Flashback (Take Me Bak Ome)

Nostalgia just isn’t what it used to be. I know that’s an old joke, but it also has the ring of truth. I don’t think we have much choice in what triggers feelings of nostalgia once the old photographs have been put away and the old records boxed up. After that it is hard to predict what will trigger the memory.

So we take our nostalgia where we can get it.

This morning I received from beloved a text message with a reported sighting of a chalky crumble¹ on the pavement by Boots on the lane down to the tube station. By, I was taken back. I haven’t seen a chalky crumble (or more importantly had to avoid one) for well over 25 years; probably closer to 30 years, now I think on it. There were parts of the Donnington and Donnington Wood areas of Telford where they were all-pervasive during the 1970s when I was in my teens, but something changed and I had assumed that they were all but extinct.

But no: a sighting in Whetstone. It’s even odder when you consider that Whetstone is a rather more upmarket area than that part of Telford ever was or will be. Maybe there is a strange retro thing going on around here?

Told you that nostalgia isn’t what it was.

¹Oh, come on. Everyone knows what a chalky crumble is, even if only by repute.

Flashback (Take Me Bak Ome)

Nostalgia just isn’t what it used to be. I know that’s an old joke, but it also has the ring of truth. I don’t think we have much choice in what triggers feelings of nostalgia once the old photographs have been put away and the old records boxed up. After that it is hard to predict what will trigger the memory.

So we take our nostalgia where we can get it.

This morning I received from beloved a text message with a reported sighting of a chalky crumble¹ on the pavement by Boots on the lane down to the tube station. By, I was taken back. I haven’t seen a chalky crumble (or more importantly had to avoid one) for well over 25 years; probably closer to 30 years, now I think on it. There were parts of the Donnington and Donnington Wood areas of Telford where they were all-pervasive during the 1970s when I was in my teens, but something changed and I had assumed that they were all but extinct.

But no: a sighting in Whetstone. It’s even odder when you consider that Whetstone is a rather more upmarket area than that part of Telford ever was or will be. Maybe there is a strange retro thing going on around here?

Told you that nostalgia isn’t what it was.

¹Oh, come on. Everyone knows what a chalky crumble is, even if only by repute.

More Jacketry

I am lead to understand that my jacket has arrived at the Athenaeum Club despite my dire forebodings.

I now have to:

a) Grind through until leaving time, despite my impatience; and

b) Hope beyond hope that after all this hassle it fits properly.

That is all.

More Jacketry

I am lead to understand that my jacket has arrived at the Athenaeum Club despite my dire forebodings.

I now have to:

a) Grind through until leaving time, despite my impatience; and

b) Hope beyond hope that after all this hassle it fits properly.

That is all.

Family Matters

I had planned to go home on Friday to see Dad in hospital; I hadn't seen him since New Year's Day and as I mentioned a while back he'd taken a fall and was in hospital. I spoke to Mum and Barbie at lunchtime and both agreed that he was looking perkier; what with my preoccupations with that bloody jacket and getting it delivered I even considered going home to visit on Saturday.

As it turns out, I am going tomorrow morning. But too late to see Dad.

I had a phone call from my brother-in-law at twenty to five this afternoon suggesting that I catch the earliest train home. In the event Dad died ten minutes later while I was on the Underground trying to get back in the bloody rush hour with all the dim wits I so assiduously try to avoid in better times. I found out the news a little over an hour later.

Elle has been lovely, she packed a bag for me and sorted all that out while I was coming home. I'm still here because frankly I was too cut up after talking to sundry family members on the phone. I couldn't face sitting on a train for three hours trying to pretend that my eyes weren't red from crying. So I shall go home tomorrow. In the meantime I have found the best way of coping is to do and think about just about anything else while the reality sinks in. I'm not made of stern enough stuff for this sort of thing and I need to marshal my resources.

I shall be out of contact for a few days; I'll see you on the other side when the new skin has started growing.

Family Matters

I had planned to go home on Friday to see Dad in hospital; I hadn't seen him since New Year's Day and as I mentioned a while back he'd taken a fall and was in hospital. I spoke to Mum and Barbie at lunchtime and both agreed that he was looking perkier; what with my preoccupations with that bloody jacket and getting it delivered I even considered going home to visit on Saturday.

As it turns out, I am going tomorrow morning. But too late to see Dad.

I had a phone call from my brother-in-law at twenty to five this afternoon suggesting that I catch the earliest train home. In the event Dad died ten minutes later while I was on the Underground trying to get back in the bloody rush hour with all the dim wits I so assiduously try to avoid in better times. I found out the news a little over an hour later.

Elle has been lovely, she packed a bag for me and sorted all that out while I was coming home. I'm still here because frankly I was too cut up after talking to sundry family members on the phone. I couldn't face sitting on a train for three hours trying to pretend that my eyes weren't red from crying. So I shall go home tomorrow. In the meantime I have found the best way of coping is to do and think about just about anything else while the reality sinks in. I'm not made of stern enough stuff for this sort of thing and I need to marshal my resources.

I shall be out of contact for a few days; I'll see you on the other side when the new skin has started growing.