Overtaken by Events

 

Recently I managed to secure one of Cherry’s long ambitions – sort of. She always wanted to be Lady Cherry. Well, I didn’t manage that (despite what all too many of my American colleagues seem to think, to judge by all the ‘Sir Geoffrey’ e-mails that came my way) but I did get an OBE in the latest New Year’s Honours List. This stands for Order of the British Empire of course, but in my case it is better understood ‘as ‘Overtaken by Events’.  It’s been a frantic period.

Of course the OBE helped the big family New Year’s Eve party that we held at my place go with even more of a gin and prosecco soaked zing than usual. It was fun. It was of course in lieu of a Christmas at Burgess Hill completely up-ended by an unfortunate late attack of Covid on the prospective hosts. It’s great when Wansdyke is bursting at the seams. I managed to get a picture of the now much expanded female side of the direct line.

We did all the usual, including the now traditional fireworks including big rockets. We even managed a day at Longleat when the rain poured down and apparently one lion killed another. But despite  this, we enjoyed ourselves. We went in convoy through the wildlife enclosure, deriving much pleasure from watching the monkeys clambering over our cars. I’m also always inspired by the Bactrian camels which plodded across the silk road from one end of Eurasia to the other for centuries. Amazing things, camels. (Of course it was much faster and cheaper to go by ship).

Later, the lights were spectacular – illustrating the stories of Raoul Dahl. I was astonished at how many people were there, and had it not been for the inertial guidance offered by my family I might still be wandering distractedly around the huge darkened, segmented car park looking my transport home. Cherry always used to say that I have absolutely no sense of direction. As so often, she was right.

Talking of transport, that’s another saga. Intermittent warning lights on the car had already disrupted one Christmas related road trip, but when I took it to the garage in Salisbury to get it fixed a whole new universe of car-based challenges appeared, Because Maxi was 17 years old, the required new parts had to be especially made by the factory in Germany and the garage could give no idea of how long they would take to arrive. All they could say was that it would be expensive when they did. They were determinedly noncommittal about whether Maxi  was safe to drive in the meantime. ‘Well, you got here,’ seemed to be the conclusion. I’d just returned from a long drive to Burgess Hill after a birthday weekend and was pretty sure that it was indeed reasonably safe. I hadn’t noticed any fall-off in performance, but all the same, it’s disconcerting humming along with a lot of warning lights flashing at you. Not ideal.

 Additionally the mechanics were startled to discover parts of the engine covered in peanuts and a mouse’s nest, next to the offside headlamp complete with chewed wires and a dead mouse. For this reason, I was wary of switching the lights on lest I blew the system ! The wretched thing had been raiding our bird supplies which are normally safe in metal dustbins, but not always !  Mick, my regular taxi driver to St Pancras and Heathrow, said that mice attack was quite common actually in rural places. He told me some horrendous stories of the damage he has known them to do. They like the warm engine block apparently, especially on cold nights. Like the frozen pipes – a consequence of that cold snap perhaps. More nut hygiene and mouse traps in the garage are called for !

The upshot of all this was that I decided, given more prospective long car trips and very limited free time before going back to Newport to hasten my planned transition to greener transport and got myself a Golf hybrid. A new one would have taken 12 months to arrive so a newish second hand one was invested in. It is now braving the garage, as I am writing this in Paris while waiting for my entrecoteat at a nice unpretentious café-bar near the hotel. Getting home was a very different driving experience, not least the automatic gears, self dipping lights etc, I shall have fun with the car, I think. The journey home, was late of course, in the dark, with a lot of ice around and a definite skid on one corner of the lane at Hilcott. This morning, on the way to St Pancras, we saw several cars in ditches on that road. Joining them would have been a sad end to my adventure !  Of course it was sad to see the end of Maxi, especially looking and driving so well even after 17 years – another association gone.

The birthday weekend was fun. The highlight was a day in London, shepherding Martha to her ballet school. I then pointed out all of our old haunts out to Philippa  – coffee shops and the like from our innocent student days at Kings, and my office spaces since. Then to two mini-exhibitions at the National Gallery; one on a woman painter called Gonzales who was a protégé of Manet and the other a two picture account of Tuner’s time in Dieppe as a painterly tourist. It’s always best to have a definite and limited objective when visiting a place like that, so a limited 90 minutes or so there with a specific target was ideal. And then on, with some misadventure (going the wrong  way on the Piccadilly line like two hicks from the sticks) and pouring rain at Granary Square near Kings Cross. Here we met up with Christopher, Beth and Elowen at a very nice fin-de-siecle place, all mirrors, dark wood and gleaming brass, for lunch. Not much sign of socio-economic stress here. And so exhaustedly, gathering up Martha on the way, home. To shepherd’s pie, courtesy of Chiff, and the Netflix version of Rebecca, partly filmed on the Hartland peninsula. The following day Ruth, Simon and Violet arrived for a birthday brunch, presents and cards. A few games of ‘Lamas in Pyjamas’, which Violet did not want to win. And then, for me, back to Wiltshire, flashing lights and all.  

I’m not saying that the last couple of weeks have all been this busy, but meeting various deadlines, doing the usual domestic tasks, and still recovering from the frozen pipe saga has been quite energy consuming. For the first time in a very long time I was urged to have a power-nap upstairs, and immediately fell into a very deep sleep. Quite nice actually, but a bit of a shock all the same.

The nice people from IFRI in Paris paid for me to come by Business Premier on Eurostar, which was a lot less hassle checking in, and a much nicer lunch was provided. For the second time in so many weeks someone asked if I needed a hand getting my case onto the luggage rack- so I think the great age must be beginning to show, unless I am fooling myself that it hasn’t already, long ago. So I had better totter back to my room in the bijou Hotel Yllen Eiffel, while I still can.

The Paris interlude was great fun in fact, with just enough reminders of French life to make one want to return  especially the corner brasseries, which they do so well. And of course I got the iconic pictures of the Eiffel Tower and scooted along to the Invalides to gaze again, after several decades, at the tomb of Napoleon.

The conference itself was small (about 40 people plus lots of virtuals) but pretty high level, with the chiefs of the three navies –US, UK and France all there. Lots of chat about Ukraine of course. A spectacular reception in the glittering Hotel de la Marine, all gold leaf, sparkling candelabras, huge amounts of quite big small eats and champagne, all watched over from the walls by any number of painted admirals. My session went OK I think. I was very impressed by Heloise, my young chairperson, frighteningly bright and composed. The next second generation of the naval community looks to me to be full of potential. Judging by the way things are going that’s just as well.