "I was waiting at London Bridge and a train came every two minutes but it wasn't mine ....I said .... and she said... and I said... It takes weeks to grow the damn things ...of course the computer went wrong..."

Early this morning from the back of a taxi, I catch sight of two pairs of hands arranging rings, watchs and other adornments in the window of jewelers. A daily spreading of the peacock's tail.

Outside a pub called TN4 is a notice announcing among other attractions: "chilled atmosphere".

milk, boat, alright?

The sun over the fields is like a splash of milk soaking through grey sky.

Across a large puddle a curled leaf sails blown by the wind like a toy boat.

A woman's voice behind me: "Hullo. Are you alright?" I think so. But I ask myself who is asking? I should have know. Everywhere, everyone has a mobile phone. And everyone is asking everyone else, are you alright?

smart cat, fuschia, silver sheep

A cat, its chest white like a white apron, sits in the sun looking smart. And smug, as cats sometimes do.

An unusual pale pink fuchsia in a front garden, a few yards on, another fuchsia, this time the more usual, red and purple variety. Both, uncharacteristically for November, are in full bloom.

From a car I catch sight of a field of sheep. The sun, low in the sky behind them gives the edges of their fleece, a silvery halo.

pitter patter, austins, knitting accents

Lucy Kempton has now illustrated the last five poems in the Handbook for Explorers sequence of poems. The complete series of photographs and poems may now be seen together for the first time on www.compasses-lucyandjoe.blogspot.com

Standing outside my neighbours front door this morning I enjoy the sound of rain falling on the shrubs. It falls straight down, in large, nicely spaced drops, nothing excessive, a measured English rain.

In the supermarket carpark, a group of vintage Austin 7s are parked, their owners, of a like vintage, gatherered in front of them. I count the cars. There happen to be seven of them. Seven Austin 7s. I recall a faded photograph of my mother leaning out of the window of hers and looking very proud of her new car.

Heidi and a neighbour talk about knitting. It seems that Germans knit in quite a different way from the English, though with the same results. It's as though there is in an accent in knitting as in speaking.

wagtail, screen, olive oil

In the Grove I see a pied wagtail. Its swooping flight is delightful to watch like a dance. And when it settles, it really does wag its tail, up and down though, and not, like a dog, from side to side.

From the street, I see into a room, where a television screen is reflecting yet another room.

A bottle of olive oil attracts my attention in the wine merchant this morning. "It's made by one of our wine suppliers," says the owner. I recall visiting an olive producer in Andalucia some years ago and tell him of a family meal in a low ceilinged cellar next to the stone press. "There was a dish", I say, "of orange-slices dressed with olive oil, unusual and unforgettable. The oranges as well as the oil came from the farm." He says: "I can taste that." And in my memory, suddenly come alive, so could I.

too familiar, moue, sky watching

It should be called the Nessun dorma syndrome. If you heard Pavorotti sing it for the first time you might be impressed. If only you could! Van Gough's sunflowers would likewise would be strike you as fresh and original if you hadn't seen them before. And then there's Wordworth's Daffodils! I confess to liking such over established works of art and literature, despite their familiarity, even if they are sentimental, like Louis Armstrong's It's a wonderful world, which I heard this morning on Deseret Island Disks.

I notice the face of a girl sitting by the window of a restaurant. She is pretty, I think, but there is something about the set of her mouth, which is worrying. Then I know what it is. The French word moue comes to mind. It signifes nothing as simple as a "pout", which is a common English translation. Rather moue suggests a look of disdain, of rejection, of superiority. It is above all a word which is utterly French, both in the way it sounds and in the behaviour it describes. When you read: elle fait une moue de dégoût, you can see the lips and hear the sound.



What is he watching? A clear, ice-blue sky with small clouds and vapour trails touched by pink light from the setting sun.

more leaves, pasta taster, for the masses

Because they have stayed so long on the trees and the weather has, at the same time, been so dry, the leaves have been extraordinary this year. Yesterday they lay scattered on the slopes of Calverley Park shining in the sun, not just copper, but burnished copper. Today, they whisper noisily - dry, paper thin and curled at the edges - as the wind drives them along the road.

Competing for the title of the most unnecessary kitchen utensil ever, is the pasta-taster - a small cup, pierced with a single hole, at the end of a handle - which I see in the window of a shop.

Ambiguous notices often give pleasure. If I hadn't know that there was a Catholic church in the vicinity, I might have enjoyed speculating on the meaning of "mass parking only".

toe, polishing, wind watching

The windows of Hooper's department store are draped with red theatre curtains. The inspiration of a forthcoming window display is announced across the curtains in gold letters as: "Sleeping Beauty. English National Ballet". In one window, creeping beneath the curtain is, intriguingly, the naked toe of a mannequin.

Against the war memorial opposite the public library is a ladder. The memorial consists of a life size bronze statue of a fully equipped soldier on top of a marble plinth. This morning, on top of the ladder is a man polishing the statue with a cloth , making it ready, presumably, for the Rememberance Sunday parade.

You can see the wind as it chases the leaves over the grass and across the paths in Calverley Park.

stealing time, nests, beans

A few days ago Lucy Kempton commented on this web log that, generally speaking, clocks only began to tell the same time as a result of the introduction of the railways. The use of chronometers in the eighteenth as an aid to navigation may be an exception. But the railway connection throws an interesting light on Victorian England. Another curiousity, which I encountered, when I inherited a nineteenth century bracket clock a few years ago, is the lock on the glass window covering the dial. Why lock up your time I asked a clock repairer? The answer is apparently that servants were in the habit of putting their employers' clocks forward so that they could work less time. The lock was to prevent this curious form of theft.

When leaves fall from the trees, you have the consolation of seeing the nests, which have been hidden all through the summer.

Yesterday evening, I shelled and boiled the last of the mature borlotti beans which I picked a few weeks ago. Tonight I shall sauté them with finely chopped shallots and a little garlic. They will go well with a grilled slice of fresh tuna.

holding on, excuse, risotto

An oak leaf hangs from a spider's web attached to a branch. It swings to and fro in the breeze, while other leaves float by.

Reading the papers is nearly always a chore. The only pleasure is finding an excuse to stop reading an article early on, because you come across something, which suggests that going on will not worth while. Today, for example, I read, in the first paragraph of an article about an impresario, that "he managed to bestride the global film industry like a Colossus". Bye bye.

If cooking is therapy, cooking a risotto is the best therapy. You feed the rice at intervals with ladles of hot broth, let the rice absorb the broth, stir and watch the rice swell, until it is al dente. As you stand over the pan, there is an immediate pleasure in the evolving dish, the smell and texture of it, and the anticipation of a meal to be shared.

naturally, hair, woodpecker

On the fishmonger's slab in the supermarket, certain fish are labelled "natural fish". It takes me a moment to realize that these must be wild, as distinct from farmed fish. But you have to be on top of these things nowadays. Who would want an unnatural fish? Or a supernatural fish?

As I pass, in the corner of my eye, I see in the window of a hairdresser's shop, a seated girl with long, fair hair down to her waist, her back to the window. With calm, long strokes, a hairdresser is brushing it over her shoulders and straight down her back. A mermaid glimpsed through the glass!

On the grass outside Heidi's ground floor room at the hospital where she is recovering, is a green woodpecker, pecking away in search of ants and the like. That was yesterday. This afternoon, I look for it again. But strutting in its place is a fine cock pheasant.

surprise reader, sniffing, poppy

The vastness of the internet and the opportunity of chance encounters always surprises me. It is a surprise and a pleasure to learn the other day that a neighbour who had no reason to look it up and who had certainly not heard of it through me, has come across Now's the time, by chance. You launch a balloon with a message and never know where it will land, far or near.

In the Pantiles farmers' market a fine, black haired retriever sniffs at cryovac wrapped beef and lamb joints on a butcher's stall with penetrating intelligence.

I visit a neighbour, a military man, who has been seriously ill for some months, and who yesterday celebrated his 80th birthday surrounded by his family. As he greets me, I notice that a poppy is pinned to the collar of his pyjamas in anticiption of Rememberance Sunday. A few years ago, a tabloid newspaper sent a reporter down from London to inverview him. The object was to profile an archetypal "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells", and I recall his pleasure with the double page spread which resulted. Disgusted or not, he is a man who knows who he is.

clock trouble, toboggans, real squirrels

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a station clock should be accurate. And a source of amusement (to me, at least, whose mode of life no longer requires intensive travel and tight schedules), that the four faces of the clock in the tower above Tunbridge Wells railway station are never right. For two years the clock was not working at all. Then, earlier this year, they appeared to do a refurbishment job. The clock is working again. But you soon realize that the different faces show different times, none of them coinciding with the actual time. The one you can see from the entrance to the station is two minutes slow - the worst degree of inaccuracy for someone hurrying for a train. Better be half an hour out. The trouble is that the trains are, nowadays, for the most part on time. Pity that the clocks are not. I make an observation to this effect to an official on the platform. "Shame," I say after all the work they've done to clean up the clock." He doesn't seem concerned: "It's the works," he says. "Victorian!" Sometimes, it is a beautiful thing to be able to conform to the old catch phrase: "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells."

A warm, almost balmy afternoon. As I pass Hooper's department store, I note that, in the Christmas window, now being prepared, there are two stacks of toboggans. and a gilded sleigh.

Shadows of branches spread ahead of me over a path in the Grove. Across the shadow-branches scamper real squirrels.

retake, wine dark, pumpkin

I keep finding myself wanting to retake a photograph I have taken before or one that someone else has taken. I have to stop myself photographing the yellow leaf of a plane tree pressed onto the pavement like a print. The same goes for the one of a squirrel with its paws together holding a nut, and managing to look like Jonny Wilkinson on the point of taking a penalty.

A grape vine which I pass regularly has not shed its leaves. Instead the leaves have turned dark red, the colour of mature burgundy.

A carved out pumpkin grins at me through a window.