This Sunday is sea Sunday ....we take this seriously here. The sea surrounding us has it's dark days as we saw last winter!
Here, the last village on a small strip of land jutting out into the sea we felt the full force of the sea just a few months ago when it battered down the door of a small bank, filled the cash machine with salt water and took the harbour mast broken out to sea.
We are a peninsula on a peninsula! The sea plays a huge part in all our lives...when a boat capsizes, when one fails to get back into the harbour we all feel the anxiety and grief....
We fish it, sail it, swim it....it brings welcome visitors to our doors, as a playground during the summer it is both beautiful and beguiling. But you learn never ever to take it for granted.....
One of the big hotels that was devasted during the worst of the winter storms is open again now.
It said it would open for Easter and it did. I was taken out to lunch there yesterday and it is truly transformed.
The terrace, full of huge rocks and breached in places is now rebuilt and tables along it are lovely places to sit and observe the passing throng!
The broken windows, the flooded carpets inside are all replaced...it is impossible to imagine just how terrible it was!
So on Sunday we will remember, we will sing "Let your anchor hold through the storms of life" with gusto and we will think of all those who have lost their lives at sea.
It is a service full of joy but edged with awareness of the dark side of the ocean...
We also remember those whose work is to look after the seas victims. Various bodies do this work and we honour them on Sunday...
My personal anchor seems to be holding through the storms of life right now but we can never forget that the sea is a moody beggar . It brings both joy and destruction....we just have to learn to live with the possibility of both.
Posted with Blogsy
2 comments:
I used to love Sea Sunday at Fleetwood- and the blessing of the waves- the hymn we always sang was Eternal father Strong to save which remains a favourite . Glad you own anchor is holding
Thanks Jean for an insight that passes us who live inland by most of the time. I spent four years in Plymouth in the late sixties/early seventies, and did a fair amount of sailing both in boats and Naval ships, particularly those big troop carrier things that took us and landed us in all sorts of exotic places, like Cape Wrath, the Isle of Wight and RAF Mountbatten (as it used to be) but also to Continental Europe. So, I got over my sea sickness quite early. Nothing like sitting off the coast in a flat bottomed vessel waiting for the weather to be calm enough for you to get off.
Prayers for you for this coming weekend and lovely to hear that you Anchor is holding you at the moment.
Post a Comment