Have you heard of the Mass Observation Archive? I hadn’t until someone alerted me to the fact that I could record May 12th for posterity.

http://www.massobs.org.uk/12may.html

‘This year the Mass Observation Archive will be repeating its annual call for day diaries, capturing the everyday lives of people across the UK.

May 12th 2014 is likely to be quite an ordinary day, but for those researching, the ‘ordinary’ can often provide extraordinary results. The diaries will be held and used alongside the 1937 documents. We would be very grateful if you could document your May 12th 2014 for the future.’

I decided to take up the challenge! Here is a shortened version of my May 12th.

I get up at 6.30, put the Wifi on and go back to bed. I’m going to finish reading ‘Island’ by Jane Rogers on the Kindle app on my tablet. But first I want to check my emails, the Open University website and my Facebook account. Since I retired four years ago it’s become a morning ritual, and I acknowledge it may replace going out to work with another kind of connection to the world. I get to know who else is a lark and can wish someone a happy birthday with ease. Now there’s even a pink gift-wrapped box with the person’s name that comes up in my ‘notifications’. Touch or click, all done.

My OH sleeps for another 2 hours and I finish ‘Island’ by eight. It’s a book that’s featured in my Open University Course ‘Advanced Creative Writing’ , which explores the links between drama and other forms of writing. Jane Rogers writes scripts for television and radio as well as novels. ‘Island’ is so well written, with unusual characters and a particularly disturbing narrator. It’s set on an island near Skye, and of course I check Google maps to try to identify it. I think it’s Raasay. She calls it Aaysar, so I might be right.

I get up at 8.15, make Lady Grey tea and switch on Breakfast Television with Bill Turnbull and Louise Minchin. The Queen’s Baton for the Commonwealth Games has arrived in Jersey, which like most events these days is described as ‘incredible’, ‘fantastic’ and ‘amazing’. I hope it gets better weather than the Olympic Torch. One of the things I reflect on when I watch television is the way language changes, not just in the vocabulary used, but in the pronunciation. It’s never long before I hear a few dropped ‘t’s, sadly even from BBC news reporters. Oh yes, everyone’s ge’ing be’er a’ i’.

I have breakfast and log on to my Open University website. We’re coming to the end of A363 ‘Advanced Creative Writing’ now, and at this point we’re providing critique on each other’s work for the final project. Some are doing short stories, some are doing scripts (film or radio). My tutor group has about eight people who contribute regularly, and it’s a fascinating process; we are all different ages and from different backgrounds and this comes out in our writing! This workshopping is a normal part of a creative writing course and has the effect of nudging you into changes you might never have considered. I’m nearly at the end of my project. A family diary written in 1905 has inspired a radio play set in Edwardian Glasgow; it has been transformed into 42 pages of script, 3 pages of commentary and 3 pages of references. Distance learning has definitely enhanced my retirement!

I reward myself for nearly finishing my assignment by booking into a historical fiction writing retreat in November. I have the aim of using the radio play as the basis for a novel, so it’s time to start planning!

At 10.30 I meet three friends (former work-colleagues) for coffee at Country Harvest, Ingleton. It’s a large shop and café complex in Yorkshire barn style. It has just one door; you have to walk past a large array of gifts and food products before you finally reach the café. The table cloths are Cath Kidston, the floor is flagged, the tables are pine and the windows look out on to rain-washed green fields dotted with sheep. We talk about holidays, people we know, ailments, our fear of the NHS as we get older and how we switch off those Panorama programmes about the elderly.

We should be in France this week, but our plan changed in the nanosecond on 4th May when my OH damaged knee cartilage in a tennis match. To make up for the loss we head to Ambleside in the afternoon. Someone has recommended the film ‘Tracks’, which is about a woman, a dog and three camels crossing the Australian Outback. There’s a screening at 3.30, and we’ll follow it with an early meal at Zefirelli’s. There are seven people in the cinema, all our age group. My OH has a stick of course, which makes us feel like real pensioners. We never used to go to films in the afternoon, but there comes a time when you realise you’re quite alert then. The film gives us an enjoyable two hours in the Outback and some food for thought. We talk a bit about the construction of a journey film. Inevitably, there are life-enriching flashbacks for the heroine as we travel. Sometimes the camels cross the screen from left to right, sometimes from right to left. Every so often there’s a crisis, and when there isn’t a crisis you wonder when the next crisis will come. The crises in this film are solved rather quickly. One is very sad, though, and will linger with you if you go to see it.

The meal is vegetarian and we share an antipasti platter and a ‘Rainforest’ pizza. This descriptor doesn’t refer to the topping, but to the fact that a certain percentage is donated to saving the rainforests. The serving staff all come from other EU countries. At first we think our waitress is local, but as she chats we discover otherwise. ‘I’ve forgot me Russian,’ she says in a Cumbrian accent. She’s been here since she was 12 and has only been back to Russia once in 6 years.

The countryside on our trip to Ambleside is looking beautiful; the trees have that fresh green foliage, the hue of the copper beeches is still light, and there are flashes of pink, red and orange from azaleas and rhododendrons. I console myself over the loss of the Provence trip. They don’t have bluebell woods there.

We set off two weeks ago to an unknown destination.  We knew where we wanted to go (home), and we knew where we had tickets for (Oxenholme Lake District), but the weather had different ideas.  Yet another storm was rushing in from the Atlantic.  And this one was due to hit the path of our train between 6 and 8, precisely at the time we were to be crossing the moors round Shap.  The Virgin Pendolino remained in Glasgow, but our TransPennine Express decided to boldly go.

‘This train may not reach its destination,’ the driver announced chirpily.  We were already pulling out of Glasgow Central, and there was very little we could do about it.  ‘You travel entirely at your own risk.  We will keep you updated.’

We’d been up in Glasgow at the excellent Riverside Museum, which features transport of every kind from old Glasgow subway trains to a tall ship moored on the Clyde outside.  I’d wanted to do some research, as I’m working on a writing project set in Glasgow in 1905.  What better place to go to see a full reconstruction of an Edwardian street and sit in the old trams?  We loved it

The TransPennine ‘Express’ gave up at Carlisle at 7 pm, where we were advised to ‘make our own arrangements’.   For us this involved giving the rather scruffy looking County Hotel a wide berth, finding the Ibis full and following the Ibis receptionist’s advice of seeking out ‘the bed and breakfasts further down the road’.  This road is Botchergate, and everyone to whom I’ve mentioned this has gone ‘oh, Botchergate!’ with a knowing expression.  The full array of seedy pubs and assorted shops ranging from Bridal Wear to ‘Thongs n Things’ was revealed the following morning. You wouldn’t really choose it for a holiday, and we are unlikely to stay there ever again, but we considered ourselves fortunate to secure the grandly named four-poster room in a very small bed and breakfast in a marginally more salubrious street just off Botchergate.  We headed home the following morning after doing justice to the full English.  The train didn’t stop at Oxenholme, though we did ask if they could make an exception.  We had to go to Lancaster and take another train back north to pick up our car at Oxenholme.

We have run two old cars for quite a number of years.  The exciting news is that life will change on 1^st March, when we go to pick up a new vehicle.  Ladies, it is white with black trim.  Guys, it is a Skoda Octavia 1.4 TSI 140 SE 5dr with dual-zone climate control, rear parking sensors, Bluetooth, DAB radio and a USB input as standard and we have taken further opportunities to ‘spec it up’.  Its arrival will be timely as, on two occasions recently, our small old car’s engine has overheated dramatically, causing expense, worry and a lot of steam.  The big old car, which was rather creaky in the end, now has a new owner.  We were quite sad to see it go, as over the years it has taken us everywhere from Surrey in the south to the remote fringes of the Outer Hebrides in the north west.  My OH has consoled himself by purchasing a complete range of extremely specialist car care products.  I’m reflecting more on where our new transport of delight will take us.

Oh to be in Austria, now that January’s here.  There’s no better way to start the year.  After thirty years of having to ski in school holidays, it’s been a pleasure for us to get on a plane in mid-January, when the only children in sight are under five or have been sneaked out of school to get the cheaper price of a ‘low season’ week.  We embark in Edinburgh with other senior skiers, their ski anoraks taken out for the annual airing on the slopes.  Over the years, the sun has given ours a chequered look of designer fading, but they’re much too good to discard, and British too – remember the company called Phoenix?

Clad in unfaded luminous green, our cheerful band of ski reps meets and greets in Innsbruck.  They look as if they’re straight out of school and are full of superlatives.  ‘Awesome!’ they cry, as someone hands them a pen for their checklist.  Ignoring the high average age bracket of the clients on our coach, our rep insists on highlighting the truly excellent pubs and clubs to be had in our resort of Sölden.  It will all be awesome, brilliant, incredible and more besides.

I’d been to Sölden in 1977, when I lived in Munich.  Some German friends were skiing there, and invited me down for the weekend, so I headed over the Alps in my Mini.  I wasn’t a skier back then, but they did take me up to Hochsölden and put me on skis, which I handled with no skill whatsoever.  We went up in a single chair lift, and I have a memory of a blanket being thrown over my legs to keep me warm.  Sölden now boasts the usual eight-seater gondolas and ‘six-pack’ chairs with heated seats and hoods to protect from bad weather.  It’s a most impressive lift system, taking us right up to the Tiefenbach and Rettenbach glaciers at 3000 feet.

Up and away

The other big change is the clientèle.  Back in 1977, the Germany where I lived was West Germany, and there was never a thought of meeting any Russians, Hungarians, Romanians – or indeed any East Germans.  Now they’re all playing happily on the slopes of Sölden, and you’re as likely to find a menu in Russian as one in English.

Our hotel was a bit of a linguistic mêlée.  Our room maid was from Italy.  ‘Buongiorno!’ we cried, on our way down to breakfast.  ‘Smakelijk!’ said the Dutch waitress in the dining room.  The dining room was like a line-up for the Eurovision Song Contest, with Ukraine to our right and Switzerland to our left.  The Netherlands occupied the far corner, next to Russia, then came Germany and two more British tables. Mid-week we were treated to a special Italian buffet.  German and English were the hotel’s in-print languages.  The English had been fast-pressed by Google translate, which led me to think that a lot of non-native English speakers were learning some very wrong expressions and that this could lead to some interesting distortion of the English language in years to come.  We were, for example, urged to ‘use water with parsimony’ in a crusade to help the environment.  Unfortunately, we hadn’t packed any.  Having said all this, it was one of the best hotels we’ve stayed in – small, friendly and family run, with spacious rooms, designer cuisine, a good wine cellar and a quiet location away from the pubs and clubs. You can’t beat Austria for this kind of establishment.

Since my first visit to Sölden in 1977 I’ve learned to ski properly and get up some speed.  Back then, the only speeding I did was on the way home to Munich, where I remember being fined 80 Schillings for a little too much acceleration through the village of Langenfeld.  I don’t think there’s any better feeling than getting up some speed on a sunny day.  Ski lifts also take you to high places and stunning views.  And then there are the restaurants and mountain huts, the Apfelstrudel and Germknödel, the blaring Tyrolean music and Europop.  Somehow the sense of concentrating on just a few essentials comes to the fore – eat, sleep, play and turn your face to the sun.  I’ll be doing it as long as my limbs hold out.   Awesome indeed.

It’s been busy!  I’ve been playing Christmas music on the harp and I’ve sung carols with my choir at a concert and at the local shopping centre to raise money for the Philippines.  Music is for me one of the most important aspects of the lead-up to Christmas.  The other special things are the connection with friends and family and the memories of times past.  So I share now a window into my childhood Christmases in rural North East Scotland, quite a few years ago ….

When the nights became dark and the stars shone as we returned from school, we began to think about Christmas.  The fields would be hard with frost, and a day would come when we’d open the kitchen door and smell the rich spices of Christmas puddings; they’d be bubbling in a pan on the stove, and the windows would stream with condensation.  It was around then that my mother would begin her nativity play rehearsals.  My striped bedspread would be taken for Joseph’s robe.  The angels brought their own sheets, but we’d help my mother make the haloes by twisting tinsel round wire attached an Alice band.  The shepherds’ outfits were dressing gowns and checked tea-towels. The Hon. Mrs L, who had lived abroad, provided evening capes from the Far East for the exclusive use of the kings.  I recognised her daughter years later at a dinner dance, wearing a shimmering blue cape that my brother had once worn in his role as third king.

My father wrote the scripts for the plays; they did not stray far from the words of the King James Bible, for which he had the greatest respect.  We never had a doll for Jesus; that was regarded as inappropriate.  The baby was just said to be down there in the manger among all the straw from the nearest farm.  Everyone came to church at Christmas, even if they didn’t attend for the rest of the year.  Light shone in the darkness, and we were happy.

Enjoy Christmas day, and the memories it brings.

ECS, Early Christmas Syndrome, is alive and well and even earlier this year, it seems. I reported last month on the irritating arrival of Christmas adverts in October and November. Christmas lights have been blazing in our local towns during November. Perhaps it would be better to just call them ‘winter lights’ and hang them from November to the end of January to cheer the winter gloom. As soon as December got a foot in the door, holly wreaths and Christmas trees appeared in our street, and Christmas cards started dropping on to the mat. Which made me think – would you start celebrating your birthday three weeks before the event? Surely there must be a certain amount of tinsel fatigue by the 25th?

On what I later discovered was called Cyber Monday, when Amazon’s robots were working overtime to deal with gift orders, we headed up to the Lakes to look at nature’s December decorations. Apart from some glorious beeches which are holding on to their leaves, most of the trees are bare now, but that makes the views better. We did our favourite walk, the round from Skelwith Bridge to Little Langdale, then over to Elterwater and back to Skelwith. It starts and finishes at the lovely Chesters by the River Café and you have the option of two pubs on the way – the Three Shires in Little Langdale, and the Britannia Inn in Elterwater. We often call it the ‘visitors’ walk’ because it’s where we take friends and visitors to show them the Lake District in a nutshell – a lovely café and pubs, a lake (Elterwater), a tarn (Little Langdale Tarn), the quaint Slater Bridge in Little Langdale, a waterfall (Colwith Force) and the amazing Cathedral Cavern, a quarried out cave complete with a window. This cavern is a secret first shown to me by the Lakeland Voices singing group, whose leader David Burbidge introduced us to its wonderful acoustic. It makes any ordinary singer sound like an opera diva. Go and try it out if you can find it!

So when I walk this way, it’s like walking with friends, as I remember this is where I had a picnic with M and K, this is where F and I were lucky enough to see the Morris Dancers, and so on. I said hello to a lot of you on Monday! But I’ll still send Christmas cards … later …

November is a neglected month.  It starts with leftover Hallowe’en pumpkins, has some brief excitement with popping fireworks, then pauses for Remembrance.  It never quite picks up after that. All the while, of course, Christmas is already barging in, making its commercial presence felt in shops and on television.  On the first Sunday of November the lengthy ad breaks in ‘Downton Abbey’ were punctuated with suggestions that a new sofa or dining room suite would be ‘great for Christmas’.  It’s as if we want to wish November away.

The other thing about November, of course, is the dark evenings.  When I was working in teaching, we always returned from the October half term break singularly unrefreshed.  Jetlagged by the clock change, we moaned about the darkness and rain, and then got on with the serious business of getting students through the exam hurdle before the Christmas lights and festivities.  Drowning in marking and reports, I hardly noticed the month.

But since my retirement I’ve discovered November.  In between the waves of Atlantic depressions bringing wind and rain, there can be sparkling days to enjoy.  The main half term crowds have gone, but there were still plenty people out enjoying the Lake District yesterday.  We walked round Rydal and Grasmere in perfect conditions; the November foliage glowed in the sun and the sheep might even have thought it was summer.

I intend to savour the rest of the month and put Christmas to the back of my mind.   Christmas is for December.  The second half of December, to be precise.

Continuing a tradition of cake pictures, my final photos are of our champagne afternoon tea at The Samling, between Ambleside and Windermere (http://www.thesamlinghotel.co.uk/).  We’d been given a gift voucher for this and yesterday was the perfect day to use it.

We left after sunset.  Through the trees we saw the Langdale Pikes silhouetted behind the silver of Windermere. Venus shone brightly to the south-west, and two deer stood still on the lawn in the twilight, watching our progress down the very steep driveway.  It was a special November moment.