More Memories.

It was very grey this morning and with the light levels being so low good old S.A.D. began to rear its ugly head. That greyness drains my energy leaving me with very little motivation. However just going outside it felt brighter and my mood lifted immediately.

I went down to the zoo mid morning and got a lot of weeding done. The grass maze, the gravel garden and the small play area are now weed free. Next time I'll have to do the gravel by the ferrets as the warm wet weather has caused the weed population to explode. 

The sun came out for a while and the air felt quite warm. The clouds are now sitting below the tops of the hills due to the temperature inversion.

When I got home a chap from BT was there (or rather somebody from a company working for Openreach) to install fibre into the house. (Not that there was anything wrong with the internet speeds we already had.) We had thought that the new cable would simply replace the old cable but that wasn't the case. Instead it comes in through the other side of the house into Peter's study. And to my surprise there was going to be a wire running from the pole on the far side of the road, above the garage roof to an otherwise unused pole in the lane behind the back garden and then back across our neighbour's garden to Peter's study. Hmm, I said. 'Why couldn't the cable run to the corner of the house and then along below the roof to Peter's study?' The chap thought that would work and now instead of wires over the back garden and my neighbours' garden it runs as I suggested. A good thing I came home at that time.

While I was still in my work clothes I made a start on the cold frame. All I had to do was move a couple of pots and planters and then build one side and the front wall with the heavy blocks. Now I may see if I can work out a way to sit the perspex on top so that I can open it to water the plants also weigh it down against the winter winds.

 And now for a few more St Ives memories.

When I was little this was a bookshop over two floors. I can remember getting a book token as a present (I was an early reader) and choosing a book about animals from this shop.

Across the road stands the Catholic Church where I was baptised. We went to Sunday mass there every week and being in the days before anyone noticed my poor sight I remember seeing candle flames as starburst lights.

Down at the bottom of the hill this corner building used to be the butchers shop run by Walter Pearce, father of the artist Bryan Pearce. The Pearce's lived in the house above the shop. Their front door was in the passage at the side and led straight to steep stairs that had a thick red rope as the bannister. I  remember going to look at Bryan's paintings in his room right at the top of building. My mother's gallery was one of first to show Bryan's work and we are very lucky to have two of his pictures, an etching and a screen print, in our sitting room here.

 

A later memory of Island Road. We spent our honeymoon here in a room (kind of a bedsit) on the ground floor of one of the houses on the right. We came back for a week the following year but after that we went elsewhere and later the sheer cost ruled out coming to St Ives with our family.