choral music, libraries, history, travel, pens, cats, books, marriage, (in)fertility, stillbirth, and a premature midlife crisis. So many projects, so little time...
I regularly read Dorset Life on my ipad. It's a local magazine all about Dorset, which I first picked up on a trip to Bournemouth a few years ago. Completely opposite to men who read Playboy "for the articles," I freely admit to reading Dorset Life for the pictures.
In each issue they have a Dorset walk, and some history, and some other fun features. Right now, they're doing a feature looking at "Dorset's Jurassic Coast - Bexington to Lyme Regis" and a highlight is the Golden Cap. Incidentally, the Jurassic Coast exposes a continuous sequence of Jurassic, Triassic, and Cretaceous rocks, spanning 185 million years of history.
It's the highest piece of coastline on the south coast (626 feet high), and offers views for miles, which would have been important around 1000 years ago. The first Viking raid on England (which wasn't really England then, since it was a collection of kingdoms like Mercia, Wessex, etc) was in the 8th century on the Dorset coast, so they probably would have used the high point to watch for Vikings coming across the "narrow seas."
If you head down the western slope, there's a stream called St. Gabriel's Water, and a little upstream are the ruins of the 13th century St. Gabriel's church. The water goes back into the sea at a secluded beach that was used by smugglers for centuries to bring in contraband goods.
Completely unrelated, other than the viking connection to Dorset, apparently Viking warriors used to file their teeth. To look tough. Or have dental bling. According to skeletons found in a Dorset grave, these guys filed their teeth to have horizontal marks, possibly to scare their enemies. It just sounds painful to me.
I've been watching the Trial of Richard III on youtube - there is no end to the geekiness.
What, you might ask, is the Trial of Richard III?
Let's start at the very beginning...
1480's. Wars of the Roses. Medieval England is in shambles as one family has been tearing itself apart for several decades.
Edward IV is king. When he got married, he made a love match with a commoner, Elizabeth Woodville. Kind of a big deal at the time. Lots of people thought she bewitched him. He died suddenly leaving two small sons, neither of whom were old enough to rule on their own. Edward had a brother, Richard. Richard wants to become king. So Richard takes both boys and puts them in the Tower of London, for their "protection". He says he's going to prepare them for their coronation, but really he's plotting to take the throne. Which he accomplishes by saying that Edward had a precontract before he married Elizabeth (he gets a bishop to agree to this). Therefore his marriage with Elizabeth would be invalid, and the children would be illegitimate.
Ergo, Richard would be king.
He has Parliament agree to it, and he gets himself crowned, and it's all good.
Except for the princes in the tower. Witnesses say that they saw them playing in the courtyard for several months, but then there was a raid trying to rescue them. They were moved deeper into the Tower, and not allowed to play outside any longer. Eventually no one saw them at all, and they were presumed dead.
So the obvious choice is Richard, right? In the late 17th century bones were found under a stairwell which match the size of the princes, and so everyone assumed that he had murdered his nephews, and that was that.
But it wasn't that simple. There were a lot of people who had something to gain by the two princes dying. Edward IV had another brother, the Duke of Clarence, who had a son. He would have benefited. Margaret Beaufort, the mother of the eventual Henry VII definitely benefited.
The bodies were never found, and one would assume that they would have been paraded around to show that they had died, especially to snuff out pretenders (there were several during the reign of Henry VII who said they were the younger prince who escaped from the tower - in the absence of DNA evidence there wasn't really any way to prove it either way).
Elizabeth Woodville even reconciled with Richard III, and there was talk that her oldest daughter Elizabeth of York would marry him (she eventually married Henry VII). She asked another son who was with Henry in exile to come home to the court of Richard. Would she have done that when she suspected Richard of killing her two sons?
So yeah, there's a lot of weird evidence both ways, and not a lot of answers.
So in the 1980's Channel 4 in the UK had a trial of Richard, where they had historians argue it out in a courtroom with a jury and lawyers.
I won't tell you what the verdict is. But the 22 videos on youtube are pretty compelling. Plus, the 80's hair is awesome.
About a year ago I discovered my favorite TV show of all time. Great British Railway Journeys on BBC2. Michael Portillo, who was a former Conservative MP and Cabinet Minister (and also on whom I have a teeny bit of a professorial crush) follows the guidebook that George Bradshaw put together in the 1860's to help Victorians navigate the new railway system. Every season he travels several main lines, and in each show he'll visit two or three stops along the way, exploring how much of Bradshaw's England is still recognizable.
This is my favorite show because it combines so many of my Happy Places:
- England
- Trains
- Exploring
- Exploring England by Train
The first time I stumbled upon it on TV I almost lost it. If only he made a little stop at the AMT Espresso Bar before hopping on each train; then it would be really complete.
If you're in the UK, by all means, watch this show when it's on. If you're not @TelevisionBritish uploads most of them to YouTube. Even if you're not into England or trains, the show would be worth watching if for no other reason than to see what pastel color combinations of shirt and jacket that Michael Portillo can carry off.
Below is one where he goes to Scarborough. But for nostalgia's sake, before that, here's a picture of me in Scaroborough in 2001. I was very hung over as I'd been out drinking very late the night before with my friend Natasha. I remember this very clearly because when I'm drunk I turn into an Angry Feminist. We were walking back to the station and stopped at a kebab shop for grease. A guy was in the queue ahead of us, and his girlfriend/wife was holding flowers. I went up to her, poked her shoulder, and promptly announced, "whatever he did to you, don't you let him buy you off with flowers. You deserve more than that!" The guy got really mad, and Tasha skedaddled me out of there. While she was trying to hail me a cab, I decided to lay down on the ground by the station because it looked so appealing (I was very drunk). I dozed off, and must have looked homeless because when I woke up, to the cab she had so helpfully called for me, there was about two pounds in change next to me. I was so pleased with myself. I held the change up, and said, "Look Tasha! Two pounds!" The cab driver almost didn't take me because he was afraid I was going to puke in his car. The next day I woke up, had a Burger King breakfast at King's Cross, and went to Scarborough.
Now that I'm back home, I've been walking at the lake every day again, working off all the pain au chocolate, muller rice, and Pret a Manger brownies that always seem to make their way into my mouth when I'm in England. The walk around the lake is about 3 miles, and takes me about 50 minutes to complete. I've been doing it every day, in the evenings when it's not so hot. Generally I listen to an audiobook - right now I'm listening to one called Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla (he so totally got a raw deal in posterity). But the other day I caught up on a bunch of podcasts from BBC History Magazine - their History Extra podcast is one of my favorites.
If you read Pillars of the Earth, you kind of know the story of Thomas Becket, who was martyred when soldiers sent from Henry II murdered him in 1170. Poor Henry. I have a lot of sympathy for him. To start with, he appointed Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury because he and Thomas were supposedly friends. Thomas had worked for Henry as his Chancellor. Then Henry appoints him Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas has a "Road to Damascus" conversion, and suddenly Thomas is fighting Henry every which way.
So for years Thomas is driving Henry crazy, and Henry is stuck with an unruly Archbishop who won't put royal supremacy over papal law and do the things Henry asks him to do, as King. And Thomas is all, "I'm standing up for the power of God," when he was probably just being a little brat. Ok, maybe he was partly standing up for God, but there was definitely a part of him that was being a brat.
So then Henry, after years of putting up with this ungrateful man, has a hissy fit. Apparently Henry used to have lots of hissy fits, and people just ignored him until he calmed back down. He was seriously emotional Well, you would be too if your wife was supporting a rebellion against you; one that was led by your sons. Doh! So Henry has a hissy fit and says, "Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?" And some younger men of Henry's, who weren't so familiar with his hissy fits, are all like, "oooh, we will! we will! We'll impress the king and kill the Archbishop!"
So they go riding off into the night like a bunch of punks, show up at Canterbury, kill Thomas, and then Henry has to do penance. He has to dress as a penitent, go to Canterbury on a pilgrimage, and beg forgiveness of everyone so that the Pope doesn't excommunicate him. At this point, I'm kinda like, "Poor Henry," right? He was just doing his thing, having his hissy fit, and it got all taken out of context.
Which is why there are two lessons for the day:
First, don't be a yes-man Chancellor, and then suddenly get a spine when you're appointed Archbishop. That isn't going to be good for you if you like your head attached to your shoulders.
Second, if you're a King, and you're surrounded by yes-men who are eager to please you, watch it when you talk about people you'd like to have killed. Because you just never know when you're going to have to wear thorns and beg forgiveness of people you can't really stand.
There are plenty of other blogs out there that are gushing about Kate's dress, and Wills' handsomeness, so I'm not going to do that. What I'm going to do is share with you my three, albeit very faint, connections to the Royal Wedding.
1. Westminster Abbey. Ok, so I know that it's been there for a thousand years, so plenty of people have a connection via Westminster Abbey, but not all of them like mine. I'm one of the relatively few people through the ages who have actually attended regular services there. I had my own seat in the choir at the weekday 5pm Evensong services, and everything. And man, would I feel smug, walking up on Sunday afternoons at 2:45, breezing past all the American tourists, and having the Priest recognize me, and move aside to let me in. Then I'd, you know, look at the chair where all the monarchs since William the Conquerer had been crowned, and I wouldn't feel quite so smug anymore.
2. Grace, the Ear-Covering Bridesmaid: So my friend Anna Louisa posted on Facebook that she went to school with Grace's mom, and was saluting her for raising such a self-expressed daughter. Therefore, by my calculation, I'm like 3 degrees away from Prince William. Anna Louisa - Grace's mom - Prince William (who is Grace's Godfather).
3. John Rutter (who composed the Anthem that the Abbey Dean commissioned for the wedding, This is the Day): In case you've never heard of him before now, he's a brilliant choral composer, based in Cambridge, I think. I'm pretty sure I've posted music of his before, because I just adore him. And I got the chance to be a groupie to him in 2001 when I went to the Association of British Choral Director's annual meeting (three days of singing and conducting! Be still my heart!). He was going to be doing a clinic, and I ran into him in a hallway. Literally. I had my head down in the program, trying to figure out where I was going, and I think he had his head down, probably composing something. I was groupie-speechless and managed a quick, "I love your work" before scurrying along, kicking myself for not thinking of anything more clever to say.
On the topic of John Rutter, you've gotta check out his Requiem. It's all on youtube in parts, posted by @MonteverdiChor. I'm posting the Angus Dei and The Lord is My Shepherd here. It's juicy. Me likey.
Well, I'm back to podcasting after a nearly-six-month-pregnancy-loss-of-pregnancy break...
This week, Edward VI's reign. Color me excited. http://englandcast.blogspot.com
I really don't know what that blog title means. I just like how it sounded.
Well here's an annoyance... I go to ebay to look for some doc martens (in an attempt to regain some of the innocence I had when I was 17, I think) and the default search box seems to link you to the page to sell an item. So I keep putting in Green Doc Martens and it brings up a page walking me through the steps to sell my Green Doc Martens, which I can't do because I don't have them, because I want to buy them, but it won't let me. It's a circle of ebay craziness! I guess they're doing updates or something to prepare for Cyber-Monday (but seriously, how many Formally-Named Shopping Days do we need in this country?).
And on to more pleasant subjects. England drew the first test in the Ashes (yes, you can play for five days and not have a winner). This is a Big Deal because it wasn't looking too good for them on Wednesday when one of the Australian bowlers got a hat trick. And I actually know what a hat trick is, thank you (it's when a bowler gets three wickets in a row, I'm pretty sure). I love the Ashes. Even more, I love that my hubby loves it. Because then I know what's going on without having to put in the effort of following it myself. Cricket is confusing! I don't have the time to figure out why Australia decided to declare at the end of the second day, or whether England avoided a follow on.
For those of you not hip to cricket tournaments, the Ashes is a tournament between England and Australia that occurs every two years, alternating countries - though it always happens in the summer in each country, which means it's not quite two years on the dot, with the whole southern-hemisphere thing. They play five tests, and each test is five days each. So that's a 25 day tournament, which will extend until January 7. They play all five tests, even if one of the teams wins the first three.
There is a big controversy brewing in the cricket world right now between the purists who want to keep Test Cricket going exclusively - that's the kind where both teams wear white, they have tea breaks, and it goes on for five days involving a lot of long-term strategy - and the new 20/20 matches. And no, 20/20 doesn't refer to an eyesight exam score. In cricket, every time six balls are bowled, that's called an Over. So 20/20 means that each team gets 20 Overs, and then that's it. 20/20 games last about 3-4 hours, rather than the five days of test cricket. And there are no tea breaks, which is sad. Tea breaks in sports are very civilized and I approve of them.
20/20 got its first big break a few years ago when the Indian Premiere League started - they got the best cricketers in the world, paid them a huge amount of money, brought over Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders, and created eight teams for a month-long tournament. The cheerleaders had to wear tights under their skirts, incidentally. After the first game, too many people complained of the impropriety of the short skirts. Sharu Khan owned the Kolkuta Knight Riders and created this kick-ass theme song complete with Bollywood-inspired over-the-top music video. It was a month of cricket-craziness, and thanks to Dish Network, we got to watch every minute of it, direct from India. The commercials were the best - Indian personals websites, calling cards, money-wiring services, and an upcoming field hockey tournament (apparently Indian men play field hockey - go figure).
Four years ago we went to England over Thanksgiving, when the first test in the Ashes was just starting. J wound up getting sick and camped out for three days on Sandor's couch becoming entranced by the bowling and batting. I'm not as into the strategy of test cricket as hubby is, but I like the Ashes because Shane Warne is one of the commentators for the Australians and I have a total crush on him.
Shane Warne is not a good man, though. Same old story - hot wife, he cheats, everybody hates him, etc. This week Sandor and Anna Louisa were over for Thanksgiving and we watched Skating with the Stars, which is hosted by a very cute man who sounds like he comes from Yorkshire called Vernon Kay, pictured. The conversation went like this:
Them: "he's big in America, too?"
Me: "I've never heard of him - maybe just for this show?"
Them: "he's trying to get big outside of England."
Me: "he's super cute."
Them: "he's an asshole."
Turns out that he was married to a very-hot Tess Daly, and then decided that he would send racy text messages to a Page 3 Girl (ie the girls who take off their tops for Page 3 of The Sun). When he was caught, he issued this very heartfelt apology:
“Now this week you may or may not be aware that because of some stupid and foolish decisions I’ve made I’ve disappointed and let down a lot of people. To my family and everybody I’m very sorry. Right, let’s crack on!”
No wonder he wanted to get out of the UK to host an ice-skating-reality-show for 6 weeks. I'd want to get away too.
And in other news, Gran Turismo 5 has finally been released. Hubby has been waiting for four years for this game. In 2006 the PS3 came out, and it was announced that GT5 would be released in January. We bought a kick-butt huge HD tv used on Craigslist on Christmas eve that year. Hubby got surround sound hooked up so that he could really get into the engine noise. We bought the PS3. And no GT5. They said July. July comes. No GT5. In 2007 or 2008 they released some kind of prologue with a limited number of tracks and cars, and that was supposed to hold over the fans until the real game came out. It was released on Wednesday. Almost four years after it was supposed to have been released. According to hubby, this is not just a racing game. This is a driving simulation game. I don't really know the difference, but he does. The introductory video that plays when you start the game is pretty awesome. Hubby said that even if the game was comprised entirely of only this video, he would have been happy.
Me, I'm wondering why, with all that awesome programming and the physics that each of the cars have, and the reality of it all, and the general awesomeness of the whole thing, they couldn't have come up with a better soundtrack. It's all Smooth Jazz, just like GT4 was. I always know he's playing a Gran Turismo game because of the crappy Sad FM smooth jazz emanating from the speakers in between races.
I have to admit, I'm slightly jealous. Hubby gets his GT5 game, and I'm still waiting on a new Oblivion.
I guess that's it for now. Life is going on, and I guess that's what healing is all about. Hubby is racing just like he raced in GT4 when I first met him. Five years later, and so much is still just the same. Different house, same general geographic area. Same job. More cats. And I lost a baby. It's just always kind of there. I wonder whether that's how it will always be. I guess I've got enough time to find out.
Before getting into anything deep, here's another sunrise picture. I've got to photoshop that little green blurb out of it - this is untouched. But when I do that, I think it'll look super-pretty. I like the tips of the grasses having the light shine behind them.
And also, the composer of the day is John Rutter. I've been listening to his Requiem for much of the day, but most of that is pretty depressing. True story: once I spent All Soul's Day in Cambridge and was at King's College listening to the choir perform the Rutter Requiem. It was getting dark at 4pm, and was a cold and dreary day anyway, and there we were, Sandor and I, in this cold, damp, 800 year old building with bad lighting, listening to this moving requiem by candlelight, and smack dab in the middle of the Agnus Dei some old man sitting in the choir stalls passes out. There was much huffing and puffing and asking if a doctor was in the house, and carrying of the man through the center of the chapel out the back door. All the while, the choir kept singing as if nothing was happening. It was so surreal.
But like I said, the requiem is pretty depressing. It's beautifully depressing, but still, I'm trying not to be a complete downer all the time. So, here is a Gaelic Blessing... deep peace of the gentle night to you, moon and stars pour their healing light on you...
So a lot of people are asking me if I'm ok these days. What does that mean? What is ok, anyway? Because with the world turning upside down on me, I've got a whole new sliding scale of what being ok actually means. According to Webster's it means "not excellent, and not poor. Mediocre." But that still isn't saying much because it's all relative.
A month ago, a day was ok if I got a reasonable amount of work done, didn't eat every piece of chocolate in the house, got to spend some time reading, maybe wrote in my journal and listened to some of my favorite music. If I worked out, got to spend some time outside, or if Project Runway was on, it was slightly above ok.
These days, I'm doing ok if I only cry three times in a 24 hour period. I'm doing ok if I can fall asleep on my own without the help of drugs (though with my back issues, I've been getting a lot of help from drugs the past couple of days). If I don't wake up when it's still dark (I dread the dark. It's not a good time of year for me to lose a child, what with the way I hate the darkness so much. Then again, is there ever a good time to lose a child?).
When I stopped bleeding, it was a great day. It meant that I could start putting this mess behind me, physically at least. And then I got the back issues, which have put me several steps behind where I've been.
The funeral home called and my son's ashes and death certificate are ready to be picked up. When we get the strength to go get them, it will not be an ok day. Picking up the ashes of a baby that you never got to hold, whose tiny fingers you never got to coo over, but whom you loved just the same - that is not the activity of an ok day.
That said, today I didn't feel like cooking, so we ordered pizza. Pizza is pretty much ok. It's hard to argue with the ok-ness of pizza. We got a lot of chores done around the house, so that's ok, too. Wrigley the Cat is being sociable and cuddling with me, which is slightly above ok on the scale. She's not the most social cat, and when I get attention from her, it makes me feel loved.
I just finished the first book I've read since the Horrible Day, Russell Wiley Is Out to Lunch and it made me laugh. Now I'm midway through Nick Hornby's Juliet, Naked. These books make me happy because they're the kind of books I loved before I lost my baby, when stupid things were important, and everything didn't have to be dark and heavy for me to think it worthwhile. Spending a day reading, and catching up on my NaNoWriMo word count is a step above ok because it lets me tap into my creativity, and I can be quiet without feeling tortured.
So who knows what ok means anymore. If someone asks me whether I'm doing ok, I don't know how to answer that, because I don't know what their frame of reference is. What is ok to them? Am I doing ok by their standards?
I think I'm probably just barely holding it together by many people's standards, but for me, every day that I get through is becoming a victory. Like an addict who is proud of getting through a day without using, I'm proud of getting through a day without collapsing into a lump of moaning sobs in the grocery store.
...even though it's snowing at the moment. Last week I was in England and June was busting out all over the place. Below is a picture of the daffodils blooming on the banks of the river Cam while my best buddy Sandor and I went punting.
Sandor is the big brother I never had. I've known him for almost 10 years and we have this funny tradition that we always go to Cambridge when I'm in the UK. We generally go punting, and then to Evensong at King's, and sometimes wind down with a coffee and CD perusal at Borders, but now that all the Borders bookshops in the UK have gone out of business, that part didn't happen. Sigh.
Now I'm back in my cozy mountains, the week before Easter, and it's snowing. At least I have a good reason to drink the leftover peppermint hot chocolate from Christmas. I've spent the last two days since we got back putzing around, getting the house back in order, and generally getting comfy at home again while catching up on some sleep.
Whilst puttering, I was catching up on one of my favorite podcasts, In Our Time. Melvyn Bragg may not be the most energetic guy in radio, but dang, he's brilliant. The episode I just listened to was on Boudica, who used to be known as Bodicea, but I guess that's changed recently. She is this amazing, mythical (and possibly real) woman who led tribes of Britons against the Romans in AD 60-61. She sacked Colchester, Roman London, and St. Albans where she was finally defeated. Throughout the centuries she's been used by Queens like Elizabeth I to show the strength and power of the British.
Speaking of British History, I've been spending a lot of time reading the Henry III Fine Rolls Project - a giant list of concessions, payments and petitions to the King from 1216-1272. It's a little window into what people wanted from their King, and just the type of admin-type of work that was done on a day to day basis. For example, on 16 November 1226, the Sherriff of Leicestershire was ordered to answer the king for a forfeiture of 10 pounds in which Robert Butler fell by judgement of his county court for the unjust vexation he made against the abbot of Croxton, Oh what I wouldn't give to be a fly on the wall in that meeting. It blows my mind to think that 800 years ago people were just going about their business the same way we are today. We tend to think of people eight centuries ago as foreigners, aliens, not people we'd have much in common with. But I think we would have a lot to talk about with those folks, and the juicy gossip of whatever Robert Butler said about the abbott of Croxton.
Tuesday we went to Bath, which is famous for two things: 1) Jane Austen spent a lot of time there, and 2) the Roman baths. It rained, so we didn't do much but try to stay dry. We did, however, seek sanctuary in the Abbey. And I loved the train trip. I love everything about train trips in the UK. I love getting to the station early and getting lunch from Upper Crust. I love getting magazines at WH Smith. I love getting a treat at Boots. The whole thing is just too wonderful for words.
Above is the vaulted ceiling with flying buttresses and everything like that in the Abbey. Below is the organ, which is just spectacular. I like smaller abbey's like this one - Westminster is just too crowded and you can't get a good look around at everything, and it's also expensive. I'm happy puttering around Bath Abbey for a few hours instead.
In each issue they have a Dorset walk, and some history, and some other fun features. Right now, they're doing a feature looking at "Dorset's Jurassic Coast - Bexington to Lyme Regis" and a highlight is the Golden Cap. Incidentally, the Jurassic Coast exposes a continuous sequence of Jurassic, Triassic, and Cretaceous rocks, spanning 185 million years of history.
and it made me laugh. Now I'm midway through Nick Hornby's 
