Honey for the king

Sleep until eight and wake rested, but still tired, during the night a torrential downpour hammered against the bedroom windows. When I pull back the curtains and open the window, the freshness of the rain on the fields and garden flows into the house. Outside the sky is overcast and threatening rain. I make a full English with the last of the sausage, black pudding, bacon, tomatoes and egg, I will need to restock later. Somehow breakfast tea seems to fit the bill today and I drink this strong and orange hued, with my breakfast. My ear infection is a lot better this morning, so after washing and dressing, pack my running gear for later and then drive to Cherry for nine thirty. I give my estranged wife, Pip, the new insurance certificate for her car and a new gold card from our joint account, that also provides breakdown cover. I can't live with her, because of her anger, but I look after her from a distance. Dolly and Teddy are eager for their walk, and although it is spitting with rain, we still drive to the Westwood and park on Newbald Road, next to Newbegin Pits woods. It is still spitting with rain, but the weather is mild and pleasantly cool after the heat. In the woods it is calm, fresh and tranquil, you can almost sense the gratitude of trees for the gift of rain. We take our time, the dogs and I, absorbed in the beauty of the landscape, at peace with the gentle flow of the eternal river of time. As we make our way back to the car, I know that today is not a day to run, today is a day to rest and reflect on the occasional quiet majesty of the World. After I drop the dogs back at Cherry, I call and see Felicity at her house in Albert Terrace, her cleaner, Claire is there. A combination of friends, family and social services collude to keep Felicity in her own home. She has people who take her dogs out, a home help she calls her Sherpa and Claire, the cleaner. After her migraine attack, she is tired but otherwise OK, another friend, Rob Byass, is helping to publish an anthology of her poems. In many ways she is like an older version of Pip, when she was Mrs. Jekyll, before Mrs. Hyde took control of her life. I drink a pot of tea with her, laugh and joke for a while, then leave after half an hour as she is tiring. On my way home I call at the supermarket to restock on groceries and then drive back for one o'clock. After unpacking the shopping, I text Dylan at Lloyds and cancel my appointment at the bank, and then make crusty bread and roast beef sandwiches, with more tea, for lunch. I eat in the garden room and spend the afternoon quietly reading, stopping now again to enjoy the heavy showers, the rain bouncing off the path outside, it's timpanation rising to a crescendo and then quickly dying down to a more gentle pitter, patter. At five I break for meditation and afterwards fall asleep again for an hour. Tea is bread and honey, the silly German phrase, "hoenig fur der Koenig", (honey for the king",) repeating in my mind, as it always does when I eat bread and honey. As I recall from four and twenty blackbirds, it was the queen that ate the bread and honey, the king was in his counting house! Read until bedtime, finishing my book. Weather permitting I will take Louis to the seaside tomorrow so that Sarah can revise for her finals.