A day of mixed blessings

Wake at seven and make a full English for breakfast, washed down by a teapot of strong tea. It's another grey morning outside, but at least it's dry. After showering and dressing, leave the house around nine and arrive at Cherry at quarter past, load up the dogs and drive them to the Westwood. As we make our way round, I get a call from Felicity to say she's under the weather and won't be going to the Poppy Seed for coffee, this removes any time pressure and the dogs and I stroll leisurely round our usual route. As we walk round Newbald Pits wood the sun comes out and, as I look at the flowers and trees and the meadow, I wonder whether the garden of Eden might have been like this? A voice comes into my head. It says "look again", and I do and have a sudden satori. The trees are luminously present and the world is always already, perfect in every way. "the kingdom of heaven is nigh", could Jesus have meant that it was "now", immanent, and if only we could shake off the shackles of language, and stop this endless ricocheting between past and future, constantly obsessed by fears and desires, that we might find real peace in the living moment. These short periods of enlightenment are essentially ineffable and fade as soon as the normal mental chatter resumes, but are nonetheless moments of great peace and beauty. As we arrive back in Cherry, Sarah's car approaches from the opposite direction, Clement gets out and tells me Sarah has gone to the village post office to collect her family allowance. As we take the dogs in the house, he starts to tell me about Louis' trip to London and that he, Clement, is getting the one o'clock bus to London from Hull. Clement tells Pip he's here, she is upstairs, and that Sarah won't be long as I put the kettle on. I shout up to Pip to ask if she wants coffee and she says no, so I make tea for me and coffee for Sarah, whilst Clement explains he has to flat hunt with friends for next year. Sarah comes in the kitchen and tells me that Pip is furious because I have made drinks, and that she and Clement are leaving to drive to Hull. I give Clement a hug, as I won't see him now until September and then leave and drive to Beverley. As I get to the end of Bishop Burton Road, Sarah phones to say Teddy has escaped and that I have to turn round and go back. I do and when I get back to Cherry, Teddy is sat on Pip's knee. She tells me not to come until Monday as she will be out, and Andrew will take the dogs. This unreasonable anger and petty selfishness, is why I chose to live on my own. I retrace my steps and drive to Beverley and park at Saint John's, I promised Josh's dad that I would light a candle and say a prayer for him today. I pray that all those performing the transplant operation will be helped and say a special prayer for him and his family. I also pray for Pip and me and our family. Afterwards I drive to the leisure centre for a swim, when I get there marquees are being erected on the sports field for the "folk music festival", that starts on Friday. The pool is fairly quiet and I warm up on 400m easy freestyle and feel terrible, but persevere and follow this with 400m backstroke and feel a little better, a further 400m breaststroke feels better still, so I put in 4 x 100m individual medleys at medium pace and find my mojo's back, not wanting to push my luck I warm down with an easy 400m backstroke. After showering and changing, I order an Aberdeen Angus beef burger with salad for lunch in the cafe with a pot of tea. On my way home I call at the supermarket for some maggi seasoning and some washing up liquid. Once indoors, having unpacked the shopping I meditate and then rest until four. Make a pot of tea and some oat biscuits with goats cheese and then set too and spring clean the bedroom. This done I put the oven on, knock up a batch of fruit oat biscuits and then put the pasta bake, I prepped this morning, in the oven for dinner. I eat around eight and then catch the second half of Holland v Germany, 1:2 , before putting some cannelloni into the remaining pasta sauce and popping these back in the oven for an hour. They will make lunch or dinner tomorrow. I have discovered that there is a bus to Scarborough that stops in Tickton at five to ten, and seeing that I'm banned from taking the dogs out, I may have a day at the seaside.