Between yesterday and tomorrow.

There is no particular rush today, so we take our time over breakfast, the usual full English, with Morrison's fresh Lincolnshire sausage, Wiltshire bacon and Irish black pudding, and the usual fresh egg and fried tomato. Melvyn Bragg, is discussing Simone Weil today on "In our time", and although I only catch pieces of it, between the shower and driving to Cherry to collect the dogs, I am sufficiently intrigued to download the podcast later. Apart from her early death, suffering and quite extreme asceticism, we seem to share not dissimilar views. Today is another quiet, in between, day. It is dry, but cloudy, misty, but brightening, and unusually for the Westwood, hardly any wind. The woods are still and pregnant with presence, the dogs treating today as any other day, its particular quality, perhaps, residing entirely in my head. However I can't shake the feeling that things before today will be different from those that follow, although I can't say how. Weird, really! As we emerge from the common, I call Leslie's daughter, Margaret, to see how her dad is and William, her husband, answers the phone, he apologises profusely, as he explains that Leslie was discharged on Tuesday morning. They ran extensive tests in hospital and found nothing wrong with him. I thank William and resolve to call round and see my old friend later in the day. Whilst we walk towards Black Mill, I encounter Margaret Richardson and her Saluki bitch, who promptly starts a fight with Dolly, which is most unusual. Margaret and her husband, Brian, are stalwarts at Beverley athletic club and I have known them both for twenty years or more. We walk together for a while until she has to peel off towards Walkington, where they live, and we turn South towards the gorse bushes. A couple are walking a chihuahua puppy and a boxer bitch, who promptly sets about Dolly and is in turn attacked by Teddy, Norman keeps out of the way. It is all sound and fury and no damage, the dogs soon separated, but for Dolly to be involved in scraps with other bitches can only have one meaning. She is coming into season! Being a pragmatic dog owner, my dogs are neutered, but my bitches intact. It is a nothing operation for boys, but quite brutal for girls. We make our way to Burton Bushes, and I pause for a rest on Brandon Barker's bench, beneath the elms, and ring my daughter in law, Sam, to arrange to visit on Monday. It is a little tricky, as she and my son are divorcing, but my granddaughters, Laura and Rebecca need as much normality as can be maintained. I have always got on well with Sam and try to stay neutral, as far as I am aware, there are no third parties involved. We arrange for me to call round at tea time on Monday, with Louis, before his swimming lesson. We arrive back at my car, after a couple of pleasant hours wandering around the common, and then drop the terriers back at Pip's before driving home. I have Louis this afternoon, as Sarah is on a training course, so I am refraining from swimming, in order to conserve energy. Since we have finally finished the lamb, we dine on pork today. I defrost a large pork chop, which I fry gently with onions, while peeling carrots, swede, potato, and chopping up spring greens, before depositing the lot in the pressure cooker. An oxo cube, a little water, and a rich pork gravy is soon ready to accompany our carrot and turnip mash, potatoes and spring cabbage. Norman has the bone and fat, with the rest of the trimmings. After lunch we listen to the news, mostly about the killings in Gaza, ahead of the Israeli elections, and then meditate for an hour. My meditation provides no solution to the Arab, Israeli conflict, only a reinforced conviction that abuse leads to further abuse. A recurrent theme in the news at the moment, a New Testament doctrine of acceptance and forgiveness of human frailty, seems ever more appropriate. I prepare for Louis' visit by cutting coloured paper into small strips, which I place in plastic containers, that I bought in Morrison's yesterday, for just this purpose. I use these, in conjunction with Louis' glue stick, to construct a mosaic of a bonfire, on black paper. He is a clever lad, and by showing what can be done, he may be inspired to have a try himself. This done, I drive to Molescroft to visit Leslie, calling at the Polling Station, in the village, to cast my vote for the Humberside Police Commissioner. It seems a straight vote between John Prescott and anybody but John Prescott. My vote is for Stuart Davison, a retired Chief Superintendant, from a deprived part of Hull, with a PhD in chemical engineering. He ended the practice of screening out low level crimes, when he ran the Beverley division. As a Labour supporter, I should be voting for John Prescott, but I don't think he has administrative competence. When I arrive in Molescroft, Leslie has just got in after visiting his friend, Mary Hodgeson, in Beverley. They met twenty years ago on an Alpha course at Beverley Minster, shortly after both their spouses had died, and have been firm friends ever since. Leslie seems a little sheepish about his emergency hospital visit, but says he felt short of breath, and after surviving two heart attacks, didn't want to take any risks. He says he still doesn't feel quite right, despite there being no detectable problems, and I wouldn't query his judgement. I leave at a quarter past five and collect Louis from his after school club, and then drive back to Tickton. I show him the mosaic of the bonfire and the bowls of coloured paper and his glue stick, arranged on the coffee table in the living room, and leave him to play whilst I prepare his evening meal and feed Norman. Louis has what he always has, Parma ham, Chorizo, Bavarian smoked cheese, olives, crusty bread and butter, washed down with a glass of cream soda. I ask him how he got on with his coloured paper and he shows me the bonfire, I made earlier,, claiming it as his own. After his tea, we take Norman for his walk around the village and call at the Post Office to buy an ice lolly for Louis. The young shop attendant confesses that he inadvertently switched off the freezer last week and consequently have no ice lollies for sale. Undeterred, Louis parleys this setback in to a Marvel Avengers comic book, with a free pop gun included. We return via the dark of Carr Lane, marvelling at the bright starry sky, but failing to find the faintest, slender, crescent moon that was rising, just after I cast my vote. Once we are through the snickett and under the street lights of Green Lane, we let Normy off his lead and laugh while we play "praise and pat", all the way home. When we get back indoors we sit down together and make a rocket ship mosaic, complete with crescent moon, stars and the planet Saturn. All this between firing his pop gun across the room, with a strict injunction that Norman should not be a target. Sarah arrives and collects Louis around a quarter to eight and afterwards I drive the car to the supermarket to fill up with petrol, while it is quiet, and pick up some more Italian coffee while I am at it. Back home, I have an email from my brother, Graham, wanting to know when I will be visiting him. Provisionally, I intend flying in to Schiphol from Leeds/Bradford airport on the 29th of November and returning on the 4th of December, and ask if this is convenient? To bed at eleven.