Day 1: Gravesend to Rochester

A staccato start in Gravesend as we wound our way out of the town. Heavy showers were punctuated  by an African sun so we dried quickly enough . We walked along miles of Thames Estuary,  in the past swarming with ships, today but a sad ship’s graveyard. Just imagine Turner’s tragic “The Fighting Temeraire”, being towed to the breaker’s yard by that smokey tug. We walked through acres of lumpy tundra: next Thursday we are told it’s a rifle range for the London Met. We won’t hang around.

I reflected on the joy generated last weekend when all 21 of the Benyon/ Hayns/ Sinclair  family, gathered in Bladon and in daughter Clare’s ancient Rectory in Iffley and Rosehill in Oxford. The family is so precious. A party of talk, games, even prayer and huge fun. What a privilege they all wanted to come.

So Long, Dear Friend

It would be remiss of me not to pay a tribute to cartoonist, Tony Husband, who died on Westminster Bridge in 2023. Tony enhanced ZANE’s work with great skill. He was a pleasure to work with. Tony was on top of his profession. We were lucky he agreed to work with us. He will be much missed. RIP.

We are fortunate in attracting the excellent Lee Fearnly as our new cartoonist.

The Art of Saying Goodbye

When our beloved daughter Clare left her role as Chaplain at Christ Church, I commented to a friend that one of the things I missed was the occasional parking spot in the heart of Oxford. 

“Of course,” he responded. “Life’s a series of getting things, then having to give them up!”

That observation triggered a memory from half a lifetime ago when I read The Road Less Travelled. The author, US psychiatrist Scott Peck, wrote about several things we must relinquish as we grow older. For starters, the follies of youth; and then, if we marry and truly grasp the soul-searing vows (not mere promises), we must give up much of our former independence. If we are granted children, we inevitably lose much of our social freedom, and because the ball of life bounces forwards, we must then let go of our children as they grow, forge their own paths, build relationships and love others. As we age, our looks – such as they ever were – wither with the passing years, and our sporting abilities abandon us. If I were to collapse whilst skiing now, I’d be unable to rise unaided – beached like a porpoise!

My shooting friends tell me that if balance falters, that’s it (on grounds of safety), while some of my golfing friends, pinched with arthritis, have had to give up the game altogether. We watch aghast as our work – surely, we were indispensable? – is taken up by the young and our “legacy” (if we ever had one) is shredded (just read Shelley’s “Ozymandias”). Speechless, we look on as debilitating illness or death fells our beloved friends and family, and finally, we begin to lose our health – and then, life itself.

And oh yes, I nearly forgot. Our society is marinated in sex, and for much of my life, I’ve felt as though I were handcuffed to a gibbering lunatic. Now the benign God has cast him into a deep cellar, from where, now and then, I still hear the echoes of his obscene yelling. But the days of early to bed and up with the cock are long gone. I’m resigned to the fact (relieved, even?) that the days of wine and roses are more or less over.

Life’s mighty tough and the adventure is best summed up by Churchill (you can see the quote in my last Christmas poetry book, page 6): “The journey has been well worth making – once.”       

The Great Escape

Some years ago, Jane and I moved from a much-loved house to a smaller one outside Oxford. We gave away many of our possessions – this reflects how we’ve changed as people. It’s not just that the children have left home, our outlook has changed too. What we want today differs from what we wanted in the early days of our marriage. Gone is the insistent need to be successful, make a fortune or be endlessly social. Now, less burdened by anxieties and responsibilities, we think of what makes us happy – relationships rather than grabbing things and parading status – and we buy less stuff. The idea of buying a new car to demonstrate our standing in society is risible (heck, it always was daft).

Our ability to ride horses has gone with the wind. And although I miss it keenly (though not the bills!), the fact that hunting – ­even trail hunting ­– is now illegal (mean-spirited and absurd) has made the choice rather easier. Perhaps visiting many of our paraplegic friends – and two tetraplegic ones, both now thankfully dead – helped us hang up our saddles, for it’s a mighty dangerous sport. So, some time ago, we disposed of our vast quantity of hunting gear – it was gutting.

Today, we busy ourselves with small, unimportant day-to-day things – family matters – but we try to do them well. 

Will our children really want my father’s pre-war diaries, his old papers and newspaper clips from India, his silver pots and ash trays, and his lamp too dim to read by? It’s a ridiculous trip down memory lane, misled by nostalgia and without purpose. And what will our children do with my army commission, or the certificate showing I passed an exam in theology? Or that piece of paper proving I jumped from an aeroplane 40 years ago? Are all these things some sort of defence against meaninglessness, proof to convince someone – who? – that Jane and I and our parents had a past? These scraps are a museum of our past lives, only dimly relevant to Jane and me – and wholly valueless to anyone else.   

We surround ourselves with briefly fashionable possessions and oppress ourselves by hanging onto them far longer than necessary. Then we burden our children with the miserable task of disposing of them.

Best deal with the clutter now. Brace yourself – what’s the address of the nearest tip?