Monthly Archives: January 2014
Walks with my dad
A few scenes with my dad are rather special to me. Times when I discovered something about how he felt; things that helped shape the way I see and feel about things today. I was about eight years of age at the time of the following events. There always seemed to be so very many […]
Oddities
I’d seen them before, a twosome usually but sometimes with an addition, walking down the streets of our small town. Strange people I thought, certain too that other normal people would think the same. (I can really be very arrogant in my thoughts at times! Just as well others can’t read them.) Anyway, the most […]
A surprising reversal
We brought nothing into this world and it is certain that we shall carry nothing out of it. However, the bit in between immerses us in many variations. I once watched a plain piece of metal being silver-plated. The process didn’t seem to take long. The piece of metal was lowered into a tank. I […]
The rent man
We lived in a stone cottage in Preston in the 1930s – two up, two down – and shared an outside loo with the folk next door. So the rent wasn’t much, one shilling a week, but it still had to be found in the days of the Depression. The rent man was pleasant enough, […]
The man behind the photograph
He was very pleased that he’d followed her advice. The photograph turned out fine. Just the right angle and lighting, with the colouring and setting adding to the dignity. In the best magazine and newspapers too! A few things had worried him though. He hadn’t altered his hairstyle. Martina, his dear wife, suggested that […]
Passing time
“Now lad, you don’t want to go wishing your time away. It’ll go fast enough without that.” That was the comment I got from my father when asked what I was thinking about one day. I must have been wishing it was the next day and then I could…..whatever. Anyway, he’d sown another seed in […]
Balance
If there is a beginning, then there has to be an end, that’s logic says the learned man, with a slight nod of his head; yet that annoying statement leaves too much to be desired and so throughout the age of man more speculation’s been applied to the penetrating question of what life is all […]
Competitors
‘Share and share alike’ was one of the things taught to us when we were young. I found it difficult at times but in the presence of older people it was best to comply. There were a few times when uncensored, I’d surprise myself by sharing something, prompted by a spontaneous surge of generosity from […]
Enlightenment
England, in the spring of 1574, saw a greater number of monks and pilgrims than usual, making their way from one shrine to the next in search of religious enlightenment. Many of them called for food and shelter at abbeys, monasteries and religious houses dotted throughout England. Waltham Abbey, in the country of Hertford, came […]
The writings of a Lancashire lad 
Oddities
I’d seen them before, a twosome usually but sometimes with an addition, walking down the streets of our small town. Strange people I thought, certain too that other normal people would think the same. (I can really be very arrogant in my thoughts at times! Just as well others can’t read them.) Anyway, the most […]