At Trago Mills (our favourite non-supermarket type store) there are always plenty of cute animals clucking or waddling around at liberty; however, today was a cute dog day, as you can see…

Yesterday was a day for looking at the clouds…

“Give us a wiggle,” Chris exhorted, trying very hard to be cheerful, considering I had been so sour from the moment of waking.

“No, I can’t,” I said disconsolately. “I’m too ugly, fat…and deaf!”

After over two weeks of suffering from a nasty virus, this morning, although better in myself, I had awoken to find myself completely deaf in one ear, and it was in my good ear at that. No amount of yawning, nose-blowing, massage or ear drops did anything to help.

Now if you’re a regular visitor to my blog you will know that I’m generally a happy soul, and also that nothing makes me happier than going out for a cycle ride on a nice sunny day; and when I’m riding my bike, and extremely happy, I’m rather apt to give a little wiggle (surreptitiously) from time to time to inform Chris (who always cycles behind me) that everything is well with the world and me (and Chris and me).

“Are you sure you’re up to going?” Chris asked.

I nodded. The bikes were already at the top of the steps, the sun was shining and I knew that a ride would lighten my mood – it always does.

In a few moments, having grumpily passed a group of jostling large pedestrians (or so it seemed to me in my mood) on the small pavement outside our house, we were coasting down the hill to Dawlish town centre. The rush of air going through my hair was exhilarating. We were on our way to the ford, close enough not to be a demanding ride for a person recuperating from a virus but far enough to feel the benefit; and the ford is always a lovely place to visit. Two girls of about fourteen, both wearing jodhpurs, let us pass them on the Newhay path, past the church, just before it narrows on the bridge. They caught us up at the ford some minutes later and we exchanged pleasantries before they continued on their way to a horse farm farther up the road.

The field on the other side of the fence by the ford had recovered from its recent encounter with tractors and baling machines, and already the new grass was lush, green and filled with little daisies; thistles were coming into flower and the leaves on the trees had turned a darker, more mature green denoting that, indeed, we are in Summer. This time there were no families with tots playing in the water, it was just Chris and me, and a lady passing by, waving, in her blue car.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” I asked as we stood on the bridge.

Chris took me in his arms and we kissed. (I bet a lot of people have kissed on that tiny bridge over the ford.)

On the way home, just the other side of Aller Arch (the top of which comprises part of the grand driveway to ‘The Castle’), we stopped and wondered at the sight of an older man in an orange jacket. The red sign close-by on the road informed of ‘ Delays, hedge trimming’ and Chris and I smiled at one another – there was nothing coming in any direction. Suddenly, as if by divine intervention, a cyclist appeared ahead of a tractor; one car appeared, and then another; a lady out cycling with her children came from the town direction, and they had to get off and wait while two trucks, a van and other cars vied for space to pass. At the point of total gridlock yet another car pulled in to wait it out by the Newhay path; inside the car were our friends and neighbours, Catherine and Martin, and his parents Ian and Pearly, who are down on holiday from Scotland.

Before long the gentleman in orange had cleared the gridlock successfully and everyone went on their ways, including us. I managed to raise a few wiggles as I went over the speed bumps in the town centre but I’m still as deaf as a post.

I’ve always been impressed by people who save the lives of others; perhaps it stems from the time when, at about the age of eleven, I was saved from drowning by three heroes – the surfie-boy who had found me and pulled me onto his surfboard; my fourteen-year-old big brother Bill, who took over from the surfie-boy; and Chris Betts, Bill’s best friend (and handsome hero – now actor in Australia) who finally brought me in to shore.

My brother Henry saved the life of a little boy who had drowned at the wading pool in Wynnum some years ago; my brother Robert is a piano tuner and part-time fireman, and therefore he saves lives on a regular basis; my nephew Tom is a life-guard (and handsome hero); my own son James, as a teenager, saved a drunk from falling fifty feet to his death from a road bridge. And now, only three weeks ago, my twenty-year-old nephew Chris saved a fisherman who was having a heart attack…

Young Chris was taking a walk along one of the breakwaters at Dawlish seafront when he noticed the fisherman in distress.

“Are you alright?” Chris enquired.

The man in his forties couldn’t answer. Chris felt for a pulse and signs of breathing, and found none. As a former Air Training Cadet, Chris had been taught heart massage and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation techniques so he quickly went into action. After a while an off-duty policeman came along and the two took it in turns to bring the man back to life. An ambulance came and the fisherman was taken to hospital, where he recovered fully.

I would love to be able to say that I have saved a life, but I haven’t, unfortunately, unless you count all my blood donations but that’s not what I mean, I course. I stopped a fight once but I’ve never experienced the thrill and pride of saving a life – it must be wonderful. I’m so proud of all the heroes I know and I just can’t help being very impressed.

Evidently, sickness is no impediment to creativity – if you can stand at an easel you can paint (at least, if you can stand painting). Well, I didn’t want yesterday to be a complete washout so I returned to my Berber Bride in oil and nearly finished her. Earlier paintings in the series were painted in pastel; interestingly, the effect is not entirely different. I’ve attached photographs of the oil in progress and a pastel print.

Oh, I feel hot – think I’ll take my temperature again.

I haven’t slept, at least not very well; in fact it seems as though I have been awake all night. It wasn’t my cough that kept me awake, although my chest did strike some particularly discordant notes during the night. No, in spite of the comfort of fresh sheets (that had appeared there as if by magic some time before I went to bed), I lay in the darkness with my eyes shut and I kept thinking about my day yesterday – the bad news, the kindnesses, the conversations, the reactions, the loss and the sense of regret that a connection had not been made in time to complete a circle…

Eventually the light of morning seeped through the black of night and sad thoughts, and I made my way here to my studio; and if Chris or Roland (our friend from Australia) should rise and find me at my computer they will be surprised to find me up so early but they will not think it so strange as to be peculiar.

Two days ago a thoughtful lady contacted me through my website. “I am a friend of Joseph Gyorffy…” her email began. We had a long telephone conversation yesterday morning.

At length I asked how she had known my surname, although I had a feeling what her answer would be – of course it was my letters.

“He kept everything,” she said.

Joseph was a letter-man, not a computer-man or a phone-book-man… So I have been mourning quietly to myself and now Chris is up and making me a nice cup of tea.

“Poor girl,” he said, putting his arms around me and giving me a kiss.

I don’t like to bleat too much about illness so, suffice to say, that I feel like groaning all the time, that is when I’m not coughing or sneezing. In spite of my dire state (not to be confused with Dire Straights, the British rock band), upon awakening this morning and opening my poor watery eyes, almost my very first thought was Roland’s request for breakfast. As you may know Roland is over from Australia and staying with Chris and me.

“Do you know what I could fancy for breakfast tomorrow?” he had asked last night as he leaned over the bannisters on the stairs.

“Fried breakfast?”

“No, all I fancy are two boiled eggs – at  five minutes boil – and two slices of toast, one for soldiers and the other for raspberry jam,” he explained.

“Your wish is my command,” I answered. (Roland is very masterful.)

Neither Chris nor I fancied an egg this morning. As I have very little sense of taste at present I opted for a healthy breakfast of “All Bran” cereal and hot milk (the same bowlful that I couldn’t face yesterday and had popped into the fridge for later). Chris saw to his own toast while I prepared a tray for Roland, who was reading a newspaper out in the sunshine on the terrace. In went the eggs for exactly five minutes, into the toaster went two slices of farmhouse bread; onto the tray went salt and pepper pots, butter, cutlery, crockery and a pot of raspberry jam from the fridge.

As soon as the eggs and toast were ready I made my way, bleary-eyed, with Roland’s breakfast tray from the dark indoors to the sunny outdoors. In a short while we were all seated around the table, Chris was eating his raisin toast, I was toying with the large bowl of re-cycled “All Bran” and Roland was tucking in to his eggs. Chris and I were looking at our friend, as you do when someone is eating something more desirable than you have on your plate.

“Are the eggs alright?” I asked.

“Perfect. Five minutes?” Roland answered.

I confirmed with a nod.

“I can’t eat this,” I said, moving my bowl to the other table, “I’ll have a crumpet instead.”

And I spread some butter on a lovely thick crumpet (I just have it plain, without jam, otherwise I might have noticed it first – it being something peculiar!).

Roland had finished his eggs and began to attend to his toast, first the butter, then the raspberry jam. At the time I was enjoying a buttery mouthful of crumpet and paid scant attention to Roland’s antics until he started laughing.

“As you know, Sally, I’m very partial to beetroot,” he said, “but I’m not sure that even I would want to put it on my toast!”

Chris and I laughed (and coughed).

“Though in Australia they do say it’s very versatile!” Roland added.

I do wish he’d stop making me laugh – as if my cold isn’t bad enough already.

.

I am fishing with Roland on the breakwater off Dawlish beach (this is a few days ago, prior to the onset of our terrible colds); from where we are standing you can see our lofty Victorian terrace built into the cliff and, in particular, you can see the sky-blue parasol peeping above the white balustrade on our balcony. The new rods my mum bought us at the bargain price of fifteen pounds each from our Trago Mills store are a great success, not that we have caught anything yet, but the rods feel good and flexible, and the reels actually work rather well (we had worried they might be children’s rods, or inferior in some way at that price). Roland baited up the hooks with squid and cast out both lines (he is more proficient than me) and now we are waiting for bites. A man wearing a baseball cap is walking towards us. I suspect that the man wants to walk by us to reach the end of the breakwater and I take a half-step closer to the side to let him pass. The gentleman doesn’t deviate and so, when he almost reaches my spot, I look directly into his eyes and smile.

“Hello!” I say.

Now this gentleman’s face lights up. Anyone would be forgiven for thinking that he is unused to strangers greeting him.

“Hello,” he returns with a smile and continues speaking in a broad, but not unpleasant, Exeter accent, “what a glorious day to be fishing at Dawlish! I live in Exeter, as you might recognise from my accent. Do you know, I must be about the only person left with an accent like this? Even my children, who are doctors and lawyers, can’t understand why I still have an accent in these modern times, but I’m a man from the country and not ashamed of it. You youngsters probably can’t remember the times when nearly everybody had accents.”

Unused to being called “youngsters”, Roland and I look at each other quizzically for a split second and I know that my good friend is thinking the same as me – “How old can this man be?”

“Roland lives in Australia and he still sounds like a Londoner to me,” I say.

“But I’m from Hampshire, not London,” Roland exhorts.

“Yes, but you sound like a Cockney to me,” I say.

“That’s because you were born in Australia,” retorts Roland and we all laugh.

For the next thirty to forty minutes we three discuss Australia, fishing, holidays, Dawlish, children, accents and more… At last Trevor (for by now we have introduced ourselves) holds out his hand to mark his departure.

“It’s been wonderful to talk to you both,” says Trevor shaking our hands very meaningfully, “A lot of youngsters don’t talk nowadays.”

“How old are you – if you don’t mind me asking?” I ask.

“Seventy-seven,” he replies.

I search Roland’s face and see that he agrees with me that Trevor doesn’t look that age.

“I hope we’ll meet again some day,” I say.

“Well,” the nice man pauses, “I’m not so sure about that, you see I have cancer – it started with the prostate and now it’s in my liver and bones – and I take each day as it comes. I try not to think about the cancer. And I’m still here, a year longer than what the doctors said.”

The tears are in my eyes and I’m suddenly desperate to help Trevor.

“I know you’ll think I’m nuts but will you let me give you my healing hands?” I ask. (Some people say I have the gift of healing and curing warts.)

So while I’m putting my hands over Trevor’s back he tells us:

“This morning it was such a beautiful day that I just felt like going to Dawlish and being by the sea. My wife said, ‘Don’t go out – you’ll be better off inside.’ But I told her that I have to enjoy each day that I have. I’m so glad that I came over to Dawlish.”

I can see Roland’s eyes glistening too. Trevor shakes our hands again and, smiling and waving occasionally, he walks back to the seawall.

“I’m so glad we didn’t hurry him away,” I say.

“Yes,” agrees Roland, “after all, what is forty minutes to us?”

And a little later Roland caught his huge toadfish.

No time to write about gorgeous Scottish ladies today (as intended) so how about some photographs of Lustleigh where we went with our friends last Sunday?