It’s about a year ago that Man of the Woods and I became very lucky parents. Our daughter – then 19 – crashed her car and turned it over. We didn’t lose her. In fact she was the luckiest girl as she only lost a few of her long hairs when the shattered windscreen nipped the ends and pulled some from her scalp, presumably when the car landed. You can read about it here. At the time I asked her permission to put it on social media to illustrate the brilliance of seatbelts to other young drivers.
I’ve just driven home from a friend’s and although there was no frost, I thought about her and once again realised how lucky we were to have her here this Christmas and for me to be able to take this photo. Someone must have been looking after her.
I was inspired to write a quick poem before bed … goodnight folks
🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸
When life is but a breath away from being not so,
As delicate as a whisper beside your ear.
Take it not for granted, pause, watch and see,
Hear, feel and taste life while it is still here.
💫
Worry less about the things you cannot change,
Don’t yearn for the past because it is done.
Avoid waiting for a future full of uncertain promises.
Grab the lapels of today, breath in and feel it on your tongue.
This short clip is one of those amazing Pathe News reports about an aeroplane, narrated by some terribly well-spoken English expert in the field.
Not just any old aeroplane, but my favourite of all time – the Lancaster Bomber. I first saw one for real when my father took me to Hendon War Museum in North West London. We lived not far away and I was probably about ten at the time.
Yes I loved ponies, cats and books but I also had developed an outsider’s fascination with mechanics. I say ‘outsider’ because I cannot rebuild an engine – as my father can – but I was exposed to the necessary teamwork required to bleed the brakes on a Morris Minor Traveller, as I was entrusted with the pressing of the footbrake while dad’s voice filtered through the floor while he lay on a carpet-covered trolley underneath said car “on” … “off” …. “on” …. “off” … I’ve still no idea what he would have been doing, but I just loved it that he got me out of bed to help him. I was the son he never had.
Close observers will notice this silver version of the Lancaster in the video clip has in fact many variations from the bomber we all recognise as part of the BBM fly past for the Queens Birthday and other state occasions (Battle of Britain Memorial).
(photo – Tony Stafford)
The silver adaptation, which needed none of the bomber capabilities for its mission to the North Pole, has been reproduced below by my own father who has spent the best part of seventy years enjoying airfix kits of and (much to my mother’s annoyance) has an attic full of unmade kits.
Although dad, now 76, suffers from some shakes, his lifelong attention to detail results in him painstakingly painting tiny surface areas of these kits … such as the yellow tips on each propeller, or the pilot’s overalls even when they won’t be seen by most admirers beneath removable canopies.
Decals (the transfers provided by the kit manufacturers) are positioned with precision using tweezers and magnifying glasses, moved a millimetre this way or that while the moisture remains. I used to hang over him on the dining room table, watching the planes take shape over a few days, growing into recognisable shapes from the plastic moulds attached to frames.
In fact I recal a phase when I was treated to a kit or two to work on alongside him at the dining room table. This was an honour and I would lay out my mat and tools, as he did his, before opening the box containing the parts to a blue-tit on a branch, or a Hussar astride a bay horse with spear in hand. The best part was opening a new box when the sheets of half moulds lay pristine, waiting to be twisted out of their frame and glued in place – except dad always insisted on wet ‘n drying the edges before glueing (so tedious were these time-consuming extra tasks to a 9 year old). In fact, I remember the process of building and painting never quite lived up to my vision of the completed model and eventually after a few months I grew bored and my half completed models were stored back in their boxes for ‘another time’. (That time never came and I believe I finally threw the boxes out only a few years ago – gulp).
When our son, now 18, became interested in airfix my dad helped and guided him, proudly drove him to special shops which still existed where you could browse shelves of kits in all available scales rather than merely logging on and hoping for the best. He did chose some planes (I remember finding a spitfire in a rose bush only last year, long after his enthusiasm for making them had departed) but unsurprisingly was also attracted to army transport (we’ll forgive dad his allegiance to aeroplane kits – he spent 22 years in the Royal Air Force 🤗).
The only trouble was, my son played rugby aged 6-14 and his weekends were taken up playing matches, then recovering and chilling with schoolmates, so his attention to those kits was sporadic. Add to that his impatience for the kit to be ‘ready to play with’ … and the results would not have made the monthly modelling shows to which my father still attends!
My father’s engineering knowledge is unbelievable. He reads. And reads. And reads; always did. He retains information better than one square of kitchen roll retains spills ..
Ask him about London Underground (which my daughter did when she first moved to the big smoke and started using it regularly) and he’ll tell you who designed it, when it was developed and improved, where the unused stations are and which are used as settings in films.
Ask him about MPG in cars, lorries, and horse lorries and he’ll explain the formula to work it out.
He has an easy unpatronising way of sharing information, should you choose to ask and listen. He would never throw that information at you, he is a quiet man.
I am more aware these days that my time to learn more about him, to really know the man behind the mask of ‘dad’, is reducing. I am mindful now that I will enjoy his company when I am with him, not allow any other voices in the room to distract me from a shared conversation, even if others are not interested in what he has to say.
One day, if nature takes it course, I won’t be able to ask him how fast a space station flies around the earth, or why some engine oil is better than others.
I’d hate to be in that situation which you sometimes hear others say say “I wish I’d spent more time just chatting to him.”
I’m not sure where this post grew from. I ought to be writing my book, or reading about Jake but the urge took over and I let it flow. Trust I haven’t bored you.
But it might leave you peckish if you haven’t had breakfast…
Nothing like a Shell garage heated-too-quickly snack to fill a hole, and burn the roof of your mouth.
What is it about the sanctuary of your own car as a teensy place to sit and contemplate stuff? Builders en route to work, wearing the statutory uniform of paint-encrusted old jogging bottoms once designed for greater things all queue for coffees and burgers. They compete for the most male stance in a queue – it’s cute actually, like any group of young male mammals strutting their stuff.
Then you’ve got the sensible grown up people in middle-class Volvos with bicycles 🚲 perched on the top, family politely obeying the rules – off on a weekend away breathing in the air of some English hill somewhere because they are fit and they are going to stay fit.
(How many times do you debate which coffee to ask the machine to spew out, only to revert to type and punch hot chocolate?)
And then there are the suits. They vary from Vauxhall-driving salesmen types (we all need those 👌🏼) to the red F-type owner who… are you serious – has asked the attendant to fill his car up?! Maybe it’s some Sheikh or other … he has certainly caught the attention of the builders!
Second course? Or should we save that for later. I bought these for you; I know you have a sweet tooth 🌸
Oooh, there’s a roar and a rumble just started. So excuse me… I’m just going to test this VW polo ….🤪
My small boy who weighed 8lb 11oz at birth turns 18 at the end of this month.
That same small boy who used to squeeze himself into a yard bucket aged around 4, was a spindly thing yet athletic and brave. Always smiling, happy in company or with his own (*goes off to find photo*).
Hours he would spend on his haunches, at the edge of the flower bed, playing with toy cars and tractors, making tracks in the dry soil, and brmm brmm noises that were surprisingly realistic and included gear changes.
His love of anything with wheels (or tracks) led him to own at some point in his upbringing a toy version of pretty much all the world has to offer in the way of automobiles.
What to do for his 18th, the young man now at agricultural college; who has true independence with his first own wheels, a – now kitted to the hilt – landrover 90. He works hard on the farm, and learnt quickly how the hours here do not follow those of his peers’ holiday jobs, or those working in retail and offices. During harvest he can easily notch up a 16hr day, and being a family farm, the laws on child labour don’t quite cut it. The fieldwork is waiting like a crocodile at the edge of a water hole, occasionally snapping at any unconscious procrastination.
When I saw the adverts back in Nov/Dec flying around across FB, and films 1-7 in the series had been previously devoured by not only our son but us all, I decided to book tickets. With our daughter living in London these days and choosing – quite rightly – much of her spare time with her lovely boyfriend, it is rare we go out as the old team of four (ooh, don’t forget your GIFs 💫)>I drove in, husband was tired. Son didn’t know what the surprise event was, although 3 miles off the O2 did guess the venue ☺️. It wasn’t until the carpark attendant said “Are you here for Fast&FuriousLive?” that he finally knew for certain what we’d hauled ourselves out in the snow blizzards for. (Don’t finish a sentence with one of those.) …. that he finally knew for certain why we might have hauled ourselves out during a snow blizzard. (much better).
The stunt driving was bloody amazing (apologies for the language but it’s what I said at the time and I simply cannot refine that). The finish on these cars’ bodywork was something else. I was mesmerised and my heartbeat played tunes of delight. As I became transfixed through my vision and hearing senses being fully engaged, I knew I was experiencing what my counsellor has told me to look out for. Anything in our lives which give us the buzz of excitement instinctively, should ideally be nurtured and understood. We humans need some of that buzz for our well-being now we no longer have to go out and kill a passing warthog for supper.
(My strategy as I soak up the advice in my final counselling session today is to move forward with confidence to be me in my real life, as I have sold myself to you guys over 8 weeks of blogging.)
Our time is spent improving ourselves, doing what’s expected and seen as right by other people, we forget to let ourselves enter what the therapists call ‘free child ego state’. That sense of freedom from constraints as the pulse quickens as our brain accepts the excitement from the stimulus we’ve always known deep down we need.
When my little boy gathered his toys aged four, his excitement levels were visible. His body shook, his grinning face, his pleading for me to open the door as the handle was too high. Some time later, his brmm brmm noises were still audible from the house and he would be lost in his own world of imagination, not a worry entering his non-furrowed brow.
I saw it yesterday too. Those minutes before the show started, after the announcer informed us that in 5 minutes we would be treated to an action-packed visual spectacle. His excitement matched my own and we exchanged grins and wide-eyed mutually agreed nods. Daughter too had phone poised for snaps. Husband slept through about 50% of it. He was very tired.
If the link below works, then I challenge you to watch it without your heart rate increasing from that of resting pace. Even if street racing is not your bag, and you’d rather watch the RAC rally through the welsh hills, or formula 1 at Silverstone, I am pretty sure that anyone who loves cars will have a small biological reaction to the engine notes, sexy lighting mixed with great music, exciting direction. Brilliant films with a good moral fibre running through.
Leaving the venue, when my son put his arm around my shoulders from his 6’3″ height, grinned and said “Thanks mum” my day was made … love that boy 💙
Morning…. come and sit opposite me while I pause a little, giving the guys at the local garage time to wash the car inside and out. We are going to be offering it today in part exchange for something else … slightly random swap of Audi A8, V8, battleship armchair with enough g-force to increase your heartbeat rapidly in a very short space of time, to a VW polo (stay with me on this …)
If you’ve been here a while, you may recall daughter attempting a Richard Hammond in her own red polo? Well, she is in no position to buy a replacement (decent) car and only requires wheels at weekends when she returns from the big smoke.
Husband has decided to quit while he’s ahead in the old-cars-are-a-moneypit game and trade in the old girl.
We are today looking at not just any polo, but a 1.6 TDI. Fast enough to satisfy his need to overtake when he decides to, rather than when the engine has caught up with the driver’s foot, but still insurable for daughter to be included before she one day is in a position to save for and buy her own money pit!
I am actually quite excited. One of my guilty pleasures is cars, engines and driving generally. My first car was a Mr Bean yellow mini (in fact I have a photo somewhere so I should find that before pressing publish … but, damn it, that’ll take time and I don’t want your coffee to go cold). It stuck to the road like glue…
oooh look, here’s one courtesy of google images (take off the wheel arch additional flares, mine didn’t have those).
I’m so thrilled a few of my regular readers are following John’s story. I’m building towards a finale, but only because I need to focus on that big romance block buster…
Researching arranged marriages is so so fascinating and could easily lead this tale into a much deeper place than I shall take it this time. Do you know, that all 8 parts written to date and added together make 5,600 words already?!!!! Too long for the average short story competition in fact. (Too many exclamation marks … looks like a teenager’s text exchange… one exclamation mark gives emphasis but is more… sophisticated).
So when my daughter rang this morning, after leaving to drive to the hair salon for a pre-booked cut, little did I expect to receive a call from her fifteen minutes later, and through the tears, make out;
“Mummy…. I’ve had an accident….. The car is on its roof.”
Never have you seen my departure from the house be so swift; grabbing keys, coat and confused husband in the process. I thrust to his chest area my mobile as we entered the truck and I reversed out of the drive, proceeding to take the same route she had only minutes before.
Black ice hid around every bend on the country lanes, it’s black poisoned fingers clawing their way silently across the tarmac.
The sun had killed some of it, where the hedges gave way to gaps and the rays had melted, then dried the results of yesterday’s rainfall.
As I drove and he held her panicky voice in his hands, her wails spilling from the smartphone screen, she suddenly sounded like the four year old who had cut her chin open tripping on a step, or the scared twelve year old stood on Stratford Station after a ‘big independent girls’ day out but finding the trains home cancelled. That tone in their voice which hits the very core of parenthood … I still need you.
As we raced our way to her, whilst driving as slowly as I could bare to, we knew she would be about to experience a whole procedure with policemen and tests and questions. Her car was blocking the lane and as we drew closer, she was stood hugging herself looking smaller than her 5’8″ stature.
How the hell did she walk away from THAT?
I pulled over to park to the side of a driveway, tears starting to flow of their own accord. I knew she was fine; she’d telephoned us and I could clearly see her standing there on the verge, but the overwhelming emotion when I saw that car filled my whole body with shivers.
My common sense translated the scene in front of me while my imagination re-wrote events. It did this immediately, the bastard. I saw my daughter’s head smashed against the driver’s window, her unconscious body unable to make her escape before another driver of a more heavy vehicle sees the obstruction in time.
She walked over to hug me and we held each other tightly, longer than our hello/goodbye hugs.
“I don’t know how it happened. It was so quick.”
“The car doesn’t matter darling; you are safe. Honestly, it’s all that matters.” I talked into her hair as I held her, tears still coming from us both.
The police had already been called by a generous young man who happened on the scene, and had kindly stopped to check the driver. He had rung the police for her and gently suggested she turn the engine off as it was still running. She sat keeping warm in his car following her initial call to us. I do not recall his name – she did mention it – but we shook his hand warmly on handover and thanked him for stopping. Bless those souls who pause in their day for others.
The police duly arrived; two patrol cars to cordon off the lane from each direction. One interviewed our worried daughter, helped her relax and explained how the breathalyser worked. She passed this; her most recent tipple had been Boxing Day.
The second rang the recovery people who arrived only 30 minutes later and established that an upside down car should stay upside down on the transport lorry due to leakages already inevitably going on.
The scraping sounds as our daughter’s first car was winched unceremoniously but expertly off the road, filled my mind with further visions of the sounds she would have endured an hour earlier.
Someone was looking on our family today. This evening she is with her wonderful boyfriend – I drove her to him myself – because tomorrow they fly out together to Amsterdam for New Year.
He was as relieved as we were to discover his girlfriend is in one beautiful peace and needs only moral support and hugs. Lots of them. He will keep her cozy this evening.
I cannot speak highly enough of seatbelt safety. Had she not been wearing one, I may not have been typing this. I may have been sat beside her bed in A&E. Or worse.
Daily word prompt – COZY
(posted with my daughter’s knowledge and acceptance that to share a positive outcome such as this, may help other young drivers)
(How many times do you debate which coffee to ask the machine to spew out, only to revert to type and punch hot chocolate?)
Second course? Or should we save that for later. I bought these for you; I know you have a sweet tooth 🌸
I drove in, husband was tired. Son didn’t know what the surprise event was, although 3 miles off the O2 did guess the venue ☺️. It wasn’t until the carpark attendant said “Are you here for Fast&FuriousLive?” that he finally knew for certain what we’d hauled ourselves out in the snow blizzards for. (Don’t finish a sentence with one of those.) …. that he finally knew for certain why we might have hauled ourselves out during a snow blizzard. (much better).
Gotta dash – car is ready!
