Cranham Feast 2013 (by sarah)

I forgot my camera on the Saturday - boo hiss - Alaric I believe took some photos on his phone but I do not yet have them to pop on the blog!

Saturday we arrived and I set up face painting which I was doing for the whole afternoon inbetween talking to friends and the like 🙂 Jeany took part in the Boundary Race but was sad she came last - the fact that she was talked into doing the race by the first aider who was dealing with her ouchy chest (she tried to summersault on the bouncy castle and had a collision) didn't seem to mean anything to her - we pointed out she'd raced whilst injured and after Christmas Daddy should be able to start running again so they can train for next year!

Sunday we got all the kids sports stuff ready - softy play kit, rackets, balls of various sizes, skipping ropes, hula hoops and more and drove to the cricket pitch were I felt bad about having to get cricket peeps to move cars off of were the kids sports and games were going to be. Then we walked to the church for the flower festival and musical interlude,

Mary sat down expectantly on the seats awaiting the music but got bored about half way through and was grumpy that mummy and daddy were on different rows and insisted on going from one to the other until Al gave up and took the girls outside to run around. Music was lovely with flute, organ, oboe? and sax, I bumped into a friend I had not seen for ages but as she was the flutist it was a quick hi!

Scarecrows featured heavily in the flower festival this year - I wish I'd found a few more to photograph but it is a busy weekend for us 🙂

The Banner and belt (which has been missing for a few decades!) were waiting for Al at the Church entrance, And the flowers inside were amazing - I didn't photograph as much as I wanted as chatting meant I ran out time - bad Sarah.

Alaric has carried the Feast Banner for the last few years - this year we had three cubs (one of which was Jean) and they had a procession from the church to the field were the service was being held and then a later one up to the cricket field.

I was a bit worried as to fit all the sports stuff in we had taken our car crate out of the boot and so we had no rug to sit upon during the service but a nice man (not sure who he was) had put out a series of blankets so we sat on the most purple one - as in me and Mary as Al and Jean had to be up with the banner. Mary was taking it all soooo seriously - NOT!

It was an animal service so of course there were animals! Everywhere! And me and Mary got loving kisses off of a black doggie and Mary wouldn't believe me that they were DONKEYS and not horses. Then she loudly named all the animals and ones that weren't there but she thought should have been and then she pretended to be a cat. I don't think anyone noticed in all the baaring and barking! I hope no one noticed she'd broken my top too and announced loudly that Mummy has boobies,

There was a silver band and we sang the Cranham Feast hymn for the second time which was nice. There was someone important taking the service but I'm really lame and knowing what's what with sorts of thing sand only remember that the lovely sheep were his.

Mary found the village sheep and as she had done the day before attempted to climb into the pen with them - she almost got over the top on Saturday.

We then amassed and began to parade up the hill to the cricket ground - Al's cousins and uncle tried to help me with Mary up the hill but she was being a moo!

We then put games out for the kids to play so they weren't noisy during the handbell ringing.

I really like listening to handbells - I used to do handbells in junior school - not that I was any good!

The animals processed as well and spent the afternoon at the Cricket Club were cricket was a foot. This was interesting whilst trying to run the children's sports!

It was actually quite funny 🙂

And lastly we finished with hula hooping and football.

And that's that for another year!

Running to Stand Still (by sarah)

So for the past 4 months I have basically not used my walking stick, I have been walking and lifting small amounts of stuff and generally getting on with things. Today I managed to sit on a rug on the ground for the animal service at the Cranham Feast and even jumped up to take some photos of donkeys and sheep (as you do), but it began to hurt so I didn't stand up for the songs but sat with Mary on the rug (Jean and Al were holding banners and flags and what not).

When I say hurt - it was nothing but a minor ache, I then walked up to the cricket field in the procession and even carried the baby for bits of it but that was beginning to be painful so I was slow but not as slow as last year and I felt proud I was walking much much much better even than last year when I was just happy to have walked it. But everyone was slowly passing me and I felt embarrassed(and sad) that I had to let my toddler cry instead of carrying her. People did offer to carry her but she refused to go to anyone other than me.

I made it to the cricket field and sat - for not very long - then I started setting up the childrens sports and I was happy, happy and exhilerated that I was managing to sort of run the routes and show the kids how to skip and so on. And I thought wow! What an improvement and then I looked at the cricketers and I thought - you know I've worked so hard to be able to do this, to be get the mobility back and to try and keep some level of fitness whilst it and the aneamia were bad. So much effort fighting the chronic fatigue and pain which will always be there and being careful about foods and the like, so much physio and effort. It's like my own mini olympic training... to be not quiet as fit as a normal person.

So though I feel proud and happy about what I have achieved and the improvements, I feel sad that it takes just so much energy and effort and to a certain extent there is always going to be something I am battling even on brilliant days - this is becoming less of an issue as I get older actually as my peers are increasingly coming up against illnesses and the like and I at least I have had a decade to adjust were as for them it is new. I also find myself feeling angry. I think, 'you know all that effort and people look at me and think lazy fat cow' and I am angry about that, I am jealous as well - the darkest moment with that was during Jean's pregnancy when I had been let out of the hospital to go to the pictures with Al, he was pushing my wheel chair and everything hurt. I had followed all the health advice and done everything right and there outside a pub we went past was a woman as pregnant as me in tottering heels, fag in one hand and bottle of something in the other talking about going clubbing. I can't express the hate I felt in that moment.

I've probably said most of this before but it just sort of hit home to me tonight as we watched AVATAR for the first time and the guy having to pull his legs about reminded me of the fact that there had been phases of my life when I've had to do that and bizarly that it is sometimes easier when you are in a wheelchair or on crutches as people can see you need help. When you are getting better (or worse) people see an apparently healthy young person and tutt about them not giving up a train seat etc...

As I tell Jean - you can never truly know how another is feeling, you do not know how hard or easy things are for them, you should not judge them as you can not judge them, you can not know.

Today Al was also worried that I was doing the main lifting and shifting for the sports stuff we did with the kids, I got it all out of the shed and lumped it across from the car etc but I was capable and he was doing the procession holding the banner and I didn't want him pushed to far with the way his legs have been and the antibiotics etc...

He was pleased to see I didn't flag as much as he was expecting - the odd sit down here and there was enough and I only started limping towards the end and it was a hard long day for me.

It feels to me like I am Running to Stand Still and I haven't even really managed to stand still, I have slipped backwards - I write adventure stories with caves and mountains and things in, I remember climbing, I take Jean to the climbing wall and look at the pictures of people climbing - I see moo cow fluffy chalk bags and I get excited and then I feel hollow as I explain to Jean why I am not buying it.

I think I also push myself for events as I can push myself through them and then take time to recover and it makes the more painful times tolerable by having something to look forward too. I have had a decade or so to adapt to my situation.

I got a thing through from college - the rearranged meeting about disabilities and stuff (I missed the first one due to Al's legs) - part of me wants to go 'no I'm fine now honest I don't need help.' This would be a stupid thing to do but it makes me feel so pathetic.

I know though that this is standard for those with long term / chronic conditions and on going health issues - hey I even stole the title of this blog post from a friends audio play about ME /Chronic Fatigue. The money from it's sales is going into research into the condition which can only be good - it wouldn't solve the separated pelvis but it would be something 🙂

Mainly though I am happy today - I walked and ran and tried to show people how to hula though I was not able to do much other than head and hand hula and I took video of Al trying to do foot hula and the kids loved everything and it was a nice day and I was pretty much a normal person - no stick or crutches nor lifts needed.

Shelters in the Woods (by sarah)

Last night we went to the woods and built shelters with the cubs for their last meeting of term, it was a huge success and everyone including Mary seemed to enjoy it.

I have also been finishing off some songs and putting them on Bandcamp. I am tending towards the arty side here as in one of them I wanted to sound like discordant fragments that stick in you mind and that sort of thing! Over the last few days I've uploaded four new songs.

Weaving the Clay (by sarah)

Wednesday saw mine and Alaric's 9th Wedding Anniversary, the theme is willow and pottery and though we haven't done anything with this theme yet we will. It's weird to think we have been married this long, been together for over a decade now and still we are just us.

We spent the evening at Cranham County Scout Head Quarters with lots of kids - no it wasn't a re-run of the wedding it was the Water and Fire BBQ and water fight for all three sections of the village scouts of which Alaric runs the cubs. We had a great time and the girls more so and though my nose got burnt and we had forgotten about our anniversary until Al's phone bleeped and told us, it was a good one 🙂

Here are the photos 🙂

The girls ready for a water fight and fun!

Jean had been soooo excited for days we went along early to help set up and her and Mary played Pooh Sticks until the other kids arrived.

Mary attempted to take part in the water fight and even managed to squirt some water though she didn't get the whole shooting other people thing!

Apart from the assault course over the stream there was a mudslide set up - Jean didn't quiet get the whole slide part of it at first 🙂

Eventually she got the idea 🙂

Mary loved exploring with little cried of 'water!'

I spent an age blowing bubbles for the kids to catch or shoot, Mary was the biggest fan of this activity though it was pretty popular all round 🙂

I cooked the veggi food (hence the burnt nose!) Mary sat on a bench quietly awaiting her dinner for ages!

She conned Daddy into feeding her 🙂

Jeany found cakes without colourings 🙂

It was a good day.

Neil Gaiman at the Royal Society of Literature (by sarah)

After an amazing weekend of being a panda on a fire engine (don't ask but there will eventually be photos!) I was abandoned in London by Alaric and the girls but this was so I could stay an extra day and see Neil Gaiman at the Royal Society of Literature. He was being interviewed by Claire Armistead. As his new book was being launched here in the UK the next day he did a reading.

Neil is really good at captivating an audience when he reads so it was a pleasure to listen too. The crowd was quiet a mix as would be expected from the variety and wealth of works he has produced. I tried to tweet from the theatre but alas my new touch pad couldn't get the wifi!

He spoke about the book and the memories and ideas that had gone into it and abit about being a writer, then they opened the floor to questions. I put my hand up (I always put my hand up1) and some how the microphone found me and I got to ask my question 🙂

I asked (after saying hello and umming), 'Did you set out to become a cross genre author, with novels, comics, kids books etc... or was it a happy accident?'

Asking questions has always been something out of my comfort zone but I am getting better at it and when he responded with that's a good question and that he hadn't been asked that before I was chuffed 🙂 I'd been pondering the question since I read this year Artists and Writers Yearbook which has an article from Neil himself but also sees him mentioned by others in the book. The gist being that you can't aspire to be a gross genre multi-market writer/artist, I got a bit incensed about this at the time and wrote about it here.

And as Alaric has said to me everytime I worry that I am too 'broad' - it is like putting all your eggs in one basket and if you can do more than one thing it is almost gambling which is going to be noticed and be the most popular!

So I listened to Neil's response avidly although I think I ended up with a fixed grin during it (I get very nervous but hey I'm going to be doing journalistic things in the autumn so I'd better get used to it!). He said he started as a journalist and was interviewing writers and they all had stories about the piece they couldn't get published and he thought - no way is that going to be me (I'm paraphrasing as I don't have a photographic memory in case you hadn't guessed!), he didn't have a career plan he had a wish list that he has been ticking off. He didn't want to turn out books that were formulaic and turned down a publishing deal after American Gods as they wanted him to just do more of the same. He wanted the scope to do new things without it being seen as him diverging from his established path.

He had known he'd wanted to be a writer and had assumed he was going to be a fantasy writer - the sort with maps in 😉 This made me laugh - Dad brought down a note book of a story I started when I was thirteen or rather an epic series and there at the beginning of the note book was a map I had drawn. My dad still lives in hope that I will write this particular story - I used to dictate chunks of it too him and we would talk about naming schemes and stuff like that - there were even warrior monks.

He said a lot more inspiring stuff and funny stuff and it was an interesting and fun outing for me. Through it I have discovered the Royal Literature Society which I didn't know existed before to be honest! As we were all leaving I head people talking about how they were going to get back to writing that story that had stagnated on etc....

I bought a copy of the pre-signed book before the event started and started reading it on the way home to my parents house and then the rest on the way home the next morning to Gloucestershire. The book swept me in, being written from a small boys point of view though it is not for children it plunged me into memories of my own childhood (something Neil had mentioned people kept telling him the book did).

I have been in a bit of a reading a writing rut recently but the weekend (which was actually last weekend and not the one just gone!) has shaken me out of this - for a start I was beta reading my friends epic novel and then read Neil's book and then I wanted more - I am in a book club but this is our first month so I am still trying to get hold of the book to read our local library didn't have a copy - I like my book club it has Good Omens on the list 🙂 I still need to decided what book I'm setting in October!

Anyway so I am now ploughing through books again and got two books out of the library one fact and one fic and am enjoying it especially as I ended up writing a couple of short stories as well - I just wish my body could keep up with what the mind wants to do!

I found Art in London too between Holborn Station and the Peacock Theatre were the event was held (3 times the capacity they normally go for but the tickets sold out!).

The next morning on the way to Paddington I found more fun stuff too by Aldgate Station 🙂

Of course I went the wrong way out of Fenchurch Street Station but hey I had plenty of time and found fun things to photograph - it was a wooden skeleton of a house except it looks newish and had stuff painted on it!

I'm ending this post with perception and preconceptions. Now I turned up early to find the theatre and wonder around taking photos of the area - but I'm having a mild pain flare up at the mo so was quiet tired and found a pub to sit in.

There are two completely true ways of writing about my waiting time but they paint completely different pictures and this interests me as it is generally assumed that the truth is a corner stone but a truth isn't always the whole truth the way information is presented can be misleading but in this case it isn't even that it is peoples preconceptions of what it cultured and what is not.

I could say 'I was in the Shakespeares Head working on my friends epic novel whilst waiting for an event at the Royal Literature Society' - which sounds very high brow and you can imagine the cut glass and what not or...

I could say 'I was chilling in a Weatherspoons pub (this is the chain of pubs I could be found in as a teen) reading about my friends space vampires whilst waiting to see the king of comic books' - I know people who would stare at me were I to say either of these to them but would find the other acceptable due to their own ideas of what is acceptable/fun.

Anyway I will stop wibblying now - basically I had a fantastic time.