centennial II

The second parental centennial arrives today: 20 August and it coincides with Mary's birhday. Just as I felt moved to make Kathleen the subject of my 2016 marmalade edition, I also decided to mark Stan's centennial with a special marmalade label; but limiting his edition to three jars: he didn't make it, but he ate it.

Stan survived my mother by some nineteen years during which time he was more or less successful in looking after himself after having been supported throughout his teaching career by Kath's catering and companionship. Stan didn't like living alone after Kath died but he got on with it. But he was liberated to continue his Peak Park Wardening, and spend as much time as he wanted in his favourite landscapes;  he became quite an expert on the footpaths and bridleways of the Peak District as well as gaining considerable ability to recognise plants and wildlife in those places he explored.

The picture that graces the top left of this page (by a school photographer) is of Stan as a primary school teacher in the mid 1950s. My father wasn't much good at a lot of things but he was a singularly good teacher: imaginative, creative, enthusiastic, caring. The best teacher I ever studied under in fact. But he had difficulty in leaving his teaching disciplines at the school gate at times, and also found fitting into the small town society he taught in quite difficult.

In his retirement years Stan accrued good friendships as well as a growing number of ex-pupils who recognised him and liked him. His lack of imagination in social terms didn't matter most of the time and he continued to be a good Socialist right up until he became a victim of the cancer that brought his life to a close and his walking and enquiry to an end. The picture on the right was taken by my friend and his, BG, and featured in his newspaper obituary.

It was after his death that Stan's orderliness became even more apparent, because he left his finances in immaculate order, surprising us all by leaving us quite a bit more in his will than we thought he had: I sorted his affairs, which he had made a relatively simple task. I am not sure why he didn't live a bit more 'generously' and comfortably – I would have preferred it if he had; but Stan was largely his own man and did things very much his own way, sometimes when a better way may have been apparent. Austerity was his watchword (except with double cream, I seem to remember).

So on 20 August 2018 I salute my father: thanks Stan, for what your generosity, in the end, has allowed us to benefit from. It has made a considerable difference to the quality of our retirements. Here is the conserve special for this centennial:

Footnote: The author of the picture (above right) is keen to point out that it was a misty day, and that Stan is sitting on a bench on the top of the hill in Bradley Wood that was placed there specifically to meet his needs for rest and recuperation, by someone who had had their ear bent by Stan concerning the lack of suitable places to sit for 'senior' walkers. Apparently he had banged on about it (no doubt at length) and the next time Stan went up there, there was this bench! I think that is what he may be chuckling about . . . he certainly considered it to be his bench, thereafter . . .

winter • sea edge • summer • exposure

One of the really enticing aspects of visiting north coast of Cornwall and Devon, is that one is never sure what variety of experience one is going to have, whilst always being sure that the visit will be most probably special in some way.

I am particularly fond of a corner of Sandymouth I have come to call The Paddling Pool; because although the pool concerned is not really ideal for paddling, it does invoke in me a memory of paddling pools of my childhood. The pool is backed by a mixture of pebble beach and smoothed grey sandstone beds which drop into the pool. The pool itself sits on the cusp of a shallow anticline of such rocks, that are sometimes hidden by sand but are usually exposed by the receding tides to some extent at least. Further from the cliff line there is a strange collection of water smoothed plinths, sitting in a large pool that does not drain at low tides. And there is also a trace of iron red in some of the stones there, over and above the naturally occurring iron oxides in the sandstones. I am guessing but I think there may be residual iron staining from a long lost wreck, just one f the many that have come to grief on this stretch of shoreline.

I like this place as much to myself as I can get it, so tend to reserve my visits to the 'off-season' months. But sometimes I just want to be back there. I have put up a short album illustrating a typical winter visit and my fascination with those smooth sandstones and the natural aesthetics of sea-arranged stones and sands.

The flickr album is called : winter beach; another from the same area is called last day of autumn

The weather plays no small part in this place: in the sea edge squall line flickr album the experience of those squalls weather adjusted the focus . . . 

I had almost overlooked the July day I sat around the paddling pool before walking on to Bude. I recall being fascinated (once again) by the entirely natural placement of pebbles on the smoothed sandstone cliff stumps . . .

The flickr album of this experience is called summer paddling pool

I can't always wait patiently for autumn, winter or spring. As well as my July paddling pool interval, I tried to avoid summer holiday makers by taking myself off to Stanbury and Rane Point, on the theory that absence of immediate access from a car park and the steepness of the route onto the beach would give me the best chance of solitude. I got my wish; there was just one couple who turned up to swim and sunbathe and they stayed on the Stanbury end of these two adjoining coves. From the visit I found more examples of this very particular smooth grey sandstone . . .

The short flickr albums associated with this visit are called point of rayne, and stanbury —pictures taken at very low tide levels . . .

So: this page introduces a few more flickr albums of ideas that are similar in subject and/or place, founded on this wonderful grey sandstone that the sea smooths so wonderfully. The albums are but lately loaded, here in France –where I can get reasonable internet connection!