So I didn’t go to the dance. The cold bug stayed at home, and last night I slept well.
The previous night I had been unable to sleep. It had been a clear night and the stars were magnificent. Orion rising at a drunken angle over the roofs of the nearby houses. The Pleiades (perhaps) close by in close conspiratorial conversation: seven sisters taking it in turn to brighten and fade.
Inevitably, the computer was turned back on, and I watched, 'Who do you think you are?' featuring Hugh Denis, a comedian I greatly admire, not least for his raptor impression in 'Outnumbered.'
It was a very moving programme, though I was sorry that his ancestral exploration went no further back than to two men who fought in the war. There was so little mention of the women who had played a part in his genesis, and who likely played some part in the creation of his comic genius.
The glimpse of coal mining in Yorkshire; close to the area to where so many of my ancestors once worked, and also an area around which as a teenager I used to cycle; brought home to me the harshness of conditions in the pit, and the hard work done there in the past by such young people.
I can well understand, as hollyhocks bob by my window, how after enduring the horrors of mining and war, how gardening became the way for one of his relatives to find at least a little peace and contentment.
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