Views

Early this afternoon, I sat in Frances and Stewart's house to watch my team on Sky Sports TV. Though we probably did not merit the victory down on the south coast, my beloved Hull City beat Portsmouth by one goal to nil. Frances, Stewart and the girls are away for two nights with old friends and all their relatively new children - down in Northamptonshire.

After the game, I took my camera upstairs to get a few shots from Phoebe's bedroom. It enjoys great views to the east. The top picture shows The Royal Hallamshire Hospital that was opened by Prince Charles - now King Charles III - in 1978, soon after I came to live in Sheffield. More importantly Shirley was working there when I met her - in The Accident and Emergency Department. The hospital has figured in our lives in other ways too as you can well imagine. 

Directly across from Phoebe's window you look out on a cliffside below Psalter Lane. You can see a cross and a light green roof. That is St William's Catholic Church. The rising terraced houses right of there are on Ecclesall Road - one of the main southern thoroughfares out of the city. The cliffside has not always been thus. It was the result of historic stone quarrying.

Turn the camera to the left and you are looking towards the bowl of Sheffield city centre. The tall building in the centre is St Paul's Tower. It is an apartment block that was opened in 2010. The houses in the foreground are in the suburb of Greystones reaching down to Hunter's Bar.

That view over the city centre is forever changing - in different light and weather conditions and in different seasons. Phoebe loved looking out on the night of November 5th last year when fireworks burst in the sky in memory of Guy Fawkes and The Gunpowder Plot which was foiled in 1605. As you might imagine that plot was all tied up with religious differences and the future governance of England and Wales.

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The word "view" is an odd word when you come to think about it. It can describe what we see when we look out in physical reality as evidenced above. But it can also be used in a more abstract sense - to describe attitudes and thoughts about particular matters.

Our son Ian has plenty of views about nutrition, healthy eating and veganism but he is not evangelical about it Last week he appeared on the Jeremy Vine Show on Channel 5 promoting his new book: "BOSH! More Plants". I blogged about it here. Yesterday, he and his work partner Henry featured in "The Yorkshire Post" newspaper - even appearing on the front of the Friday edition. See below...