I didn't post yesterday because my brother came over to see me in the morning and brought me a load of logs which he had cut up after a large bough of a tree came down in his garden in a recent gale. We unloaded it and stacked for seasoning and then he came indoors for a chat. We got to discussing my grass and he asked if I had found anybody to cut it when the times comes because our brother, my lawncutting one, is not driving for six months following his latest illness and will not be able to come with his mower. Anyway, I said no and that I was wondering about getting a mower myself and doing it. Now this brother mends and services mowers in his workshop and he has offered me one before but I have always declined. Yesterday I said I would have one and he actually didn't have one. Sods law. However later in the afternoon he rang to say he had sourced one for me and did I want it and I said go ahead. So I am having a ride-on of my own, little used, and ready. That is when the Spring comes but not yet of course.
We reminisced about the past when he was here as we do sometimes and both have vivid memories of being snowed in at the farm when we were children and it was always in February. We also have a clear memory of the late 1950s when we were snowed in in Norwich when the snow came after we had all got to school and all roads home were blocked. That day we found the station and got home by train. A first time on a train for both of us. We wondered yesterday about how we got tickets and neither of us could remember that part. We were collected from the station by father on the tractor. I was 6. (The other two walked home as they were on half day and their bus got as far as four miles from the farm and they walked the rest of the way. It was the birthday of one of them is all I remember but as they both have birthdays in February it was definitely February). So overseas readers do not be misled into thinking that winter is over in Britain, snow comes here anytime up to the end of March. The beast in the east which last snowed me in here just a few years ago was March.
I didn't go out on Sunday apart from late on at 5pm and still managed to buy a Sunday paper at the Co-op and a kebab for tea at the kebab shop next door. So once again on a Sunday the kebab men were the only people I spoke to.
The news of Britain should be enough to keep British people going, it is bad enough , and good news of money handouts by the Tories was and is long forgotten and I should hope that that forgetfulness by the voting public is also regretted after the mess we were landed in in July 2024 . Foreign policies should interest us of those policy makers overseas but apart from that, no, no judgment from here will be joined, we have enough local mess, evil and madness here.
I remember a year when there was snow at the beginning of May ! It wasn't much, but it meant the 1st cricket match of the season didn't go ahead! This was in Hertfordshire so quite far South!
ReplyDeleteYes, we can have extremely cold weather in April and May. I remember news of cricket at Lords being stopped because of snow.
DeleteAs you were only 6 years old AND it was something of an emergency, maybe you were not required to buy tickets for the train on that snowy day.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I have never experienced a situation where I was really snowed in, unable to get from A to B or leave the house, I can say that we have also mostly seen more snow in the months of February to April than in December and January.
When I went to Librarian School in the 1980s, I remember one spring when on a balmy evening in April we strolled through town in short sleeves and had ice creams, and come May we had snow and wore our warmest winter coats and heavy boots for the long uphill trek to the school.
Yes, to your first sentence, I also wondered that. I remember the train being packed to the gunnels and standing in the corridor, shoulder to shoulder looking out to flooded (yes flooded) marshland that the train passed through. My brother wondered how we coordinated it because we were at different schools but I imagine mother must have telephoned both schools for the arrangement to be made. I can still see my brother walking through my school gate and coming up the drive and me insisting to the nuns that I would be alright now and running out to him.
DeleteYes also to the weather, I never really think of Spring until April but that it can also be very cold.
I would love a ride on mower but my garden is too small! I bet it will be fun to ride on. It was clever of you and your brother to find the train station and manage to get the train to the station at home at such young ages. I can't imagine many children knowing how to do that these days. No sign of snow here but it has been a bitterly cold grey day and I haven't even been out to the rubbish bin. British politics shows up more corruption by the day. We know that so many people in high places are corrupted and there isn't a thing we can do other than pray and witness their demise. Hope you have a nice evening Rachel in the warm and dry. x
ReplyDeleteOn refection, I was in fact only 5 because it was before my April birthday. But my brother is my oldest brother and he was 14. How we found the station I have no idea except that there may have been signposts to it and instructions would have been given to him by his school. It was very cold today but I sat outside at a garden centre to have a cup of tea and read the papers, much to the surprise of the staff in the café. I look forward to the ride-on mower. My brother rang me today to see if I had changed my mind. I said on the contrary, I am excited about it. Labour are the party of envy, jealousy and spite who are ignorant of investment, growth and the good workmanship of Britain. They will not be happy until they have destroyed everything that is good about Britain.
DeleteRachel, I remember that story about coming home with your brother on a snow day, from your previous blog, how touching and what a strong memory it left for both of you. I have never seen real snow, just a few flakes over the years.
ReplyDeleteHi Yael, yes, you are right that I have written about it before. My brother and I are close, we remember much together. We remembered other snowy times yesterday as well as our walk to the station that February afternoon.
DeleteI grew up in northern Scotland and remember years with very heavy snow. Large drifts and roads closed. I was in UK a few years ago at Easter when there was a lot of snow - quite a novelty for me now as I live in a warm climate….. Enjoy the ride on mower! Such fun!
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like 2018 when we had the snow from the east. They called it The Beast from the East. I was snowed in for 4 days here although if I had had a Landrover or similar I could have got out sooner. The snow came in late March.
Delete