Belton House was the location of the first family picnic of the summer, although we did have a barbecue in Carbis Bay. If you haven't been this is place has a full-size cricket field for its turning circle, in front of what I thought to be a fairly modest house.
But not modest woods, for the first time I saw a huge, weeping beech and a giant fir with quite distinct foliage, all this with a miniature train track carrying families on their bank holiday day out, and my two grandchildren posing for photographs!
The football did not go quite so well, we lost at Morecambe, apparently we must expect teams to play like this against us, ergo it is going to be a season of frustration and disappointment, that is unless we win next Saturday and return to the top of the league.
The Belton House picnic was facilitated by our visiting Hull on the Saturday, a place, at least down by the fruit market, very much on its uppers. We have committed to visit again, but for a stay-over weekend on the next occasion.
There as to be a poem, so here goes:
No-Flap Jack
Not a seat in the house
Sat instead, in the small café
Eating what I shouldn’t eat
Although it is laced with ginger
The gold mine, for that is what it is
This first fine Saturday of summer
A first day, and also a last day, for today
Ends my Vipassana meditation course
Twelve weeks of transportation
Inspiration and motivation
Eighty-four days of waking
With a chosen purpose
& to conclude, in the luxury
Of endearing choiceless awareness
The more I am aware the more
Difficult I find it to be surprised
Yet I know that that pleasure
It is just around the corner
