Preface

"How terribly strange to be seventy..."

Badger

Under our kitchen window there's a big black plastic box. We call it The Coffin but do not be alarmed for it does not contain a human corpse. Instead, it holds garden sprays, clippers, a couple of old blankets, old glass jars and a swing bin filled with wild bird seed. It provides useful storage for things we do not want inside the house.

Late last night I was sitting in this very study battering away at the keyboard when I heard something outside, beyond the kitchen door. What could it be? There was a thumping and a bumping and a scratching. It's not the first time I have heard it.

I tiptoed into the dark kitchen and headed for the light switch. This time I remembered to go for the first of three switches - the one that illuminates the outside area around our kitchen door. If I had been thinking really clearly I would have grabbed my camera because I correctly guessed what I was about to see.

It was a badger standing on the black coffin, trying to remove the three bricks I had previously placed on the coffin lid. Clearly it was after the bird seed in the bin. He or she was no more than three feet away from me.

The badger stopped what it was doing and looked up at the kitchen door. They have notoriously poor eyesight but I suspect that the creature saw me and soon jumped down from the coffin.

However, he or she did not run away immediately. Six feet down the path the badger turned and looked up at me as I opened the door and for a brief moment our eyes were locked together. Then I hissed and the badger ran away as fast as its little legs would carry it. Up the lawn and off into the night.

It was a magical encounter. I am a big fan of badgers and resentful of the persecution they have endured from both official and unofficial quarters in recent decades. It is as if their history on this island bears no weight. They were here before human beings.

I have blogged about badgers before and I will remember last night's encounter for the rest of my days. God Save The Badger!

Praise

In one's working life, praise is often in short supply. However, praise can be like rocket fuel - it gives us a boost and encourages us to carry on, to keep putting our shoulders to the wheel - week in and week out.

For sixteen years, I was The Head of English in a north Sheffield secondary school. During that span of time, I worked closely with up to a hundred other English teachers. Some were with me for years while others lasted for no more than a single teaching year. And there were student teachers, supply teachers, even an Australian teacher who was with us for a year on an exchange programme.

I led them all - the young ones, the older ones, women, men, competent teachers and incompetent ones, teachers prone to tears and teachers who went the extra mile to serve pupils to the best of our ability.

I led by example and by listening to other teachers - showing that I valued them as colleagues and by encouraging them - often with praise that might spur them on. It was my natural style and I am proud to say that in general I earned both their respect and their affection.

It must have been just after the turn of the millennia that a young university student teacher called Sarah joined us on a  successful teaching placement. She was a happy, intelligent human being with drive and personality. After her placement, we gave her a job and she joined my English department on a permanent basis.

Fast forward the tape twenty years and now Sarah's youngest son goes to the same pre-school nursery that our Phoebe attends. 

Earlier this week Sarah had her first ever conversation with my daughter Frances. She said that I had been the best "boss" she had ever had. I was respected by staff and pupils alike. I listened to colleagues and made time for them and intervened when discipline issues cropped up.

Even after all these years, this report gave me a lift and caused me to reflect upon my leadership skills in those very busy working years. Though I wasn't perfect, I think Sarah's summary was pretty fair for I gave my all and I guess that I have every right to feel proud of my performance and my endurance.

Sunak

Today I did something that I have never done before. I watched the entire speech of a Tory prime minister from the annual Conservative Party Conference. Rishi Sunak's  words were carefully crafted and delivered in a steady manner. No doubt a team of speech writers had been involved in the making of his script which was read from an autocue that accidentally appeared on camera from time to time.

Sunak is the latest Tory PM, following on from Cameron, May, Johnson and Truss. They all seemed like hapless cartoon characters to me - a bunch of Magoos.  In contrast, Sunak comes across as dignified, intelligent and well-rehearsed. Perhaps a wolf in sheep's clothing, he was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth  and he is a very plausible figure.  However,  please don't worry because there is no way that I would ever vote Conservative no matter who the leader was. There's more chance of me winning an Olympic  medal in rhythmic gymnastics.

As expected, Sunak confirmed that the ludicrously expensive HS2 railway project is to be hugely curtailed and he claims that  the money saved will be spent on more cost-effective infrastructure improvement projects. He reeled out a long wishlist. Whoever did the initial costing for HS2 must have been living in cloud cuckoo land. They got it so terribly wrong, I could have done better using Phoebe's abacus.

Sunak also talked about big changes in the education system and severely restricting cigarette smoking plus a few other projects that might appeal to the general public as we move towards the next general election. The conference hall in Manchester was filled with bloated Tories, smugly applauding when instructed to do so and very aware that they were on camera. After thirteen years of Tory rule it is laughable that Sunak wants the electorate to believe that he represents the prospect of change.

Currently, all opinion polls are pointing towards a sweeping Labour Party victory so the likely truth is that none of Sunak's half-promises and recently hatched dreams will be realised when The Conservative Party is in power. He could have promised anything without the responsibility of having to see it through.

"Long Term Decisions For A Brighter Future" sounds like it might have been a rejected album by The Moody Blues. There's "Silverfish" Sunak at the top singing the lead track as he desperately attempts to close the gap on Labour.

Silverfish

Silverfish - actual size

Throughout time, humans have lived in close proximity to insects. Just today I read that in several French cities there has been an explosion in the bed bug population while over in Africa mosquitoes  continues to spread death as they are the prime carriers of malaria. Fortunately, most insects are benign and hardly trouble us at all. In fact, they mainly benefit our lives.

Here in northern England, insects are most obvious in the summertime. Out in our suburban garden, insects flit between plants or crawl in the grass. There are thousands of them. Long ago, Jimmie Rodgers recorded a song called "An English Country Garden" in which he asked: "How many insects come here and go/ Through our English country garden? " Well for the life of me Jimmie I cannot say but a hell of a lot.

Sometimes, I visit our downstairs toilet before I go to bed and very often I spot an insect on our vinyl flooring. I have only ever seen one on its own and I have never seen one in the daytime.

It scuttles about and obviously does not appreciate the electric light. See the image at the top - it is a silverfish  and it loves dark, damp places like benighted bathrooms. I guess that if we have one silverfish there must be more but I have never seen them. If you get an infestation they can cause minor damage  but I think that our silverfish must be living off dead skin particles and dandruff.       

You are probably curious about how silverfish reproduce so I have undertaken extensive research (read the Wikipedia page) to satisfy your curiosity...

"Before silverfish reproduce, they carry out a ritual involving three phases, which may last over half an hour. In the first phase, the male and female stand face to face, their vibrating antennae touching, then repeatedly back off and return to this position. In the second phase, the male runs away and the female chases him. In the third phase, the male and female stand side by side and head to tail, with the male vibrating his tail against the female. Finally, the male lays a spermatophore, a sperm capsule covered in gossamer, which the female takes into her body via her ovipositor to fertilize her eggs. The female lays groups of fewer than 60 eggs at once, deposited in small crevices. The eggs are oval-shaped, whitish, about 0.8 mm (0.031 in) long, and take between two weeks and two months to hatch. A silverfish usually lays fewer than 100 eggs in her lifetime..."

I don't know what our silverfish is called but I shall call him Hector after the famed Trojan warrior of Greek mythology. A few minutes ago, he was there on the floor once again when I went into the toilet to urinate. I told him he shouldn't be looking.

AI image of a silverfish talking to a spider

Sycamore

Hadrian's Wall was built under the instructions of the Roman emperor Hadrian. It stretched from The North Sea in the east to the Solway Firth in the west, covering some eighty four miles. It marked the very edge of The Roman Empire and was also intended to keep out unwanted visitors and warriors from the land we now call Scotland.

The wall rises and falls, clinging to the landscape in terrain that remains challenging to this day. It was an ambitious project that took around six years to complete but it did not function as intended for very many years. After Hadrian's death a new but less imposing wall was built further north called The Antonine  Wall.

I remind myself at this point that when I sat down to create this blogpost, I did not intend to write a potted history of Hadrian's Wall. That is just background context for my reflections upon a beautiful sycamore tree that hugged the wall at a point where the base  geology had formed a significant dip in the land.

They say that the tree was around three hundred years old. It was disease-free and had every prospect of thriving for another three hundred years. It had found a perfect niche - partly sheltered and well-watered. Lonesome but strong.

People loved that iconic tree. They felt connected to it and countless photos were taken at Sycamore Gap. Marriage proposals were made there and the tree even featured in the film "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves".

And then in the dead of night just last week the tree was cut down with a chain saw. The tree crashed to the ground. People all over this kingdom shared a sense of sadness mingled with utter disbelief. Why would anyone do such a thing? 

A sixteen year old youth and a man in his sixties were arrested, charged  and later bailed. If they have any reasons to explain their vandalism we have not yet heard them. Something died in all of us when they murdered beauty. Personally, I hope that for the rest of their lives they will be known  as the men who chopped down the iconic tree and that that reputation will follow them to their graves.

Below - the sycamore tree and Sycamore Gap seen  via Google Streetview from the nearby "B" road...

Weekend

It was a good weekend. My old friend, Tony, invited me over to Beverley in the very heart of East Yorkshire. It's where I went to school and where Tony now lives with his second wife, Pauline.

We drove into the nearby city of Hull. The team I have supported for sixty years were playing Plymouth Argyle. But Tony had not only bought me a match ticket, he had paid for a "prestige" package that involved a lunch, free drinks, great seats next to the directors' box  and so on.

High Esk Lake  by The River Hull

At halftime, we looked up at the big screen and a  digital birthday greeting came on wishing me a happy 70th birthday "from Tony".  I have waited for fame all my life and now I had it. Of course the crowd cheered wildly when they saw my name.

Though Hull City deserved to win, we ended up drawing the match with Plymouth. The final score was 1-1.

The River Hull north of Hull Bridge

Back in Beverley, we visited Nellie's. Its real name is "The White Horse" and it is my favourite pub in the whole world. Right next to St Mary's Church, it is an authentic  Victorian pub in which time has stood still. I first went in there when I was seventeen - 53 years ago. It is little changed.

On Sunday morning, in spite of the inclement weather forecast, we  drove out of the old market town to undertake a four mile walk east of   The River Hull and it was on this walk that I snapped the attached pictures.

Cattle by The River Hull at Arram Carrs