Wild Geese , livre ebook

Balboa Press UK - Marjorie Wynn

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58 pages

English

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Living an idyllic life in Wales, bringing up a family to appreciate the countryside and detailing the events which took place and formed my psyche.
This is the story of my life from the war years living a modest and pretty uneventful life in Lancashire to marrying an artist/rock climber which opened up a world I had never known. Our first home was in the bleak Peak District and eventually (as befits a rock climber) to the delights of the Welsh hills with a splendid view of mountains.
I have spent the majority of my years in this ‘other’ country with all its wonders and delights, but I am mortified that I never learnt to speak or read the language. Nevertheless, I can turn my pen to extolling on the many delights that have come my way from settling into this land of Wales.
We restored a 400 year old cottage with a tremendous view of Snowdonia (it was the view that clinched the deal) and the ‘Wild Geese’ of the title refers to our flight from our familiar world and all our relations to this Welsh wonderland.

Sujets

Performing Arts

Biography

Entertainment

Autobiography

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Publié par	Balboa Press UK
Date de parution	20 novembre 2022
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781982286699
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0250€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

WILD GEESE

HOW DID I GET TO HERE?

MARJORIE WYNN

Copyright © 2022 Marjorie Wynn.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-9822-8668-2 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-9822-8669-9 (e)

Balboa Press rev. date: 11/16/2022
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
About the Author
Prologue
We had been discussing birthdays – my partner, my eldest son and I. The pity is that all my immediate family celebrate their birthdays in the latter part of the year – mine is in November when the weather is, to say the least, dull, grey and chill. But now that we are in the height of summer and in the middle of a heat wave, the idea of conceiving babies at a time when they will always have to celebrate their birth in the depths of those sunless days seems at worst like bad planning, or at best just carelessness.
It would be lovely to stage a summer birthday in a garden filled with flowers, sunlight and warmth and perhaps a marquee and a band. Then my son came up with both an incredible and obvious idea – ‘Let’s have your party now and call it “In Case I Don’t Make It Birthday!” At first I met this with consternation at the cheek of it and then realised its potential. It would mean that on my real celebration day we could go away for a few days before the joys of Christmas loomed. Now it’s beginning to sound like a good idea and being a Very Special Birthday (I’ll leave you, dear reader, to work it out for yourself) all the planning and organisation will be done by my family and this will leave me to think back over all those years and work out how I have arrived at this stage in my life.
Chapter 1

We did have the party entitled “In Case I Don’t Make It” – a lunch party for 24 in September, in a local hostelry, delightful, successful and very memorable, surrounded by some of my closest friends. I had a large square cake for the occasion with the words “Happy 80 th Birthday - Well almost, not quite, well not yet!” This was a line from a couple of poems of mine and which fitted admirably with the early party. Most of the guests could not understand the logic of this early celebration and made me promise not to open my birthday presents until the correct date. So the gifts lay on the dining room table untouched, begging to be opened. My thank-you letters must have come as a surprise two months later.
September brings warm and misty days - the drone of wasps in the orchard feasting on the blood red juice of currant and bramble, a spider weaving a magic thread of gossamer and clouds of midges which dance and sparkle in the sun. At this time when shortening days and lengthening shadows signal the onset of winter, I watch the blaze of colour that is Autumn before the trees are stripped bare and become skeletal, awaiting the first frosts.

I HAVE BEEN CONTEMPLATING HOW MY life has evolved, how much the course of events was destined to happen and what part did my own aspirations mould the person that I am. In my mind’s eye I see the girl I always was, more learned now, perhaps, certainly more experienced, more sure of myself and my role in life; but otherwise exactly as I always have been. But if I take a good hard look in the mirror, examine what I SEE, what do I find? The image is of an ageing woman with the ghost of the girl she was, peering through. How can this be? When I am dressing for an outing and looking in the glass in order to check if I look presentable, I still see a flattering view of myself, smiling attractively, no hint of the ageing person I have so obviously become. So there appear to be two differing images – the one I have always recognised and the one as others see me now.
The mirror reveals the truth - crinkly eyes with too much laughing, (or crying), flesh around the mouth no longer firm, hanging down where it used to smile in a happy curve; the neck wrinkled in folds, arms dry and often itchy with liver spots making their appearance, and standing back for more horrors, I see breasts and hips heavy with age, legs perhaps my best feature, still shapely if you disregard the raised veins tunnelling down the calves. I can just about take the honesty of this standing-still front view, but checking out a passing glimpse in another mirror reveals rounded shoulders, balanced out by protruding belly, no waist to speak of, with a facial profile showing a heavy nose and jowls, hair grey/bleached blond, scraped back in a ponytail for convenience – not a charismatic view at all. And this is as others see me! Until pensionable age, growing old gracefully (or otherwise!) was never a consideration. It was not a choice we had to make - it just happened. For most of our lives it is a stage far away in the future, well over the horizon, and then it is suddenly upon us. And it comes as a shock, as inevitable as day following night.
This is only the outward appearance I tell myself. Inside I am the same as I was at 20 or 30 or 60 and through all the changes of life, except that those changes have added to the SELF that is me now, and so I conclude that I cannot be the same. Frowns, crow’s feet, whatever, are the results of life, of living, and make up the character that is now ME. I am of an age to do as I please. As Jenny Jones declares in her ‘WARNING’ poem -
“When I am old I shall wear pur ple . ..
And run my stick along the public railings . .. and learn to spit.”
My reply to that is (without any remorse) -
“ Now that I’m old I don’t give a damn, I’ll cough across the table and sneeze into your gin!
And be a soddin’ nuisance to all my kith and kin.”
But inside I feel the same as I always did. Should I feel different now that I am older - that dreaded word that sets us apart? I still live and love my life. I enjoy things I have always enjoyed – my home gives me great pleasure still, my garden and woodland. What do I find has changed? I do everything more slowly. I have time to think and I appreciate more because of this. I don’t think of myself as wrinkly or even ageing which means losing some of your faculties. There is a stubbornness about me that says never mind what others think. As I ended a recent verse –
“...I’ve not found any wealth
So now it’s time to break the mould
And please me bloomin’ self”.
I am the product of a working class background of cotton mills and poverty which is still apparent in the make-up of my psyche. I know that I am still a product of the folks of Lancashire, share their humours and resentments, always being aware that what I am now hails from what I was then. I was never exactly an ugly duckling, but flying away from my roots and taking on a new persona and settling in a different country aligns me more with wild geese fleeing the nest. At bottom I am a shy soul- yes, yes. Our sort usually are. We come into our own when we are centre stage or the centre of attraction. I never wanted to be in a choir or to join a group unless I had a leading role. Knowing this and being confident, I still squirm inside at the audacity of it. Confidence – what an elusive concept! When faced with opposition or lack of support I crumble with embarrassment.
I am older than my parents were when they died. I am older than they ever were. What a shocking discovery this is to me now at my advanced age. It still feels unreal that my parents are no longer here to share my latter years. In fact in this early part of the 21 st century people are living longer. I have several friends well into their 80s. Only a few weeks’ ago a 93 year old woman, aided and abetted by her family, went on the Zip Wire adventure trip in North Wales – a new branch of outdoor activity aimed at the young and obviously appealing to the old. The zip wire was installed in an old slate quarry. North Wales now has the first Wave Machine built on the land where once stood an aluminium works; you can now go trampolening underground in a disused and ancient slate mine. Who would have tho