I realise that life has its ups, but also its downs. A very definite down appeared just before Easter, in fact the day before the family were due to arrive for the tribal gathering. In preparation for that, I had just finished repainting the skirting board of the Granny annexe after the January flood and was upstairs in one of the bedrooms clearing away the cobwebs to make all ready for its next occupants. Beavering away I happened to look out of the window and thought the road out there looked a bit strange, so went downstairs for a closer look and was shocked to see that it had turned into a river of brown field water surging down to a mini-lake across the bend in the road outside my front fence. Appalled I rushed round to the back door of the annexe. So far so good, the defences seemed to be holding but within a minute or two I could see the dread approach of gleaming water seeping towards me. I rushed around putting up more emergency barricades as fast as I could. It was sleeting hard as well, extremely unpleasant.
The seeping rapidly became a flood so strong it wrenched great baulks of timber out of my hands and in less than five minutes of staggering around trying to lift the rolls of carpet still lying around after last time to block off the annexe, I realised I had lost the battle. It was much worse this time a foot up against the glass door of the annex, not just three or four inches, and the garage was flooded this time as well. By this time I was soaking wet and freezing cold, so I heated myself up by hauling the pump out of the well on the far side of the main house ( a considerable effort in the pouring rain) and set it up to get rid of the water as soon as possible. The aim was to reduce the water’s prospect of getting into the walls. Outside on the road there was a chaos of cars negotiating high floods. My neighbours were flooded for a second time too, in their main house which is worse of course. Other people in the village were even worse off. One of the other old houses, its owners already out and living in rented accommodation, was flooded for a fourth time this year.
So it was back to the routine of shifting everything out
again and taking up and throwing out the brand-new carpets and vinyl that had
been laid three weeks earlier. The visible water had nearly gone from the Annexe within the hour, there was no more
water pouring off my drive way but the various ditches behind the annex were still
gushing water out onto the road. The causes of the problem were obvious. The
first ditch had been overwhelmed by the volume of water; the second had almost
coped except for the two bridges across it. At these two places there were gaps
in the bank and that’s where the water was getting though. So I knew what had to be done.
Urgent consultations with all members of the family. Without
the accommodation of the annex it would have been a squeeze getting everyone
in, and there were various bugs and the possibility of scarlet fever to
complicate the plans. In the end team Powell came down as scheduled on the Friday
and with the sterling support of four more able-bodied people all the furniture
was moved into the garage, which had suffered less or the stable-outhouse which
was fine. It was all done in a much more orderly way than last time, as I was
able to profit from recent experience. Chiff was amazing getting the carpets up
and out. That’s really hard. Soaked carpets are VERY heavy as I had
re-discovered the day before.
So that was the main down. An Up was surviving it. All the
family turned up in the end, some just for the day and a great time was had by
all and a new WIFI net was installed so that t would extend to the annex once
back in use. Good food and company and the woodburner all worked wonders on
morale. Since then of course, I have been dealing with aftermath, with three
de-humidifiers going full blast in the annex. Nathan came the day of the big
clear-up too and devoted himself to digging an extension to the first ditch. Later
we worked out further really quite major strengthening of that ditch and a way
of blocking the bridges should the water come again. And I guess with climate
change it probably will. Accordingly I took the suggestion of investigating alternative
flooring for the Annexe. The trouble with carpet and vinyl is that to get it up
all the furniture has to be taken out. Next door have a parquet floor. Here, although
there was minor damage, at least the furniture could stay where it was there
was and in their case, things were back to more-or-less normal in a day or so.
So I’m investigating tiling through-out. Much more expensive of course and much
less cosy for the old ladies and gentlemen its intended for but well worth
looking into. Some of the wood-effect tiling is amazingly convincing. We’ll
see. No firm decisions taken yet.
Of course all this has so far taken a couple of weeks out of
my pretty packed schedule of academic and domestic plans. I gouged out a few
extra days by cancelling a much anticipated trip to Hawkchurch with attendant
side-visits, but am still way behind schedule. The rising need to help out with
Mike over the road whose wife is dying of dementia - he’s 90 and struggling to cope - has to be
factored in as well.
Still, spring has come, things are growing in the vegetable
garden. Despite the vicious attentions of the Muntjac deer, all the bluebells
are coming out in glorious profusion and the Cherry tree outside the kitchen is
looking gorgeous. It’s hard not to feel a surge of optimism even just looking
at it. I can well understand why the good people of Beijing, Tokyo and Seoul
make such a song and dance about their cherry blossom time. I had a really
enjoyable trip to Salisbury to attend a session with my colleagues on the
Historic Churches committee at St Thomas,
and so able to look at the spectacular Doom painting over the Chancel Arch which
is all about deciding who goes to heaven and who down to hell. The fae vividly portrayed
for the latter certainly puts one’s current
problems into perspective. So all of that has to count as an up as well. As
does the occasional academic foray. Last time by train to London for a Naval workshop
on the Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea where I saw a lot of old
friends, made some good contacts and had a very interesting time. Other than
that the current lull in overseas trips is drawing to a close- and the next
couple of months promises to be quite agreeably spent.
Meanwhile, back to clearing up the garage…..
