The best laid schemes o' mice an' men, gang aft agley, an' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, for promis'd joy

Last night my car broke. I had planned to spend today visiting sites in the West Midlands but it was very clear when the temperature gauge sailed through 90 and the STOP sign insistently flashed and beeped on the dashboard that this was not going to happen. We stayed in a hotel overnight and then called the AA out. Their mechanic's diagnosis was a burnt out radiator fan and a tow back up the M62 and M1.

I thank my lucky stars that this happened on the way home from holiday, not on the way. Also that it happened in a city, not on a motorway. And finally that I have AA membership. It's easy to overlook that lone parents have one income to pay for at least two people, where young couples may well have two incomes for just themselves. It would have been easy for me to economise by not having the AA membership but right now I'd be well over £300 down in tow costs before the cost of the repair.

We managed to have half an hour visiting the Bullring for lunch whilst we waited for the tow truck.

In all the waiting today my son was amazing - he read his book quietly and was overjoyed at the chance to ride in a tow van. He's a joy to be with.














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Thoughtless Youth

A long time ago I was a second year literature student at the University of St Andrews and I was supposed to study Wordsworth. I forget how much effort I put into reading Tintern Abbey but it won't have been much. It amused me today because I went to Tintern Abbey with my own, rather more thoughtful, youth and realised the truth of that poem.

The day started out in Cardiff and we visited Castell Coch. This castle is a Victorian rebuild of a medieval castle that was destroyed in the fourteenth century. It was a project of the Marquis of Bute, reputed to be the richest man in the word, and work started in 1875. It was hardly ever used as it had no guest accommodation and Bute was interested in the project, not the outcome. Inside the Arts and Crafts inspired furnishings are incredible.













Afterwards we drove to the former Cistercian monastery of Tintern Abbey on the banks of the Wye. It was impossible to capture the beauty of the surroundings with my iPhone: the colours of the autumn leaves were glorious. I sat for a while and read Wordsworth's poem and was very struck by these lines:

... For I have learned
To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime

That is how I felt in the light rain at Tintern Abbey looking at the hills, the trees and a perfect rainbow 'a sense sublime'. It was a real gift.



















The rainbow

Afterwards, my son and I did the huge trek up the hillside opposite to see Offa's Dyke and the Devil's Pulpit from where we surveyed the beauty that is Tintern and the Wye Valley.







To quote Wordsworth again:

And this prayer I make,
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to lead
From joy to joy

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