Category Archives: Health

A Hipster’s Story

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This post has been in my drafts since early December last year. I really wanted to finish for the sake of the conclusion. If you don’t want to read the whole thing (it is very long), the tl;dr is this: if you or someone you know has thigh pain, do see a doctor or physiotherapist. Physiotherapy works. If you or someone you know needs a hip replacement, go for it: it’s life changing.

The Beginning
In May 2018, I was walking home from work when my right leg almost gave way underneath me. The pain passed as quickly as it came but the same thing happened several more times during the summer. I thought about going to my GP to get his advice but as I was working as a temp at the time, I didn’t want to take the time off work.

The summer turned into winter and I started experiencing pain in my right leg, specifically my thigh, on a more and more regular basis. In April and May 2019, as chronicled elsewhere on this blog, I walked the Camino Francés, from Saint Jean Pied de Port to Santiago de Compostela. The pain remained with me every day but I managed to complete the walk thanks to Ibuprofen, trekking poles, and the use of public and private transport. Simply saying ‘thanks to’ doesn’t do justice to the fact that without all three of these things, I would never have made it.

Once I returned home, I started a new job. The pain in my thigh got worse and worse. By November 2019, I couldn’t walk around the house without limping. In December, I began my current job, which involved working from home. Now, you would have thought that I would choose this moment to visit my GP. After all, I was also working part time. It was very easy for me, therefore, to work out my own working hours. Not a bit of it. I have a most wonderful GP but I still hate going to the doctor unless I absolutely, absolutely have to.

Finally Facing the Problem
That point was coming, though, and it eventually arrived in February 2020. Unfortunately, I can’t remember what triggered this move. I don’t recall the pain getting any worse at that point. I think it was just a case of finally not being able to live with it any more. Anyway, I visited my GP and explained the problem. He recommended that I get physiotherapy. I looked up the (NHS) website, e-mailed the application form, and waited.

February 2020. You would be forgiven for thinking that I had a long wait ahead of me. Like, a two year wait, for Covid was just around the corner. However, I was blessed. In early March, I received a call. An appointment was made and just two or three weeks before the first Covid lockdown hit, I saw a physiotherapist for the first time. As a result, I went into the first lockdown with physiotherapy exercises to keep myself busy with.

The Pandemic
I kept up the physiotherapy exercises all the way through the first, second, and third lockdowns. In fact, I was still doing them – with some adjustments here and there as I realised what worked for me and what didn’t – when my NHS contact called me to make a new appointment to see a new physiotherapist (the first one I had seen was from Finland and, I think, returned home). Our first appointments were via Zoom but then, finally, we met in person. I was able to report an improvement in my leg to him… although, there was a fly in the ointment: the pain in some areas had disappeared, but appeared in others. That was no problem for him, he just gave me new exercises to do.

November 2021
One of the new areas to experience pain was my hip. I thought nothing of it at the time. It was just one more. In the subsequent months, however, the pain did not go away. In fact, slowly but surely, it got worse. My hip got more and more stiff.

Early 2022
The year got off to a good start. In January, I realised that all the pain in my right thigh, that had been with me since 2018, had now gone. My thigh wasn’t in perfect shape – there was the pain in my hip and one or two other areas – but after visiting the physiotherapist again in February, I believed that the pain of those ‘other areas’ was connected to my hip problem.

The visit to my physiotherapist in February was the last – to him. There was no more he could do. He sent me on to another physiotherapist who would be able to look at my hip. I can’t remember now but maybe he suspected that I had osteoarthritis, something which this other physiotherapist would be able to diagnose. That’s what happened. I went to see her. As we walked into her treatment room, she walked behind me. After she had done some exercises with me she said that from the way my leg reacted to those exercises, and the way I was walking, she was fairly sure that I had osteoarthritis. Only one thing would confirm it: an X-Ray.

Confirmation
I was referred to my local hospital. A few weeks later, I went up there, got the X-Ray done and then, a week or two after that, went back to the physiotherapist. It was as she had thought. The cartilage that connected my hip bones had worn away. Ouch! What was to be done? The physiotherapist warned me that there were really only two options: pain management or a hip replacement: a plaster over a deep wound, or the nuclear option. As soon as she said this, I knew I would prefer the hip replacement. Managing the problem would mean avoiding an operation but it would also mean no longer being able to walk very far, to probably having to use a stick, to having to rest more, and so forth. I wanted – and still would like – to be able to walk the Camino again one day. It may be a pipe dream, but I won’t even be able to consider it if I can’t walk an hour without hurting.

The Final Decision
The physiotherapist referred me to a hip specialist (at least, that’s what he is to me; I imagine he specialises in much more!) at my local hospital. I went to see him in April. We discussed my situation and looked at the X-Ray of my poor hip. He confirmed what my two choices were. I could not tell him quickly enough that I wanted the hip replacement operation. Very good, he said, the waiting list is nine months, but we’ll get there. I left the hospital with so much gratitude for the consultant, physiotherapists, GPs, and the state of British medicine.

The Wait
A nine month wait meant that I did not expect to hear from anyone until January 2023. During the summer, I was called to UCL Hospital to get scanned in a machine that looked like a giant polo, and which, rather inexplicably, had a device in the ceiling with an X-Box logo on it. Do you think they play games in there? Once that was done, I again didn’t expect to hear any more until the New Year. Towards the end of October, however, I received a letter informing me that my operation would be on 23rd November! Had someone dropped off their waiting list? I was filled with nervous excitement.

The Lead Up to the Operation
In the lead up, I had two phone calls with a nurse and physiotherapist to discuss my medical history and what would happen after the operation. I also received two letters, one of which – my admission letter – told me what I needed to do three days before the operation (i.e. take a Covid test) – as well as what to bring to the hospital on the day, etc.

Everything was clear. 23rd November was a Wednesday. Just after 5pm on Sunday, 20th November I took the Covid test. It was negative. After I had logged it on a government website, however, it occurred to me that I should have taken the test in the morning. The letter, after all, had said that the test should be taken 72 hours before my admission (which was scheduled for 7am on the 23rd), and it was now 62 hours. Oh dear. A few weeks ago, I had woken up thinking I had missed a detail of my medical history and so fired off a worried and apologetic email to the nurse to whom I had spoken. As it turned out, however, I had nothing to fear: I had actually mentioned it to her. This time, the same thing happened. I had nothing to fear. Someone from the hospital called me the following day to make sure I had done the test and was all ready to come in. I mentioned the timings and he wasn’t at all bothered. The only important thing was that I had done the test no earlier than 72 hours before the admission.

Admission Day
Right up until the operation took place, I half expected a delay of some kind or another. Given the overworked nature of the NHS, such would not have been a surprise. It never happened. I arrived at the hospital, was checked in, shown to a bed, and there waited. Doctors and nurses came and went, I was given a gown to wear, questions were asked, my possessions were bagged up and taken away. Details of my next of kin were taken, and I waited.

The Operation
At about 10:45, I was taken up to the operating theatre via the X-Ray room. In a room next to the theatre, the chief anaesthetist and her staff spent several minutes looking for somewhere in my spine to inject the anaesthetic. They tapped, they prodded, they pricked, but all, it seemed, to no avail. I would have to be given a general anaesthetic. Finally, however, they managed to find a vein (which is what I guess they were looking for), and started injecting. I was rolled onto my side. Curiously, I was rolled onto my right side and my bad hip, not my left; I was assured that I would be rolled over in the operating theatre. Speaking of which, they were playing dance music in there! I asked if they could play Bruce Springsteen. Someone went to ask the surgeon if he had The Boss on his playlist. He did! Sadly, however, the anaesthetic got me before I could hear any of it.

Aftermath
I woke up all of a sudden in the recovery room. Very groggy, I just listened to what I was told and lay back. After a short stay in the recovery room, I was wheeled off to a ward. In the following hours, the grogginess went and I was told that the operation had gone well. In the written notes, given to me when I was discharged, the operation is described as being ‘uncomplicated’.

There were four beds in the ward. Only the one opposite me was being used – by a patient who had had a foot amputated, and he left later in the afternoon. I had the place to myself until another patient arrived not long later. I love my iPhone, but not its lack of a phone jack. I don’t use AirPods as they fall out of my ears too easily. I would have bought my iPad and headphones but my admission letter said no tablets or laptops (the second patient ignored this advice and tapped happily away on his laptop). As a result, I was without music. As I had nothing to do but lie there all afternoon and evening, I really would have appreciated having something to listen to.

***
continued on 1st March 2023

I was kept in hospital overnight. Being (more or less) physically fit, however, I was able to leave the next day. My sister, H., came to pick me up. We called a minicab and before long were back home.

December 2022
December was a time of rest and gentle physiotherapy. For three weeks, I did very little else. At first, I was certainly happy with that but as the month wore on, I did start to get bored. Finally, my patience broke and I resumed my part time job. Through the month, I continued to take the cocktail of pain killers that had been prescribed to me. Only at the start of December did the pain level rise, and then just over the course of an evening and morning. I had been warned that this might happen, and had been given morphine to counter it. I wasn’t keen on taking the morphine as the label said it was addictive, but the pain was such that I could not resist doing so. Thereafter, as December progressed, the wound in my right thigh healed and I grew stronger. At the end of November, I hobbled about with two crutches. As time went by, I was able to get by with just one. In December, I started going to Mass again – using still just one crutch before finally, I became able to walk/hobble without it. Finally, I no longer hobbled.

January 2023
In this month, I recommenced my lockdown exercise of walking on the spot while watching a YouTube video (to counter the effect of boredom). Except now, I was able to jog. When I began (around the third week of Jan.), I did this exercise for 45 minutes at two different speeds (25 minutes at a very brisk pace, 15 at a brisk one, then 5 minutes very brisk again). Within a few weeks, however, I was able to jog for an hour. When I started this exercise, I couldn’t talk to myself (which I often do as I try to develop story ideas) as I needed to breath deeply. In the last couple of weeks, that has changed. I can now jog and talk at the same time.

Weigh In
On 1st October last year, I weighed myself. I was 17 stone and one pound. I am quite tall (6’2″) but I thought that is really too much. In the seven months leading up to the operation, I started doing what exercise I could (mainly the on the spot walking as I couldn’t jog with my bad hip), and used an app on my iPhone called Lose It! to monitor my calorie intake. I lost several pounds – nearly a stone, in fact, because on 22nd November, I weighed 16 stone 3 pounds. I stopped exercising and checking my calories in December as I focused on recovering from the operation. Having largely done so by the end of the year, I weighed myself again on the last day of the year. Amazingly, I had lost more weight and was now 15 stone 12 pounds. As of the time of writing, I am currently 15 stone 7 pounds. Slowly but surely, I am heading towards my target of 15 stone 3 pounds. I have no doubt that the improved exercise that my new hip is enabling me to do is helping me get there (unfortunately, it has to contend with my still high calorie in take. Just last week, I recorded 15 stone 4 pounds. I celebrated by eating a lovely beef burger, which promptly gave me back a shed load of calories that I had lost!).

To Conclude
I would like to conclude this post by saying this: if you, or someone you know, has problems with their thigh muscles or hip, encourage them to go to the doctor or physiotherapist. The physio that I did between 2020 and 2022 helped wonderfully in that regard. If you (or a person you know) does require a hip replacement, they might for very good reasons choose not to have an operation. If they are tempted by the idea, though, it is a good one. My hip replacement has given me a new lease of life. I sleep better now. I can kneel down. I can walk without pain. I can walk long distances: just last Saturday I undertook a three-and-a-half hour walk! Yes, I felt very stiff afterwards, but my hip was just fine. No need for a stick. No need for pain relief. It was wonderful. My only regret about the whole business is that I left it for so long. I put a job that in some respects didn’t even treat me that well first. Having an operation can be a nerve wracking time. The recovery period can try the patience, but it’s worth it. It is so, so worth it.


At the end of May 2022

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It’s coming up to seven AM on a sunny Monday morning. At least, I think it is sunny as light is coming through my window. It’s hard to tell, though, as there is a huge bush outside obscuring all sight of the sky. We would take the bush down but, unfortunately, it is growing from the garden next door so we have to wait for the local council to do the job.

***

I am writing this blog post with dry hands. I think I must have been bitten by a vampire with a fetish once. Instead of being interested in my blood, he decided to suck my natural oils out. Ever since then, my hands have got drier and drier. Thank goodness for E45 cream.

***

I have mentioned previously on this blog my ‘gammy’ leg. A funny thing happened at the start of 2022 – I realised that all the problems with the muscles in my right thigh that had afflicted me since about 2018 had been cured: nearly two years of physiotherapy had finally paid off!

Unfortunately, that was not the end of the matter. In November 2020 I began experiencing pain in my right hip. Over the next few months, it did not respond to physiotherapy at all. Little by little, it got worse. Earlier this year, my physiotherapist sent me for a scan at the local hospital. It revealed what she suspected: I had (‘quite advanced’) osteoarthritis.

Treatment for this is one of two things. Either, more physio, pain killers, managing one’s movement, using a stick, etc or a hip replacement. I cannot walk very far these days without having problems. I can’t remain still, either standing or lying down without experiencing stiffness and pain. As soon as the physiotherapist told me the options, I knew that if asked, I would go for the hip replacement. It will put me out of commission for a while, and – as operations do – comes with risk, even if slight, but the other option is simply a plaster over a deep wound and a form of managed decline. Who would want that?

After the scan, I was referred to a hospital consultant who did indeed give me the option of managed decline or hip replacement so, despite being young for such an operation, I went for the latter. I’m now on the waiting list and will, all being well, have it either at the end of this year or the start of next.

***

For many months now, I have been a very bad reader. It’s been my own fault – I just haven’t got on with it as I ought. It probably didn’t help that I was determined to finish one particular book before moving on to any others. That book was Hilaire Belloc’s The Cruise of the Nona. The silly thing was that, whenever I did start reading it, I liked it. It was just the sitting down and starting it that was the problem. It didn’t help that my edition of the book had small text. to try and get round this, I took an older edition – with slightly larger text – out of the library. It worked and I finally finished the book. This Friday (4th June), makes the anniversary of the start of Belloc’s pilgrimage to Rome in 1901. That means, I will start reading his brilliant account of his journey, The Path to Rome. I shall have more to say about this in due course.

After finishing The Cruise of the Nona, I moved on to the other book that I started last year – This Thing of Darkness by K. V. Turley and Fiorella de Maria. It’s a Catholic horror story, meaning, it’s about an alcoholic war widow who interviews Bela Lugosi in the last days of his life and gets drawn into the diabolical reality of what he represented on the silver screen. Horror is not at all my thing. I read the book because Turley is a friend. I am glad I did, though, as it is a compelling read. Though, no, not enough to make me read more horror books.

My current read is Checkmate in Berlin by Giles Milton. I actually started this book briefly last year but put it to one side soon after. Checkmate in Berlin is Milton’s account of the start of the Cold War in Berlin. If the book is half as good as his other narrative histories (which include an account of D-Day, British spies during the Russian Revolution, and the destruction of Smyrna in 1922) then I know I will be in for a treat.

***

A few posts ago, I mentioned reading Evelyn Waugh’s biography of Monsignor Ronald Knox. Well, I shortly off to Mells, to go on a literary/spiritual pilgrimage in search of Knox’s grave. Watch this space for photos and and an account of the trip. I can’t wait.

Pandemic and War.

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Covid
Last week, Boris Johnson lifted all of England’s Covid restrictions (read here). If you catch the virus you no longer have to self-isolate. If you travel on public transport, you are no longer legally obliged to wear a face mask. We are back to where we were at the start of 2020. Almost. Self-isolation is encouraged for anyone who has tested positive, and wearing a face mask on public transport is “strongly encouraged”.

When the pandemic first hit, I updated my British Catholic Blogs page to include a series of prayers for the sick, medical professionals, scientists, and so on. The prayers appeared in a post below the weekly calendar of saints and above the A to Z of British Catholic blogs. When I heard that the restrictions were going to be lifted, I decided that this would be the moment when I removed the prayers and let the BCB blog go back to being exclusively devoted to its original purpose.

Then, Vladimir Putin began his invasion of Ukraine in earnest. When that happened, I wondered if I should include a new set of prayers for the Ukrainian people. As I write these words, I’m leaving the blog as it is because I really would like it just to be an A to Z. I am wondering, though, if maybe its worth while including a prayer page – one that could highlight the Ukraine, Covid, and all the other national and international issues that we need to be praying for right now.

***

Ukraine
Vladimir Putin has committed a profoundly wicked act against Ukraine. In reply, the Ukrainian people are committing many heroic ones as they defend their country. Governments worldwide have started placing sanctions on Russia in response to what has happened. Although these sanctions will hurt both ordinary Russians and people everywhere, I have to hope that no government holds back. Principally, to help Ukraine, but also because if Putin achieves success in that country, his avaricious eye will surely fall upon other countries on his borders.

How do we as individuals react to the Ukrainian crisis? Prayer has to be at the top of our agenda. What kind of prayer? For peace, certainly. Further to that, though, I have found myself thinking about the Catholic I once met who happily told me he prayed the imprecatory psalms against his enemies. At the time, I thought that a bit stiff but, you know, these psalms are Biblical so they are legit. What I never stopped to think, was, were they legit for the time in which they were written, or for all time? I might have been tempted to say the former – until now. For what he is doing to the Ukraine, Putin surely deserves every imprecation placed upon him. However, our God is a god of love so to put it bluntly it does not feel right to ask Him to punish anyone, much less remove the stain of them from the world. That love, however, is not of the merely sentimental kind, and neither does it exist in isolation. God is also a god of Justice. But, even more than that, of mercy. So, that is where I find myself now: praying that justice – and mercy – may be done to Vladimir Putin.

Praying the imprecatory psalms or simply praying for a person’s overthrow or death is not a thing lightly done. If we say these prayers without a desire first and foremost for the object’s repentance, we risk falling into a spiritual darkness full of malignant desires for vengeance and revenge. That, in turn, could destroy our souls. How do we avoid this? I guess, just as I have said: Yes, pray for Vladimir Putin’s failure, overthrow and/or death, but pray first and foremost for his repentance. The repentance of a sinner, however great or small, is what God is about. If it is His purpose, it should be ours as well.

Notes on the Late Summer

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Despite Covid, life continues to get back a little more normal…

Two weeks ago I visited the London Library for just the second time since the pandemic started. Being there was bittersweet. On the one hand it was great being back among all the books. On the other, walking among them reminded me of how rarely I have visited the Library these last few years. Since 2015, when I finished my four year career break (yes, it was that long), you could probably count the number of times I have visited the London Library on one or two hands. Disgraceful.). I made a commitment to visit the Library at least twice a month. I will see how that goes.

One week ago, we had a joint family visit to Bateman’s, the home of Rudyard Kipling. It is a lovely little country house in the deeps of Sussex. Representing my side of the family were myself and my mother. Representing my sister’s family were her, husband, and children.

Kipling is famous, of course, for the If poem as well as for being the author of The Jungle Book. He is infamous for his views on imperialism. Not surprisingly for a man of his age, class, nationality, etc he was very much in favour of it. I don’t know if it represented reality, but I was very heartened by the overflowing waste paper bin in Kipling’s study (above). I discovered that T. E. Lawrence once annoyed him by flying low over his house – Kipling was unimpressed by the plane’s noisiness! I came away from Bateman’s with several books including Puck of Pook’s Hill, which I read while at university, and am enjoying reading again.

Six weeks ago, I had a two hour appointment at my dentist’s. A lot of work was done on my poor teeth. Unfortunately, not every problem has been resolved, and I have to go back. Due to the backlog caused by Covid, however, the earliest appointment I could get is at the end of the month. Ouch.

The coronavirus caused a year long delay to my scheduled appointment at the optician’s. Things went better there, when I finally fulfilled it this week; I damaged my main pair of glasses in late 2019 and was finally able to replace them. The frames of those glasses were inspired by John Paul II when he was still Karol Wojtyła (appropriately enough they were made by a company called Religion). The new frames were inspired by Hugh Grant’s in Notting Hill. I love that film and I love Charles Thacker’s glasses even more. What can I say; that’s the truth!

Oh, I almost forgot – I actually had a night out in the pub! This happened a couple of weeks ago with E., my best friend. We don’t see each other very often these days (not a Covid specific thing, just life) so it was a great pleasure drinking and chatting with him. We met on a Saturday night in a pub that would otherwise have been packed. It was instead rather empty. I guess it will take a while before people pick up their social lives again. That’s understandable.

So, life has been getting a little back to normal. It hasn’t been perfect – family members with ill health has seen to that – but I am grateful for what I have all the same. I think I will end this post on that note: being grateful. It’s something I know I am not as often as I should be.

Vax to Reality

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Last Friday (2nd July), I received my second dose of the anti-coronavirus vaccine.

Earlier that day a friend sent me a text message asking if For Whom The Bell Tolls was a good book – one worth having. I love Hemingway and have read several of his books but have tried and failed three times to get on with this one. I don’t know why – perhaps the Spanish Civil War setting doesn’t grab me, or maybe Hemingway’s use of archaic language (there are lots of thees and thous) to illustrate the (presumably) old fashioned way that the Spaniards are speaking puts too much distance between us. Anyway, after admitting that I hadn’t read the book, I couldn’t help but take it down off the shelf again to give it another go.

My copy of For Whom the Bell Tolls with two sheets of paper containing information about the coronavirus vaccine above it

I took the book with me to the vaccination centre and started reading it after I had received my jab: I presume this is happening over Britain: everyone who receives the vaccination has to wait at the centre for fifteen minutes afterwards just in case they have a bad reaction to the vaccine.

Fortunately, I felt alright, and was able to leave when the time was up.

The worst that I felt on Friday was that my arm – the one that had been jabbed – hurt a bit. This had happened in April when I received the first dose, if not quite as much, so I just got on with my day.

That night, I slept terribly. In fact, after three am I didn’t sleep at all. When I got up in the morning on Saturday, I felt achy and at one or two points shivery, even though it wasn’t cold.

As a result of this, Saturday became a rest day: no daily physio for my dodgy leg, no exercise, no anything: just rest. As the day progressed, I started to feel better but went to bed that night still aching, somewhat.

Rather to my surprise, I woke up on Sunday morning as if I had never been ill. I felt just fine, and have continued to be so, since. Now, I guess I just have to wait two weeks (or one and a half now) for the vaccine to fully kick in.

And then? Well, it looks like the government will end as planned all the restrictions relating to the coronavirus on 19th July, so I’ll be able to go and paint the town red. Of course, we can already go to the shops, pubs, etc but the truth is it will be a long time before I fully integrate myself back into society. I also need to wait until work pays me (even in a pandemic, some things don’t change!) before I can buy any paint. I won’t, of course, that’s not my thing. What I might just do instead is buy a celebratory bottle of wine, and maybe a new book. I like the sound of that.

Speaking of books, I read Chapter One of For Whom The Bell Tolls on Friday, and Chapter Two on Saturday. Since then – nothing. Why? Not actually because I still don’t like the book but because my reading at the moment has stalled. I’m determined to kick start it again but that is a topic for another post.

Two Parts of the Whole

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Writing this blog is both a compulsion and an embarrassment.

It’s a compulsion because I keep coming back to it no matter how long I spend away. Even though I have fewer readers than Shakespeare had Greek, my heart aches to return.

Why? I have a theory: on Facebook, Twitter, even Instagram, I am writing for an audience. Every photo and piece of text is written with other people in mind. Here, however, because so far people read this blog, I am writing for me; only me. That helps me to say the things I really want to say (or, at least some of them, since I am not yet brave enough to say everything).

Sehnsucht and Wine is an embarrassment because of the amount of time between each post. The last one was published on 27th November. The one before that, 11th September; then, 22nd August and 28th June.

Actually, it isn’t the blog that is embarrassing, but me. Why can I never stick to a regular schedule? There is an answer to this: I never create one. Not a proper one that I can look at and say ‘Right, this week, I turn to turn my attention to x’. I tell myself ‘I will write this here, and that, there’, but never make an effort to keep to the plan. A few days ago, I wrote up a blogging schedule for S&W, Hilaire Belloc and The Second Achilles. If I stick to it, I will write one post for each each week. Ideally, I would like to write it over the weekend but I’ll be happy if it just gets done.

I don’t want this post to be just about me having a go at myself so let’s catch up again.

Coronavirus
The U.K. continues to suffer under the pressure of COVID-19. There was good news at the start of December (the 8th to be exact, on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception) when the first vaccine against the virus was administered. Bad news, however, followed, as infection rates shot up and a new, more virulent, strain of the virus appeared in Kent. As a result, we entered our third lockdown of the year. It remains in place. That isn’t the end of the story, though, as Britain is now pushing ahead with her vaccination process. I think we are currently the leading European country for vaccinations and perhaps one of the world leaders as well. That’s a piece of news that should make us all happy.

Brexit
The U.K. left the European Union last year but the transition process only came to an end on 31st December. From my perspective, it has changed absolutely nothing about my life. Of course, other people will have different stories. Brexit is such an important event in the life of this nation that I feel I should be writing much, much more about it; only, I really don’t have anything else to say. I almost feel guilty about that.

Happiest Season
Watching this was one of the highlights of my December. It stars Kristen Stewart (Abby) and Mackenzie Davis (Harper) as a couple who visit the latter’s family for Christmas. It turns out, however, that Harper has not yet come out to them. The film is a romcom but a bittersweet one as Abby and Harper are forced to keep their relationship under wraps. As you might imagine, doing so almost drives them apart before love wins out at the end. Victor Gerber stars as Harper’s father. As it turns out, Harper is not the only one in the family keeping a secret – thanks to her father, everyone is. Because this is a romcom, though, he is not a villain. He is very cute, however. Dan Levy (John) steals every scene he is in. His character is over the top but he is also a Feste-like figure, speaking the truth to those who need to hear it.

David Hogarth
I attended an online conference hosted by Magdalen College about Hogarth last weekend. I will try and write more about it in another post but I am very pleased to say that the conference was a fascinating event that taught me much about this elusive figure.

During the talks, I took a screenshot of nearly every slide that came up – below is one chosen at random (it shows Hogarth as a young boy; inset is Ben Taylor, the Magdalen archivist who is cataloguing the papers). I look forward to sifting through them.

The reason for the conference is the donation of Hogarth’s papers to his old college by Caroline Barron, who is an emerita professor of History at Royal Holloway University. She is also Hogarth’s granddaughter. What a kind gift to make!

Spiritual Matters

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Lockdown restrictions will continue to be eased this week. Of particular interest to me is the resumption of public worship in our churches and the re-opening of pubs – both of which will happen on 4th July.

Reopening of Churches
The Diocese of Westminster has not yet, as far as I am aware, issued any guidelines regarding measures to keep priest and congregation as safe as possible. I imagine, though, it will look something like the Diocese of Portsmouth’s:

(I nabbed this from my friend Stuart on Twitter, so thank you to him!)

Portsmouth’s guidelines mention that there will be limited numbers at Mass ‘based on capacity with 1m between seats’. They also say that the church should be cleaned between Masses.

My parish church can seat several hundred people. It isn’t a huge church but cleaning it between each Mass might take a fair bit of time (depending, of course, on volunteer numbers). If we currently have four Masses on Sunday, I wonder if the Parish Priest will reduce it to, say, two to allow time for cleaning to take place. I could only see four Masses happening if there were two in the morning and two in the afternoon, and I am not sure there will be the volunteer numbers for that. Any reduction in the number of Masses, and the more limited numbers allowed to attend, as required by the one metre spacing rule, could make attending at all difficult. What to do?

Our cardinal offers an answer in this video.

He says that the obligation to hear Mass on Sunday remains suspended, and suggests going during the week. I think that is what I might do. Although I live very close to my parish church so could probably guarantee getting a seat every week, I like the idea of combining Mass attendance with exercise and walking to the cathedral. It would be a three hour plus round trip.

Happily, the cardinal also says that confessions will resume. This is very good news. I last went to confession in February so am in good need of a spiritual scrub.

The Reopening of Pubs
Like any other sane Englishman, I like visiting the pub (!). I doubt very much, though, that I will visit one after they reopen. Not for a while, anyway. For privacy’s sake, I am not enthusiastic about passing my contact details to the bar staff. The pubs will be very clean and tidy in order to ensure that they are safe places to be. I respect that but the thought of drinking beer in such a sterile environment does not appeal to me. In time, I might become reconciled to the thought of doing so. In the meantime, I think I will stay at home and stick to sipping a little wine in the manner of St. Paul (1 Tim 5:23) even if my stomach is in better shape than Timothy’s.

Bringing The Two Together
In the past, I have often celebrated being absolved of my sins after going to confession by going to the pub for lunch and a glass of wine. I don’t think I will be doing that next time but I wouldn’t bet against it! Being in a sate of grace is a rather marvellous state to be in and well worth celebrating.

It’s Lights Out…

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On-Line Gaming
As I have probably mentioned before, I love watching people play video games online. My current favourite is Codemasters’ F1 2019 – soon to be replaced by this year’s iteration of the game. The lock down period has been a blessing for discovering Formula 1 Twitch live streamers.

As I write these words, however, I am listening to an LMP 1 car race around LeMans in a virtual 24 Hours of LeMans live stream. Each team has four drivers, each of whom drives for a certain number of hours before handing over the to the next person. I don’t know who organised this race but it must have taken a lot of work. I imagine the stamina required to race is also pretty high!

The Last of Us Part 2
I discovered Twitch in 2014 when I started watching The JHN Files play the original Last of Us game. I was captivated by both game and the live broadcast. The Last of Us Part 2 finally came out on Friday, and I can’t wait to play it.

The game was originally meant to be released at the end of May but earlier that month was suddenly and indefinitely delayed. A specific reason wasn’t given for this, which led me to wonder if it was because the game – in which your character has to survive in a world that has been ravaged by a pandemic – might not sell so well in a world currently being ravaged by, well, a pandemic.

Fast forward a few weeks and all of a sudden, Naughty Dog, the company behind the game, announced that it would come out on 19th June. Why? Probably because an irate developer who had left the company/been sacked published spoilers about the game online. Thankfully, I managed to avoid those so can still look forward to diving into the game as soon as I have a chance.

The Path to Rome
Today is 21st June. In 1901, Hilaire Belloc is eight days away from Rome. I have written my tweets (@PathtoRome1901) covering his journey up to the 25th. Today, I hope to write the last four days worth. Then, I will be able to relax and think about ‘what next’? I want to read more Belloc. Do I have the time? If I do, what should I read?

Protests
The protests that started out as a reaction to the death of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis (USA) are now in some places morphing into a wider campaign against statues of people from various periods and backgrounds.

Predictably, statues of slave owners have been pulled down – here in the U.K. a statue of Edward Colston was dropped into Bristol Harbour by protesters.

Less predictably, I have seen photos/footage of a statue of Union General and U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant being pulled down; the same treatment has been meted out to a statue of George Washington and St. Junipero Serra. A bust of the novelist Cervantes has also been defaced. All these have happened in America.

What’s going on? I have read that Grant only ever owned one slave, who he inherited, and who he set free as soon as he was able. Cervantes was not a slave owner but rather, held as a slave for several years. Maybe these details are incorrect. But if they are right, they provide proof that for some people, what started out as a Black Lives Matter protest is dissipating into a campaign against anyone they happen to dislike. If that is the case, their campaign, lacking any solid foundation will surely collapse in due course.

But maybe they know perfectly well what they are doing and these acts of destruction are part of a deliberate campaign to destroy public remembrances of the past. Is this a good thing? No. Individuals or unauthorised groups who destroy statues are declaring that they have the authority to shape how society remembers the past. But this authority belongs only to the people as a whole (through the government) or the private organisation that owns the statue. Individuals who destroy statues or any public remembrance make themselves petty tyrants.

If the government or private organisation takes down the statue without considering first the pros and cons of doing so also acts in a tyrannical fashion. Once a statue goes up, it should only come down after the matter has been given full consideration. Nothing else will do.

When we ask ‘what is going on’, there is, of course, another option that we should be alert to: that agent provocateurs are acting in order to discredit their rivals.

Football Returns
The Premier League returned last Wednesday. Sky Television is broadcasting its games on two channels – one with fake crowd noise and one without. Neither are satisfactory. Hearing the fake crowd noise and seeing the empty stands is too distracting to be acceptable. Watching a game without any crowd sound at all takes away any sense of urgency and almost all the excitement. With that said, I prefer watching the games with no sound as at least its more honest.

I am not fond of the fact that all the players take the knee/have the Black Lives Matter wording on their shirts. I dislike particular causes getting so much publicity when there are so many others out there that are extremely important and necessary yet get little or no publicity at all.

Sainsbury’s
Up till last Friday, the queue for Sainsbury’s was getting shorter and shorter every week. On Friday, though, it was a rather longer. A sign of things to come? Probably not. I think I just arrived at the wrong moment. For example, a week or two ago, I arrived at the store when there was virtually no queue and left when it was as long as this week’s.

Also, per Government guidelines, I have started wearing a face mask when in store. Strangely, though, most people are now not doing so! The other week, one of the Sainsbury’s staff very kindly showed me how to wear it in a way that reduces the amount of fogging over on my glasses. Very useful! (I’m probably the last person in the world to realise this but in case you don’t know, you just bend the metal strip so that it follows the contour of your nose).

The Camino
I have heard that the Camino is opening again in July, which is great news. It won’t be like before, though: face masks must be worn in albergues, and I think there will be a reduced number of beds available. Next year is a Holy Year for Santiago. This should mean that pilgrim numbers go up, up, up. It will be interesting to see what happens if the coronavirus remains an issue (as will likely be the case bar the discovery of a vaccine). I would like to walk the Francés again next year. In the current climate, I really don’t know if that will happen.

An Unexpected Letter
This week, I received a letter from HMRC saying that I had paid too much tax over the last year. The reimbursement will be very gratefully received. This week, I found an old USB stick and on it was a document with my Government Gateway number on it. This means I can finally sort out my tax status for my current job, which is a great relief.

Out of This World

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Hey, here’s me checking in. How are you?

As I write these words, the clock reads 6:46am so I have beaten my previous early post record by a clean twelve minutes. In these days of lock down we get our pleasures where we can.

Who am I kidding – I would have mentioned this anyway; it’s an easy way to get into the post, after all (blogging-wise, there’s nothing worse than knowing that you want to write something but don’t know how to start).

***

So, how are things here? Well, my parents and I remain well, for which I give thanks. Overnight, one of my fillings fell out. I wasn’t surprised – the same filling has come out several times before. The shape and, I think, shallowness, of the filling has made it an impossible one to stay in. My tooth doesn’t hurt so I might just leave it be until my next scheduled dentist’s appointment.

***

Last Sunday was the first anniversary of my arrival at Santiago cathedral at the end of my first Camino. As soon as I am able, I will write a post about this. I know part of what I want to say so just have to work out the rest before I put finger to keyboard. Next Sunday is the first anniversary of my return home so I shall try to do it by then. If you want to know how I felt last Sunday, though, well, I teared up when I listened to ‘Santiago de Compostela’ on The Way soundtrack. This music covers the arrival of Martin Sheen et al at the cathedral and the swinging of the Botafumeiro, which always moves me deeply when I watch the film. Here is the music:

I feel so much for people who intended to walk the Camino this year but whose plans were scuppered by the coronavirus. I hope all of them are able to reschedule to next year or the year after.

***

Yesterday, 19th May was the 85th anniversary of T. E. Lawrence’s death following a road accident: he was riding his motorbike home down a country road when he turned a corner and was forced to swerve to avoid two boys on bicycles. Lawrence was launched from his bike and suffered head injuries that would prove to be fatal.

Unsurprisingly, there is a conspiracy theory regarding his death as a car was seen driving away from the scene of the accident, but I don’t think it has gained any traction among Lawrence scholars. At least, not among the few that I have read. A new film about Lawrence is due out soon – Lawrence After Arabia; judging by its IMDB synopsis, it will take a deep dive into the conspiracy theory:

Retiring to his cottage in Dorset Lawrence hopes to forget his past fighting in Arabia but soon he is drawn into political intrigue and his many enemies begin to plot against him. Was a motorcycle crash an accident or attempt at assassination by the British Secret Service? 

IMDB

According to IMDB, Lawrence After Arabia is due out on 16th October this year so going to see it might just make a nice early birthday present for me.

***

Apollo 13 (9/10)
I have wanted to watch this film for ages but couldn’t find it streaming anywhere. While I was looking through our DVD shelf the other day, I found that we owned a copy of it. A very nice surprise! The film is as good as its reputation. Tom Hanks leads the way as Jim Lovell, captain of the ill fated Apollo 13 mission to the moon. The acting, script, special effects, music… everything about this film is pretty much spot on.

The American (8/10)
Okay, the facts:
Stars: George Clooney and the Italian countryside.
Directed by Anton Corbijn.

The American is about an assassin named Jack who is ambushed by unknown assassins outside his Arctic hideaway. He manages to kill them but is forced to kill his lover: she didn’t know his profession and there can be no loose ends.

Jack heads south to Rome where his handler tells him to go a small Italian town and await further orders. Not long later, Jack is given another job: to make a rifle for another assassin. He does so, but realises that it is to be used on him. In the denouement of the film we see what he does to get out of this very unpromising situation.

Anton Corbijn is a photographer so The American looks very good. I mean, George Clooney is in it. It is set in Italy so of course it was going to look good but under Corbijn’s directorship it looks even better. The story is told very tightly. Music is used only sparingly. This means we really focus on Jack – despite knowing so little about him – and become much more unsettled than we would if we were watching a Bond or Jason Bourne film.

I found the denouement of the film quite confusing. One or two parts of it still are. On the whole, though, I enjoyed the picture. It was very different to standard Hollywood fare, and while I like that, too, I appreciated this.

***

Finally, Monday just one (18th May) was the one hundredth anniversary of Karol Józef Wojtyła, more well known as Pope St. John Paul II. Fifteen years on from his death (15 years already!) I still miss him. He was pope when I became a Catholic so will always be special to me – even though nowadays I am not as right on in my Catholic views as I used to be. I think in the end it will be people like him (rather than many living clerics – and laymen for that matter) who keep me in the Church. Pope John Paul: Ora Pro Nobis!

As You Write It

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I am writing this post at 6:58am. I usually try to do a little creative work early in the morning but thought I would turn to the blog today as I need to catch-up again.

Well, a few things have happened since my last post on 3rd May.

Last week, one of my aunts died. She had been suffering from dementia and latterly had moved to a care home. I don’t know the cause of her death although in the current context one might hazard a guess. I wasn’t close to her – I hadn’t met her since the 90s – but one of her sons is an occasional visitor to our house and I keep up with his and some of his family’s life on Facebook so I feel for them.

A few days ago, my brother’s mother-in-law died – I believe of natural causes; she had been very ill for sometime. I never met her at all but I am sad for my brother’s wife.

A couple of days ago, I was just about to start my daily exercise when an e-mail notification flashed up on my screen: my parish had started livestreaming a Mass. Very unusual as it was 2:22pm. Afternoon Masses are not usually until much later, and then at the top of the hour.

I read the text accompanying the notificaiton: RIP Derek Vitali. This cut me to the quick. Derek and his wife were regular attendees to the 8am Sunday Mass – the one at which I altar serve. Derek himself was a reader. He had an amazing voice – deep, clear, and authoritative. It was always a pleasure listening to him. We often spoke ‘back stage’ before or after the Mass as well. He was a very kind and happy person; full of good humour. As with my aunt, I don’t know the circumstances of his death but I will miss him very much.

Requiescant in Pace.

My parents and I remain well. I continue my social media work, exercise, reading and preparation for creative writing.

Howards End (9/10)
After watching The Martian, I turned to this Merchant Ivory classic. Leonard Bast’s death remains incredibly sad and frustrating. If only the Wilcox family had had an ounce of compassion it need never have happened. It’s worse because I can identify with Bast – I am not as poor as he is but without the help of others I probably would be. I appreciate his love of literature and nature, his day dreaminess as well. I try not to think about how it is not just the Wilcox’s but society itself that brings him down because then I might have to ask questions about my own society – not so much or only in connection with me but in regards all of us.

K-19: The Widowmaker (8/10)
My second Russian submarine disaster film. This one is set in the early 60s. The K-19 is the USSR’s latest super-sub. It has also been badly constructed. It should remain in port but the Soviet Navy chiefs want it at sea to conduct missile tests so off it goes. Predictably, disaster follows: Piping in the nuclear reactor breaks. Water coolant can no longer get through to the reactor itself. As a result, its temperature rises to catastrophic levels. The crew undertake a race against time to repair the piping before the high temperatures cause a nuclear explosion that could in turn lead to nuclear war – rather unhelpfully, the sub’ is close by an American spy station.

K-19 is a solid action-drama. Harrison Ford acts against type as Captain Alexei Vostrikov who seems to care more about the Party than his crew. Liam Neeson’s Mikhail Polenin is the noble submarine commander who does his best to defend his crew’s interests against the captain.

In the end, Vostrikov comes good: he puts the men first. If I have one criticism of the film it is that it didn’t develop Vostrikov’s character enough. We know that despite his party loyalty he has a suspect background but in the film he goes from being cruel to kind in fairly short order.

John Wick 3: Parabellum (8.5/10)
I finished watching this yesterday. John Wick 3 is very stylish, and violent. It has a very interesting internal mythology that raises the film above being just about the violence though I don’t know by how much. I think I need to watch the first two films in the series.

Happy Birthday Formula 1!
Formula 1 turned seventy years old, yesterday (13th May). The first ever F1 Grand Prix took place at Silverstone in the presence of King George VI. There was big news to go with the birthday, of course, with the announcement from Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel that he would be leaving the team at the end of the year. Let’s hope we can go racing and he can get a win (after Hamilton has won his seventh title, preferably) before the year’s end.