A day to remember

Sleep in until half past seven, which leaves a little over an hour to have breakfast, shower, dress and drive to Saint John's for nine o'clock mass. For someone who simply refuses to rush, this is barely adequate, and I ponder the alternatives; attending ten thirty mass, but Leslie is expecting me at ten, so it would mean ringing him as well. In the end, I compromise, by foregoing my cooked breakfast and finish the last of the cream cheese and smoked salmon on rye toast and have ten minutes to browse the Observer over coffee before leaving for church. Norman has to make do with a trip into the garden until I return. It is another stunning autumn morning, It is becoming a bit of a cliche to keep saying this, but sunny, clear days in November are usually a rarity. It is also Remembrance Sunday and as an ex regular soldier, my thoughts turn to friends and comrades that have been lost in action. When I arrive at Saint John's I say a special prayer for Paul Lightfoot, he was my goalkeeper when I coached the Army Apprentices Water Polo team that won the Army Championship. This was during my final posting to the Apprentices College in Harrogate. A lovely lad, his dad, Terry, was also a major in the corps. Paul was the only one in the team who could keep pace with me during our circuit training in the gym. ( At that time I was supremely fit and strong). Paul went straight from the college to SAS selection in Hereford and was the youngest ever Corps member to be selected. His helicopter crashed into the sea off the Falklands, killing everyone on board. He was just twenty years old and had married a few weeks before he deployed, at a church in Harrogate. This morning's service is well attended and the hymns are moving, but the last post and the minute's silence at the end, are hard to take. I leave church in a bit of a daze, emerging into bright sunshine, with that feeling you get as a kid, when you come out of a dark cinema after a matinee and are surprised by presence of daylight. By the time I arrive at Leslie's house I have gathered myself together, and he is waiting for me at the door. I have brought him a resupply of oatmeal biscuits, but didn't have time to pack the filter coffee, so we make do with instant. Leslie thinks he may be up to resuming our Sunday visits to Caffe Nero next week, he looks OK, but says he still has problems with his sinuses. The doctor visited and prescribed a nasal spray, but that has had little effect so far. I tell him about Robert Ades, Tempest, and by this morning the significance of Robert Lepage's direction is beginning to sink in. He sets the opera within an antique setting of Milan's La Scala Teatro, Prospero is, after all, Duke of Milan. This makes the performance even more reflexive and suddenly the words, "all the world's a stage", that came to me at the end of the opera, make sense. This was Shakespeare's own testament and has references within it to other previous works. Le Page in his interview said this was the eight or ninth time he had directed the "Tempest" In one form or another so he knows it intimately. The mind worm burrows on! Leslie and I chat about the American election and share a hope that the latest crisis at the BBC, doesn't lead to it being burdened with unnecessary red tape and political influence. In the furore no one seems particularly interested in finding out who abused this poor chap Measham, if it wasn't Lord McAlpine! I leave around eleven and call at the supermarket, where I find a frozen leg of New Zealand lamb at half price. When I arrive home, Norman is ready for lunch, so I feed him before stripping the lamb of its protective packaging, which says it can be roasted from frozen in three hours at 150 degrees centigrade. I wrap it in foil and put it in my fan oven, set the timer for three hours and then take Normy for his walk, after first snacking on the last two pizza pies that I made yesterday. (I ate the other two when I returned from the theatre last night.) They worked well, the pastry crisp, but the filling more generous than you would normally get on a traditional flat pizza. A shame they weren't ready in time to make a snack for the intermission at the opera. It is half past twelve now and there is hardly a cloud in the sky and not even the hint of a breeze. As we make our way down Carr Lane, we are surrounded by clouds of midges, they must have hatched in the warm sunshine. As we pass the farm it is lunchtime for the animals and the Alpacas and chickens are scrabbling for food. We cross the little bridge over the drain and make our way into "almost straight wood", despite the dry weather for the last week, the boggy ground at the start persists and I carry Norman until we are past the worst of it. The field to our left is green with sprouting winter barley and the resin smell of pines fill the air. We are in no particular hurry today and wander happily around the fields, extending our walk by carrying on to the bridge over the major drain, a canal some fifteen feet across. I sit on the bridge and enjoy the warm sun on my face, before calling my brother, Graham, in Rotterdam. He has just turned sixty and is a social worker, the enlightened Dutch labour laws allow him to gradually reduce his hours until he finally retires. He has chosen to work a four day week, but once a fortnight he has both Friday and Monday free. I need to know when this is, before I book a flight to visit him before Christmas. Next weekend will be a long weekend, but that may be too soon, the weekend which takes us into December looks more promising, so I promise to check flights and ring him back later. We arrive back at my bungalow at three o'clock, I peel some potatoes, parsnips and onions and coat them in olive oil, salt and pepper and place them in the roasting tin with the lamb. It doesn't look cooked yet, so I extend the time by an hour and prepare some carrots, broad beans and sprouts from the freezer. I serve dinner at four, more by luck than judgement the lamb is cooked to perfection, tender, yet still pink in the centre. The only problem lies in the fact that there are still a couple of pounds of meat left to eat. I am sure that, with Norman's help, this won't be a problem. After dinner I bring my shirts and socks off the washing line, they are almost dry and will air on the radiators in half an hour. My niece, Rachel, phones, she has a redundancy interview tomorrow and we chat about her options for nearly an hour, then my daughter Sarah rings on the landline to say she is calling round with Louis. They arrive five minutes later, as ever, Louis is starving, so I rustle up some ante pasta, crusty bread and olives for him. Sarah only wants coffee, after he has eaten, Louis wants to draw, so we move to the living room and chat there. Norman is really happy to see Sarah and rolls on his back for his tummy tickling. They leave an hour later, Sarah seems happy with her job as a podiatrist, its better for her than being stressed and depressed teaching. After they have left, I tidy up, clear the plates and then read Yasmina Khadra until bedtime.