I was that hippie.

I was reading the blog of Archdruid Eileen as she wonders where all the hippies have gone....well one of them is still around. I was indeed a hippie. I embraced flower power with joy and as I trod the flowered path I learned a great deal.
At first it was just great fun. I loved the long skirts and skimpy tee shirts. I had one long purple skirt embroidered with flowers that I wore to near extinction.
I was a vegetarian and a young mother and a teacher and I fitted it all in with huge enjoyment.
I was still a Christian of course but learning to do Transcendental meditation enhanced that rather than cancelled it out. It certainly brought me closer to God.
There were some difficult moments though.
I had a colleague who was not just a hippie but also a firebrand. She was a very outspoken woman's libber and indeed contributed to one of the new magazines on that subject weekly.
She came for a meal one night and enjoyed the lentil bake I gave her.
Over the pudding she leaned over the table and said
"So what do you do about your tits Jean"
Both of my children leaned forward and giggled.
I didn't really know what she meant. But no I had not burned my bra and never did.
I loved the whole thing. For me it was a period of self exploration and happiness.
I know the sixties now are looked back upon with some contempt as are the Beatles journeys into TM but I can only speak as I find and for me being a hippie was one of the building blocks that brought me to who I am today. And I do thank God for it.

Angelic voices?

I have sung in choirs ever since I was a little girl. The Coop library in Rochdale  was just around the corner from Toad Lane. I lived just around the other corner and as a child of about 8 used to go to the library to get books for my dad and then the children's books for myself. One evening as I browsed I heard this glorious sound . A choir was singing something or other and it was wonderful...I found the room and went in. In a most unlikely way I was not only allowed to stay and listen I was accepted as a choir member even though the actual age was 10  .I was tall for my age!
It started me off on a path which led to my always looking for a choir to join where ever I lived.
The Coop choir was wonderfully avant garde.....they did operas , one a year and I was able to sing in one by Benjamin Britten when I was about 10 and still tall for my age because I was singing the part of a boy!
 I sang in "The Magic Flute" too before my parents were rehomed to a new council estate a long way away!
There I tried to join the the C of E choir but girls were not allowed. So I went down the hill to sing with the Methodists much to Bill Vanstone's amusement!
Singing in a choir is a great joy and it teaches us allot about being members of a team and making glorious music together.
At college I was the leader of the choir which taught me something about the delicate egos involved in making creative choices about music.
As an adult I have been in Madrigal groups in various places and one of my best memories was here in Cornwall where a group of musicians sat in the garden , over looking the sea and sang al fresco very beautifully with a lot of laughter and much joy.
Which makes it a great pity when wounded egos clash.
We have lost several of our organists here in the last years  by death or old age. Sadly no one person has been found on a permanent basis to take charge of everything musical so a certain amount of confusion ensues.
As we struggle to get a simple choir together for our carol service we are trying very hard to find ways through the problems and are asking questions like........do we have to attempt things we are clearly not good enough to perform or by trying to do it , do  we then improve our performance ?
To sing, in a beautiful building in harmony with other people and to produce music which soars and builds as it goes skywards is to partially know God. So its tragic when muffed attempts go badly wrong through no ones fault.
Learning to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, is a growing process and the choir enables that process to be painless and positive....So altogether now!   Lets hear it for the angels!

Friends or Social net working?

In this strange linked up world we now live in the nature of friendship is changing fast. In the old days friends and acquaintances were people we had met, who lived or worked in close proximity. Now a friend can be someone we have never actually met.
I started to play backgammon on Fibs before the rise of social net working sites. Some of the friends I made then are still friends, though none of them are  on Fibs any more.
Now I play scrabble too on Facebook....and again I have made friends. Its also brought me back in touch with people who were friends many years ago but who I don't now see following my self imposed exile in Cornwall.
Some times though I do wish for fewer people on Facebook....and on Twitter, though to a lesser extent.
Because sometimes my time lines get completely clogged up. People who play games often publish the results of their games.   If they have  spent a day playing the announcements can take up a lot of room!  When I'm home I don't mind at all,  I can just skip past them. When I'm abroad though its a different matter since every time I download anything it costs me money....and it can mount up over a week or two to quite a lot of money!
So every so often I have a cull.
I unfollow  people on Twitter fairly regularly to try to keep the whole thing in reasonable bounds but on Facebook its much harder....I don't like to cause offence or have people wondering what they've done wrong.
The other part of FB is of course the fact that every time you go in there waiting for you are pictures of people you definitely don't want to be in touch with...I skip over them fairly quickly trying not to feel bad about it.
The whole thing is a trap for the unwary.  But the fact is that we have another trip planned for early next year so if you find yourself cut off please excuse me.....I'm just trying to keep the costs down!
I count all the people I talk to regularly on both Titter and FB as real friends, some of them I have met,  some I haven't but our conversations show a shared concern for all sorts of political or social issues.
Its a wonderful thing for an old woman cut off from much that I was used to to be able to hold conversations with people all round the world on all sorts of subject.....nearly as good as a magic carpet!

Gremlins? IN church?

Things going wrong around me just now have become the norm . I try not to  take it  personally.
I have done battle with  the iPhone, the iPad  and the lap top over the last few days!  I am getting used to the feeling of abject helplessness it engenders. However when the same gremlins turn up in church then it could just be time to start worrying.
The sound system has not worked for a some time so its just as well my teacher voice can cope!
We didn't need the karaoke machine which was good  as that's gone loopy too.
WE did have an organist.....Thank you God,  but when I got there she had failed to find any way of making the pedals work.
The person setting up the church,  being on holiday,  nothing was in the right place and there was fierce dispute about the advent candles....the man who said he always did it clashed with the church warden who said it was her job,,,,,and you all know how that went I'm sure.
I got all the right books out for Advent...talked them through  the  three year cycle of readings and we still hadn't got the organ sorted out.
Off I went to robe up whilst another man fiddled with everything in sight.....the candles were not lit and it was almost time to start.
The lady organist prepared to play without benefit of pedals when she had a brainwave....she turned the whole thing off.
It worked. Treating it as if it was a computer worked!
If only life followed in the same way......something not quite right, just shut it down. It would be so glad to be turned back on again it would behave itself!
I am hoping this run of gremlins in the works is coming to an end.
After all its New Year in the church......And a very Happy one to all!

Dark side of TV

When my first husband died I found myself for almost the first time of my life in charge of the  television. This was a novelty because I was free to explore...to watch things I'd never seen before or even imagined existed,  and as I found myself wide wake most nights for the first year of widowhood my reach extended into some very unlikely territory.
Late night viewing included Jerry Springer, Oprah, Judge somebody or other....astonishing stuff for me..I  had no idea  that personal confrontation as entertainment existed!
I looked in on the shopping channels ..I even bought somethings late at night when no one else  was watching. ...I became very self indulgent and enjoyed the whole process.
Once I'd got  totally involved with the church then I slept like a log...there was no need to stay up half the night watching other peoples misery. I admit though that I occasionally trespassed into Big Brother and Jungle capers....all in the spirit of intellectual curiosity of course.
Once ordained I was just too busy and went to bed early most nights to have enough energy  to cope with the next day.
Marriage came next to the Church warden...and once again watching the TV became a  negotiating exercise.
It took quite a while before we sorted it all out amicably. Us old people are set in our ways!
He sleeps through anything of mine he doesn't understand....West Wing defeated him completely, there were too many characters and too many sub plots.  I still have the last two seasons untouched!
If he is watching sport or scientific programs I tweet....amongst other things but an amicable agreement has been reached....
Thank goodness we both like Emmerdale and Corrie! There is other common ground too but the darker, arcane side of the box is never visited these days....
Just as well I suppose.....when people are hurting as badly as they are right now I'd rather not be witness to misery  on the box.

Several moans.

I am trying to put aside  irritations and downright annoyances that have cropped up this week.
I find I am cross with people I have never been even upset by before.....and now the apple store is causing me grief as well. They ask you to update your stuff which is fair enough but then they eat your apps.  True they do warn you in advance that they are going to do it but the assumption is there that you can put them all back when you've finished.
Unfortunately when there are two computers involved this is not possible...you can't be registered with two at the same time so all the apps I bought right at the beginning are on my other lap top.
This in itself would  not be so bad if you could then just go and get them again from the app store. This I have tried to do and of course its possible,  but they are charging me again for stuff Ive already paid for. I am sure that somewhere they have a note of what I've bought...deeply buried in the apple interior but not hard if you have a massive computer to dig in!
To add to all of that some of the reinstated apps are not working properly. The blog app for instance at first never loaded. It just winked out when I touched it. I deleted it and started again.....success this time till I tried to save the first blog of the day. Gone the moment I hit the save button.  I have searched but failed to find it......arghhhhh.
We are only half way through the day!    If this bleep bleep cloud is any use at all it will have got my blog from earlier and let it come down at some stage....If not.....I am not going to write it all again.....ARE YOU LISTENING CLOUD?
Sorry about the moaning ladies and gents....but sometimes you just have to write it all out!  Thats what belongings all about!

Hooch for Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving Day   is etched on my memory since the time when I had an American colleague. We both taught in a small teaching centre in Rochdale and he was home sick.  He needed to recreate Thanksgiving  as best he could and we all offered to help. The first thing he needed was hooch! Apparently making your own booze was always part of the celebration!
I gave him a demi john  or two of my home made elderberry wine. The still he set up in the chemistry lab was quickly dismantled. The smell really was a bit of a give away!  So he resorted to other methods of distilling the wine. He froze it in thin layers and then lifted off the layer of ice every morning. Hooch was what we were left with.
On Thanksgiving morning he arrived with silly hats for all, tin whistles, drums and lots more besides. He  organised a march through the school, round the play ground and car park then back into school...the noise was amazing as all the children blew their whistles and banged anything that came to hand!
After setting the children off so they were hard to deal with for the rest of day it  was the turn of the staff. A party was arranged for when the children had gone home.
Turkey sandwiches  and various nibbles were served along with the hooch.
It really was lethal! A small glass and none of us were fit to drive home so the party continued!
Im not sure just how authentic it was  in terms of Thanks giving Day but we all enjoyed it and it was  a taste of America never to be forgotten!

Boxes everywhere.

The Christingle saga continues I regret to say. I explained in a pervious post that I had inadvertently got several parcels en route. We are now up to three with two more on their way! So far only one £20 has been taken from my account but there's time yet !
In the meanwhile the church warden wanted me to go back and order more stuff!
The only consolation is that I must have easily enough for the next five years. After that I won't be doing all this I expect!
Here's the pictorial evidence!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Advent is coming!

Its the first Sunday of Advent  this week!  Woe is me........or something like that. Its a season meant to be taken seriously to prepare us for the coming of the long awaited Christ child. And yet it is so hard to do with all the Christmas joy already in the shops and on the television.
We don't have flowers in the church during Advent and its a season for reflection . I have found that we all treat it differently.
A few years ago when entertaining another vicar I made the mistake of offering her her usual tipple....a gin and tonic. It was refused with great charm because she had given up alcohol for Advent.
In school the Christmas rush is on to get the nativity play  up and running.....the excitement in the air is palpable.... charged with the delight  that the coming of the  Christ child will bring.
For ten years in Rochdale I taught children with no English to speak and write it. Every Christmas we had the same problem.
"Does Father Christmas only come to visit white children? "
That was a hard one so we tried  to bring Christmas into school  on a secular basis of course.
The year we did the story of Goldilocks as a pantomime   has stayed with me.
A very brown boy....girls were not allowed to take part then , wearing a blonde wig, was  standing and looking at the audience saying
 "Whose been eating my porridge?'  This is a picture that comes back every Christmas without fail.
It was in the days before the PC brigade had made everyone conscious of language and symbols...having Christmas plays and songs were fully accepted by all the Muslim children in school with great delight.   They joined in too.
One year I got lots of cards including one addressed  like this.....
"Happy Christmas dear Grandmother"
I was about 34 at the time!
The lead up to Christmas according to the church year should be treated with respect and reflection but its very hard to do when mince pies are already being cooked, presents being hidden, and the mad dash to the shops has started.....listen.....
Bells, swooshing reindeer, Santa Claus...they are on their way!
Oh dear!

After the war.

Its not clinging to the past to remember things as they once were.  To keep something the same as its always been is to try to freeze time. We have to change...our genes need us to adapt, to evolve and so we do but we put the past to one side at our peril.
Thinking about yesterdays blog about my granddads brought into focus just how much things have changed. There was radio.....my welsh granddad used to spend hours with his crystal set trying to get words out of it...  There was no TV, newspapers were full of  war reports..and books were very scarce.
In the absence of what to day we call the media we had words....people talked and sometimes the talk was intense, political usually but sometimes religious.
I listened to what the grown ups were saying as a small child and the most common phrase was
"After the war."  Everything good would happen after the war.....that was what we were waiting for . A brave new world was possible and it would start after the war.
My granddads who had been part of the first world war and spectators to the second envisaged this wonderful new world......after we'd won the war.  Everything else was put on one side to wait for better times.
All the injustices, all wasted opportunities were to be put right after the war.......that was what we were all waiting for.
When my dad came home from the war a stranger who seemed to think he could boss me about, I was 7.
Life settled into a sort of routine as he looked for work and talked.
Everyone who came to the house was invited in for a chat.... they were all waiting for the brave new world....and then there was the general election of 1945. I still remember it well...
We lived close to the town hall in Rochdale and I was carried down there by my father to hear the results read out. The cheering was amazing...it was all going to happen...it really was...Labour had got in!
This determination for change resulted in the setting up of the Beveridge plan. Much has been written since of the welfare state with sneers and laughter about free specs for all.  At the time it was quite simply marvellous.
And every bit of it was discussed in my house and I listened to it all. For a long time they did not think I was listening or understanding until one day I interrupted the conversation to ask a question.
"What does rape mean? " Stunned silence until my dad tried to fob me off. A man stopped him.
"If she's old enough to ask the question, she's old enough to listen to the answer." I think it was the man from the Pru.
After that if I wanted to ask questions I could...and did.
I was privileged to witness the birth of the welfare state...
.Please don't let it be dismantled!

My granddad knitted carpets.

My granddads were very different. I lived with my Welsh one till I was six and loved him dearly. He had been a miner who was locked out in the general strike and I learned socialism and Christianity in equal measure sitting on his knee as he expounded to his friends and family.
My other grandad was a strange man to me after the war as was his son, my father....but I got used to them both in time.
The Lancashire granddad had joined the army at 16, telling them that he was eighteen. They took his word for it. He was sent to India and whilst he was there he learned to sew and to knit and became proficient at  all the skills usually practised by women. He was a gentle man and a creature of habit. He placed a bet on a horse every Saturday lunch time and had a pint with my dad every Sunday lunch time.
He was the night watchman at an old mill. Cotton and rayon balls  appeared in the house occasionally and he would knit them into jumpers that were very scratchy and not much worn.
As his retirement loomed the balls of cotton started to proliferate....cupboards full of them got everyone wondering what on earth he was up to.  The mill was about to close down. They had all been told they could have what they could carry away....so on the day he retired he found another job instantly.
He started knitting. The fabric was unbleached and greyish....and there was a lot of it. Every day he knitted...there was a huge weight of work and none of us knew what on earth he was doing!
After about a month all was revealed. He had knitted a carpet.  A fitted carpet at that...with holes just the right size for the fireplace and the doors. The room was cleared whilst he laid it very gently.  It  covered the room before the furniture and granny came back in.
"I know its not the right colour love" he said apologetically but it will save your feet on cold mornings!
He went on to knit carpets for the whole house apart from the kitchen which was allowed to keep its oil cloth.  The stairs and the two bedrooms were carpeted by grandad.    So he became known as the knitting grandad.!  
I have told my children this and I could see their disbelief.....but it is absolutely true and the carpet out lived them both!

Farewell to the Bishop.

I went to a farewell service in the Cathedral last night. The man who was retiring was the bishop who ordained me. I was unprepared for the sadness and for the sudden rush of memories.
Just one story from many....
After I moved to Cornwall I joined the church choir and soon became the church secretary. I became aware of a call to ministry long pushed to one side returning with great vigour and persistence. I went to talk to the parish priest who said that as I was then just 60 I was now too old for almost anything.  The inner voice kept returning I had to do something. I went back to the vicar and told him I was going to try to be a reader. He produced a leaflet telling me the cut off date was 60. But he thought it might be worth a try.
I applied and all went very quiet until one day I got an invitation to go to a readers selection conference.
Off I went and was interviewed by various people until it was time to go into the Bishop.
He smiled at me, asked a few questions and then rifled through a lot of paper.
Suddenly he flung the whole lot of them into the air.
I was stunned.....
He smiled at me again.
"I have no doubt you would make an excellent reader" he said "But I have no intention of letting you"
Dashed I said something about realising that I was too old...
"Oh no" he said with a broad grin from ear to ear...".I want you for the clergy....Have you thought about becoming a priest?"
I looked at him very carefully in case he was joking.
"Well yes I have" I said " But I'm too old for that too now."
He laughed again, a warm, caring laugh.
I will ordain you as a deacon in one year and as a priest the following year if you agree."
I agreed of course.....the call that came in my youth was finally going to be answered.
He was as good as his word.
The bishop made me into the very happy fulfilled woman I am today. I shall always be grateful to him.

Candles and red tape?

I am not sermonising for the most part in this blog  but this week I have been talking about the gospel from Matthew where Jesus is telling the disciples that in doing things for the least of us we are also doing them to  Him.  I included in this  the Celtic tradition of hospitality to strangers just in case they were  Jesus.
This led me on to the subject of charity and not wanting it to be too heavy I ended with  what has happened to me this week with the Christingle society.
I tried to order all our stuff  during the week  and kept getting a notice saying my order had been received but the payment process had not  worked. I tried several times before I gave up on the net  and just rang  them and placed  the order by phone. I then got four emails saying my order had been received . Then another saying the same thing. Five in all...
Yesterday a parcel arrived.....only one as yet....but I fear we are going to have more red sticky tape and candles than we can use in several years!
My other concern is that each time I ordered, I pledged £20 as a donation.  Am I now going to find that in fact this donation has now gone up to £120?
Its not the end of the world and I can deal with it.......but my main problem is ,  how will I know if I ring the Children's society again that its not Jesus at the other end?

Original blog 2007

During the last days of attempting to sort out various computer problems I have been driven back to the last computer on several occasions  and its proving very interesting. In the documents I kept finding something labelled Original blog.  I've skipped over it till this morning when I decided to risk a peep. I will take time to read it all but for now I've just done the first few posts....going back to the summer of 2007. When it was apparently raining!    I've copied and pasted a bit from the beginning.

Several sun filled days.....what a difference! My children are staying over in Portscatho where I used to live before I married David.There was no hot water when they arrived and no TV. The Sky engineer was sent for and a plumber. We still have had no word from the plumber but the Sky man said he would go on Saturday afternoon. He phoned to say he was behind...not to worry..they waited in on Saturday night....still no man. Eventually they got a call from St Mawes which is where I live now. "I am on my way" he said..".Give me the details of how to find you." He wanted the post code. HP said my son....for Harry Potter. The man was very suspicious. "Hang on" he said, 'The house is called "Potters End" Is this a wind up?" No it wasn't just one of those weird coincidences you get from time to time. He finally arrived at 10.30, in the dark and gave them a choice. Cut down the mimosa tree which in the last five years has grown to massive height or move the dish. The dish was finally moved at 11pm....end of Sky enginners day!

 We are taking my grand daughter and son out for the day today. I asked if she would like to go to see the Eden project.

" Ummmm" she said"Its all plants there"

 Even when I said there was a shop I did not  get her interest. Welcome to the wonderful world of teenage girls. Falmouth looks favourite at the moment.....they have shops there!

Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2007 at 09:59AM by Tregearvean | 

There you are.  Nothing has really changed at all!  Since 2007.  

Nuisance phone calls.

I am not on the whole a rude woman. I listen usually with great patience to people explaining their difficulties  most days of my life but recently I have started to respond to certain calls in a fairly unsympathetically  way.
The phone rings. I pick it up to find no one on the either end. I say hello. Nothing. I put the phone down.
That scenario may happen several times in a day. Sometimes I hear the sound in the back ground of a busy office. Other voices speaking , phones ringing.
Sometimes the phone goes dead the moment I answer.    If I was a suspicious woman I'd assume it to be "The other woman"
Then sometimes someone speaks to me. They say. "Hello Mrs .... how are you today?"
This simple question makes me very cross now. Its obviously being used as a way to get people to respond...I have often wondered if you started to tell them how you really are it might put them off a bit.
Next time I could tell them about a bad back or an anxiety about a trivial problem.  I could stretch it out a bit  to see what happens.
They don't really want to know how you are though. Its just to get the ball rolling so the ball goes no further with me. I pick it up and lob it back!
This morning I said in answer to the question....."Look just tell me what you want please."
The young man with poor English asked me to repeat the question at the end of which he went into his spiel about getting me 40 % off my electricity bill for the rest of my life......which might not be long at this rate.
Why do they do it? Who thinks its cost effective to have a call centre in India?
The real  problem here is that I have twice now responded badly to a genuine question as to my well being....  then its difficult to explain!  If the number says International its usually a sales call. If its says the number is with held..same thing  but just occasionally its a call you really need.....this whole selling by phone thing is an actual nuisance.....how do we get it stopped?

The churching of women

I  spent much of my time being pregnant in hospital with what is now known as pre-eclampsia. When I went into labour the dire warnings  of other people were predominant in my mind but I need not have worried....it was a quick labour and an easy delivery. I was one of those women for whom giving birth was a natural joyful occasion. Afterwards I felt lifted onto a higher plane of achievement and the glory that was  having become a mother. 

When I got home I had not taken communion for months and was eager to do so. Me and my  baby went to church and the vicar who was a lovely man came to sit with me before the service to tell me that I couldn't take communion without being churched. 

I made an appointment with him to go to church midweek for this short service. 

I can't remember any of the words...just the dawning slowly upon me that this was in fact a cleansing of my sin....that for the church giving birth was not the glorious thing that it had been for me. 

The tone was censorious, slow and deliberate. 

Having looked at the prayer book this morning I see that we almost certainly strayed into the next bit about the commination of sinners..and I am  outraged that such a term could be applied to some one who had brought a new and innocent life into the world. 

The overall impression was dark and deeply disturbing and I felt let down by the church I loved.

It was clearly news to some people in a recent discussion that women in the C of E were still being churched in the the 60s . 

It could explain why a whole generation of what became known as women's libbers were born. 

It certainly stopped me from going to church much for years after. 

Thank God times have changed  but it might explain why so many male priests were anti women. It was part of the culture. 

Hopefully now some of us have been allowed into the clergy this culture has gone. I hope for good....

Retreat house with no booze!

Watching Rev last week I was reminded of a retreat I took after my ordination as a deacon.   The TV Rev  had taken the precaution of having a bottle of the hard stuff tucked away.....I had no such forethought.
I had done two organised and directed  retreats  and this one was different. It was a retreat house on the Cornish coast where you can book in for a few days on your own and be still.
I did have my laptop with me but no phone and no booze.
I walked the cliff paths during the day and was quiet at night.  That was the plan.
The first night I was alone in the house. I went to bed quite happily and woke up several times to hear scamperings in the room above me.
The next day a your man arrived...in his twenties...he had forgotten to bring food so I cooked us a meal and we went to bed. He was in a different part of the house from me but I still heard him scream....
The next day we had breakfast whilst he explained that mice made him very jumpy!
"Me too" I said..."I'm not keen either"
The next evening we played scrabble together before going to bed.
I had left my walking boots on the floor by the door and woken up in the night by strange  sounds...I saw the boots being dragged over the floor by their laces........I sat up, turned the lamp on and saw a very large rat.
Rushing downstairs at top speed I found the young man sitting in the kitchen next to the Rayburn with his hands over his ears!
The next two days and nights we really could have done with some booze of some kind but instead we sat up all night playing scrabble and watching episodes of West Wing together.
It was not the retreat I had been expecting but it was very memorable!

Our wedding pic.

I am not good at getting the pics and the words together.....but this was me and David on our wedding day!

My Monday morning wedding.

Twas on a Monday morning.....that we got married 6 years ago today!  I was then the curate of four parishes and David was the Church warden of one of them. It had to be quiet....we knew that if the parishes were in the picture it would become a much bigger affair than we wanted it to be so we chose Monday morning as the best option.
My tutor was asked to perform the ceremony and she and I had a hen night the night before after doing Evensong!   Th ancient priest who had been my spiritual advisor gave me away.   Gladly!
The only other people were the other church wardens and their spouses. One of the spouses played the organ and the verger rang the bells!
It was perfect.  A lovely bright sunny day. Afterwards we all went out to lunch at a hotel with a veranda looking out to sea and drank Rose Champagne.  An amazing day, still remembered by the parish in amazement.
The parish priest was off long term sick and that night we had a PCC meeting. David was the chairman so we did have to be there.
When we arrived they had laid on cake and champagne...and one of them said happily
"This is what we had to do to make sure we always have  a priest in the parish...marry one of them. "
It was a wonderful happy day for us all....not just me and David...and long may it continue.
We are now aiming at the tenth one which at our ages would be a miracle!
But we all know we can do the impossible. Miracles takes a wee while longer!

Flags on the altar.

My first ever Remembrance day service was whilst I was a curate. The parish priest grinned as he explained that he would be away and it was all mine.
That should have started alarm bells but oddly didn't. It was even more weird when I found we had to have a rehearsal the night before.  After that I knew what the problem was.
Old service men each had their own version of what happened the previous years. One man did one bit of the service, another a different bit. The procession with the banners to the altar had to be done  with military precision...it was important to them...it had to be right.
I agreed with that fully. The problem was that they had different memories.
"No we never did it like that. "
"We've done it like that every year."
"  No, one year he did it but only because I was ill."...
.The tone was set. Walking through it was a mine field. The British Legion sent representatives and they also  had their own way of doing everything.
The girl guides and brownies had to be dragooned into walking with their flags  up to the altar ,in exactly the right position... The man doing the dragooning was also the man whose mode of transport around the village was a camouflaged jeep!
I did the service for several years, learning as I went along just how important it was to everyone and giving in with good grace when disagreements occurred. Now I am only asked to do the service if the incumbent is sick so Ive been let off this year but its the first time!
Last year for the first time I did lay down the law. One browny's mum told me that on the previous year her daughter had been very sick after being told off by one of the men. She had actually thrown up at the back of the church.   I had to do something she said.
So I explained to the old soldiers that the children had not been taught the ways of the army barrack sergeant and that if they went wrong they had to be left alone.
They were not impressed but they were noticeably more relaxed. No one threw up!
As these old boys get older and less in number its going to be even more important to keep the spirit of this day alive and well.  We will not forget!

We are not all vicars!

The Church of England with all its various layers is difficult for those who are in it to understand. For people looking in from the outside  it seems almost impossible. How to differentiate between curate and priest...how to understand the difference between licensed paid clergy from non stipendiary clergy. To those outside the church they are all vicars!  I am actually an assistant priest.
Which is fine for the most part.
Its when you get someone who tells you that as he is paying your wages then its your job to do as he wants you to that I get a little stroppy!   Pay? Wages? You have got to be joking!
And here its important to understand that I am not complaining about not getting paid.   This is the job I signed up to when I joined. I am fortunate in having two pensions already. I don't need to be paid for doing what I do. I work a fairly full week most of the time and I do everything from love. Love of the church, love of God,  love of people.
I recently did a funeral and was amazed to find in my thank you card a twenty pound note.
I joked that I didn't do money and it went into the collection the next Sunday.
People just don't actually believe me when I tell them I don't get paid or indeed claim expenses..
 That is not true really.  My pay comes in the form of knowing that I am useful and that I am  privileged to be able to preach, to  marry, christen and bury people.
It's just that when I may have not done quite as much as some people would like me too, and I am only a fairly ancient human whose energy levels are not  as good as they used to be...its when someone outside the church  then tries to make me do something because thats what I get paid for! Thats what grieves me!
But now I've blogged it all Im still smiling!  Thank you God.

Heaven-Haven

I have always enjoyed the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins.  The wonderful imagery and the sprung rhythms make them essential reading for me . Over the years I have often taken refuge in  and wept at the plight of the nuns whose ship was sunk as they fled from persecution described in his epic poem "The wretch of the Deutchlander"
Today, thinking of all the fallen I read this wonderful short poem written by Hopkins as he prepared for priesthood...but it might equally be appropriate for those going into battle.

Heaven-Haven

I have desired to go
Where springs not fail
To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail
And a few lilies blow

And I have asked to be
Where no storms come,
Where the green swell is in the havens dumb
And out of the swing of the sea.

Hopkins

I too wish to be out of the mad worlds clamour  today.
Silence really is golden.

Armistice Day on an glacier.

Remembering those who have died is always important but even more so if they have died in saving others and securing our future.
I have been remembering an extraordinary armistice day.
I was in Canada, having chosen to do my first trip abroad as a widow.. I had gone on  a tour so that there would be other people around and I had made friends as we travelled over the Rockies from Vancouver.
On November 11 we were on a glacier...fairly high up and were being shown a native American encampment. As we were approaching eleven O clock I needed to be on my own in silence but didn't want to impose this on anyone else so I quietly made my way back to the coach, explaining to the tour guide on en route.
The coach driver said as I climbed on board. "I wondered if any of you Brits would remember what day it is. "
We agreed on a minutes silence at eleven and then looked up as more people started back to the coach. By eleven we were all on board and we held the minutes silence together, around 40 of us.
The tour guide then said"I think Jean might want to say a prayer now."
This shocked me because no one knew that I was then en route to ordination.
Put on the spot I said a short prayer and then the words of a poem floated into my head.

In Flanders field the poppies blow, 

Between our crosses, row on row

That mark our place and in the sky

The larks still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below

We are the Dead, Short days ago

We lived. felt dawn, saw sunset glow

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders field.

Take up our quarrel with the foe

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch, be yours to hold it high

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders field       Amen

Oddly I was able to say the whole thing without tears.....but afterwards  many tears were spent by all those on the coach who thanked me for remembering.  It was written by John McCrae and is I think beautiful. 

Lest we forget. 

Angry? Blog it.

I am a pretty even tempered person mostly....but I haven't always been like this.....In my younger days, tearing around from pillar to the next pillar before getting to the post I did have a bit of a cross streak...There I admit it...there have been times when my fuse has been very short indeed....it was wise to put on a tin hat when coming into a room where I was stressing out.
Now for the most part all is well, I am only over burdened with work occasionally and I get on with most people....computers are the exception here obviously .  They make me cross without even trying!
My daily  set backs consist of small things like  the dog barking just as I'm getting the ideas in line for a sermon!.
So why am I so nadgered this morning? My computer is working just fine.....shhhh  
Its grey outside and damp but in here its warm and cosy.
All is well with my world apart from one E mail which has made me cross.  I've wasted far too much time already trying to write a conciliatory, soothing reply but I've failed because every time I sit down to write, anger, and irritation flood my brain and the really annoying thing is that  its not anything important at all....easily solved with good will on all sides.
All the techniques I learned in my youth are now in review.
Shall I meditate using a candle flame  or a flower to focus on?
Or....sweet music doth soothe the savage brow....  etc.
There's any number of calming influences around me...so what will I do?
First I'll talk to the dear lady whose husband died recently.
Then I'll walk the dog around the field in the rain.
Then I'll plan a nice comforting beef casserole for lunch...with dumplings..
I am already doing the most important thing though. I'm blogging.....and that's the whole point of the exercise  for me.
Instead of harbouring deep dark thoughts and forming all sorts of sentences in my brain  to repel boarders....I am writing it out. a technique used by me for far too many years  but it works.  I no longer want to scream , or send rude emails.
Its done....there, I'm smiling again.    Honestly I am.  :-)))

Posh nosh.

Having to go into Truro this morning made me realise yet again just how lucky we are .

Shopping is  always a joy....the day I no longer I enjoy it you'll know my end is nigh!  Having got the laptop introduced to the cloud I then had time to go to Marks and Spencers for some much needed food shopping.  We can now eat again.....and what  a choice!

Sorry to take you back down memory lane again but I do remember a time when everything was on ration and food in very short supply. My mother would leave me in one queue whilst she queued elsewhere every Saturday morning. I still remember the thrill of my first banana and ice cream! 

The whole diet was simple....peasant food really. always good and wholesome but with little or no choice...

Today's array of food is amazing. Its not long since the first "foreign" food arrived in the shops, avocados, mangos, even pineapples were  the stuff dreams were made of.

Now M and S produce such a variety of ready meals as well as wonderful meat and fish that had we seen it 50 years ago we would have thought it fit only for the very rich and thats the problem for those of us with a too well developed social conscience. 

The difference in the rich, the not so rich and the poor is highlighted by the choice of food available. 

Its no good having all this stuff if you can't afford it buy it. 

I have a friend who is posh....very posh,  and she regards shopping as a heaven sent gift from God...

One of my favourite lines from her was 

"In the old days people like us had servants to cook for us. Now we have Marks and Spencer." It was said with no trace of irony.

There is some truth in that statement but then you have to consider those whose limited budgets are getting stretched ever tighter....Things are tough today....even in this village full of large expensive houses there are families living on the bread line,  families  who are hard pushed to provide their children with warm clothing in the winter and shoes that don't let water in. 

I try hard not to feel bad about our way of life in comparison with others.  It makes me an easy target for the charities ringing in daily.  Having a social conscience can be  a nuisance at times!  I have no plans to become a latter day Lady Bountiful! 

Geeky problems!

There are few things in this life which make me more cross than an inanimate object refusing to do what you want it to do....computers were made with just this in mind.
They are a test, first of human ingenuity and then of patience. As I am almost at the point of flinging the lap top out of the window I have let off steam by using the iPad which has it's faults but is obedient ....mostly.
I bought the new lap top less than a year ago and at first it was brilliant . An apple Mac book pro....fast, easy to use. no problems.
Then I put Lion on it and that was also great...and again no problems.
We ran into trouble with the update......first it took all day and then it just kept going most of the night, the daisy wheel going round and round so that I had to turn it off manually.
Since then it has refused to cooperate! No matter what I try to do the bleep bleep daisy wheel just goes round. The only way to stop it is to force a quit. This has happened several times today and I am back to the good old iPad. Solid reliable iPad...
Beam me up Scotty......please.
I wonder if threats might work........start behaving or I'll sing hymns to you all day!
Then I'll preach.....oh dear, I am now treating it like a person. It's going back to the shop tomorrow...that'll teach it!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Joyous singing.

We had an organist in church  this morning which was a great treat after using the karaoke machine last time! A part of the treat was that I had chosen the hymns and they were all tunes  that I love....if your going in for self indulgence you might as well do it properly.
We ended with "Jesu lover of my soul." sang to the tune of Aberystwyth.   This is one of my favourites and as I roared it out I remembered again  that it had been a hymn we had sung every Sunday morning when I was in the college choir.
I was actually the leader of the choir and this was on the whole an onerous task since every week I had to learn all the stuff  we were going to sing with a very demanding lady choir master.
The icing on the cake though was that as we sang at  the Eisteddford every year we also had a visiting  Welsh choir master...
He was wonderful and his aim to make the rafters shake was very nearly achieved. Our warm up hymn every Sunday was "Jesu, lover of my soul" we sang it with variations, with descent, loudly and  softly, but always with gusto   and not a little love!
It has stayed a favourite  of mine ever since and was one we sang at my ordination.
Singing it again this morning with a good organist and a church willing to give voice was a great delight.
It will now stay with me all day and I might be heard giving it some wellie later as I walk the dog round the garden....  Alleluia!

Proof of a brain!

Tomorrows sermon is on the subject of being prepared  for being prepared, during the pre advent month. .. I had let my mind play with this for a little while and I suddenly remembered a time  when I had been prepared to be prepared, but I was in hospital.
My daughter was born very quickly and I went into clinical shock afterwards..
I recovered fairly quickly and just enjoyed the new baby until a doctor realised that I had no reflex in one eye..In sunlight I had odd eyes.They moved fast. Within the week I was in the Manchester hospital that deals with brain tumours!
Tests, more tests and finally the moment when I was to have no breakfast they were going to have a look to see what was happening!  I was not a happy woman!
Lying back and trying to think of England I coped with all the visitors coming in and out....they were preparing me.
Finally there was a large influx of young doctors, all wielding opthalmoscopes. All peering into my eyes eagerly.
The consultant arrived at the same time......"It could be worse dear" he said happily. "There are much worse places they could be looking in."
That made us all laugh.
It was all good in the end..... .they found evidence that I had a brain....and indeed that I was unique . It was likely a small stroke  that had caused the problem...but no one else had ever presented such symptoms!
Looking back I marvel and am aware of much praying going on around me in the lead up to surgery.
I still have no reflex in the eye... and  the only thing effect is  that I do wear sunglasses most of the time.
So my experience of being prepared was a positive one....and I hope for the same for us all in this lead up to Advent.

Malice and spite.

Nicky Gumble's thought for today was from Proverbs. " Malice backfires. Spite boomerangs."
I don't always pay much attention to the daily quotes....but this one grabbed me because it is very appropriate in many ways.
If you harbour any negative emotion over a long period of time its not good for you, mental health requires a calm,  whole hearted approach to life which under difficult circumstances may be difficult to achieve.  But we do have to try.
Loving your neighbour is sometimes just as hard as loving your enemy but it is possible. In most cases.
When I was a much younger woman and not as happy  as I am now,  if things went wrong for me I tried very hard to blame someone else. "Now look what you've made me do." was heard fairly often in our house.
Now if things go wrong there's no one else to blame . I have to face up to being wrong fairly regularly.
We are all different people and we have our own approach to life...there is no one right way of doing anything....and as far as I am concerned   all ways are valid.
Occasionally on the net I read  rude,  ill considered comments about the way people live, politicians, students, news papers , there are people whose whole life consists of finding fault with everyone else. I always read them hoping that the person expressing them has at least got a sense of humour and that they can laugh a little as well as hating.
In the end though hatred of anyone or anything will rebound.....it will come back on you and make you unhappy.
Trying to be happy is in our genes..we are much healthier people if we are well balanced.
If we can also find time to express our joy as we go along then maybe other people can catch some of it...
I am in danger of sounding like Pollyanna so it definitely time to stop before bursting into a chorus of "Smile, smile, smile as you go along!"

I'll be there dreckly.

People like to grumble....Having a good moan is one of life's pleasures especially on a gloomy day in winter...And they do moan....so do I sometimes but I hear a lot of moans on a fairly regular basis. Doctors, tradesmen, the weather....all grist to the moaning mill.
The problem is that my conception always varies, sometimes by quite a lot. The doctors and their receptionists are unfailingly helpful to me and my husband.
So you can only speak about your own experience. To repeat what others have told you without checking the facts is simply gossip and can cause damage if the original grumble is repeated too often.
The main subject of gossip in a small village is very often the tradesmen. The plumbers, electricians, builders etc are often busy and fail to make their deadlines...Do it too often in a small village and you are out of work because every one knows...
My husband was a builder and knows all the local tradesmen well. Some of them have  worked for him at various times...and there is a great deal of respect on every side when one of them is asked to do a job.
So yesterday when we had a problem in our bathroom David was confident...it would be fixed dreckly he said...Dreckly being Cornish for manyanna.
Around 4 yesterday afternoon he rang the local electrician and left a message for him.
There was a knock on the door about 5 pm and there he was beaming and  pleasant.
He diagnosed the problem needed a part and said he'd be back in the morning.''
"I'll wait till your back from church " he said..."Around eleven?"
Bless him. He'd not only come straight round after his days work, he knew that on Thursday morning we do the midweek communion together.
I have no doubts that he will be here when we get back.
And then there will be light again in the bathroom!

Dogs and beds.

Dogs are as we all know almost human in their attitudes and likes and dislikes...they have their own ideas of what's right for them . Or not!
Our first dog was a tiny Jack Russell called Patch rescued from the RSPCA in Bolton. He did have a bed but he knew that if he crept very carefully into either of the children's beds he would get a warm reception so I'm not sure how much time he spent in it. It was wicker and lived in the kitchen. Not sure that he spent much time in it .
The next dog was a daft Springer spaniel...William was full of hang ups...he came from a game keepers cottage in North Wales and was actually balmy through interbreeding...he had a rage syndrome which got worse as he got older but he did love his bed which was in fact a bread tray swathed in cushions.
William was fastidious and whenever the mood took him he would spring clean his bed, taking everything out carefully before replacing them in a better order. Old bones, rubber toys, mouldy biscuits all found their place there and woe betide anyone who offered to help!
After William came Major, a rescued golden retriever whose original family had thrown out their Christmas puppy when he got big enough to be the leader of the pack of four boys during the long summer holiday.
Major had his bed and it was a proper one specially manufactured for big dogs.
When I became a widow Major opted to share my bed and I was glad of another body in it so there he slept till he died.
There was a lap over of about a year between him and Crispin a golden puppy.
As Major's bed was not slept in the new baby  was introduced to it. He did not use it....nothing would persuade him to even get into it.
After Major died I tried again but no he was not having it so after we'd moved to Cornwall I bought him his very own bed, giant sized...comfortable, navy blue padded and fluffy.
Nothing would persuade him to even try it....over a period of months we tried him with it but no....he was not having it at all. It now lives in the barn, a virtually unused bed.
People who come to the house ask where his bed is?
I feel mean having to tell them that actually he sleeps on the sofa in my office..specially if they were getting the golden  dog hairs onto their dark clothes.
Dogs are strange. How they decide on their own preferences is fascinating...even now as a very old dog Crispin views his bed  with suspicion and prefers the struggle to get onto the sofa.
We are all different in this life...one dogs bed is another ones prison.....and so it is with people. We should celebrate our diversity!   it would be a dull world without it.