Remembrance

Thursday 11th November, 2010

For The Fallen
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

Binyon, L.

For the last three days the weather has been grey, overcast, windy and for Andalucian Spain a tad on the chilly side. I have had logs burning in the grate. My mood and behaviour have also been far from sunny – listless, moody and not at all inclined to put pen to paper. Today (sun, blue sky, still air and warmth) I have been transformed into a literary…um, something. Pen has been applied to paper very rigorously whilst sat on the verandah enjoying the clement weather. Another chapter of my book, this blog and quite a few freelance project applications have been rattled off. And it’s not as if I haven’t done anything else – house swept, laundry laundered plus a 2 hour round trip into town. Not bad considering the only thing I had planned for today was to get my butt to Fuengirola police station for 8.30am; that I did not manage as I overslept.

The crux of the matter is that the weather obviously plays a big part in my mood. I’m a summer baby – I like blue skies, warm air and the sun (though as a red-head I like the sun from beneath a wide-brimmed hat) – and if I don’t get them I am unproductive and miserable. It is little wonder that in the winter months in the UK I hovered around the depressed reading on my mood-o-meter. It was always the winter months when I joined dating websites and lurched from one dating disaster to another. I feel vindicated, therefore, that to enable the writing of my book I upped sticks and made my home in southern Spain. So I may have the odd day or three when the weather is less than desirable and my mood matches it, but that has got to be better than 5 months of misery!

My trips into town, or reality, are accompanied by a local Spanish radio station. I have it on in the hope that some of the language will sink into my sub-conscious and have a positive effect on my speaking/comprehension skills. I think it is working in some small way. I do not understand 90% of what is being said but I can discern words as opposed to just noise. “Blah blah blah blah five blah blah but today I have blah blah blah” is an improvement on “anyanayanayanayanayanayanayanay”. There are also a few words/phrases which I automatically say in Spanish in my head rather than in English and then translate into Spanish…caldo (stock), no sé (I don’t know) and just about all the contents of the fridge – and that is NOT just vino!! The learning of food stuffs has been aided by writing the shopping lists in Spanish, of that there is little doubt. So, I think I shall apply the same method to the rest of the language (excitement! I actually thought idioma rather than language there!!! Oh yes!) and give myself a list of verbs to write out every day.

Learning should be quite simple once the method of teaching effectively for that individual has been identified – fingers crossed I’ve found it.