Morecambe

We’ve just come back from a holiday up North but it involved some soul-searching. The Lake District came to our minds first but the hotels were underwhelming and overpriced. The weather didn’t look promising, and I just didn’t fancy trudging around in the wet surrounded by anoraks, the determined and intrepid. I can’t be doing with intrepid. 

And so, we settled on the seaside. You can’t go wrong with sky and sea, whatever the weather; though you can go wrong with the resort. We settled on Morecambe because of one very distinctive hotel: the Midland, which featured in the Hercule Poirot episode Double Sin in 1990.

We stayed two days with my brother and his wife in Chorley, where we sampled gentlefolkof a certain age playing bowls in Astley Park. 

It was so restful sitting on a park bench with nothing better to do, and later another park bench watching ducks and a fountain doing its thing. I remember, as a child, throwing conkers at old men playing bowls and getting chased. Now here we were, sitting on a bench appreciating nothing in particular and enjoying every moment.

And then on to the Midland Hotel, which didn’t disappoint. Nor did the sea and sky.

Your host for today.

Now you see him.

Now you don't

Courtesy BMK

The Pier

Courtesy BMK

A view of the hotel from the beach, the promenade running for miles past the ground floor windows. Behind them was the restaurant, where we sat eating splendid food watching fleets and battalions of joggers running by. Huge amount of joggers in Morecambe. I remember feeling guilt and a degree of smugness as I tucked into my moules marinière and chips as they struggled and sailed by the windows.

We didn't run but walked in search of the legendary Eric Morecambe. And believe me, the promenade is very long, five miles long. Eventually we found him enjoying the sea air.

Courtesy BMK

The Midland Hotel from the front

Instead of this motley collection of cars, there would once have been Lagondas

The hotel was built in 1932/33 and is an art deco gem with its Eric Gill sculptures and Ravilious murals, now sadly gone.

Inside is dominated by a beautiful spiral staircase, and I imagined walking up it with the legendary penny lodged between my buttocks,* but took the lift instead. 

Such is the fragility of life that by the late C20th this beautiful building was fast fading into a derelict ruin destined for flats or a care home. Thank God for the determination of activists and the visionary hotel group that took it over and brought it back to life.

*David Suchet, the actor who played Poirot, explained how he created the detective's distinctive mincing gait by clenching a penny between his buttocks; whether imagining it or for real, I'm not entirely sure

Life is nasty, brutish and short

Thomas Hobbes

Usk is now a small but pleasant town, but exploring Usk’s House of Correction Keeper’s Book for 1821 – 34 is both chilling and instructive: 

A lady from Llanfoist called Mary Howard was sentenced to a year’s hard labour for bearing a child out of wedlock. There is no record of what happened to the child.

Little mercy was shown to vandals. William Morgan was imprisoned for a month for venting his ‘unlawful and malicious’ rage upon ‘one chestnut tree and one gooseberry tree in a certain garden.’

Welfare claims were not encouraged Richard Powell of Llangibby spent a month in prison for not providing for his family. 

 In 1827, James Williams was given three months for stealing three cabbages, a month for each cabbage.

In 1871, the Monmouthshire Merlin reported the case of William Betts (15) and James Betts (11) and Joanna Betts their mother. The two boys were convicted of stealing a lump of coal from a railway wagon from Newport docks. They were given a lashing and a day in gaol to ponder on their crime. Their mother was given 12 months hard labour because the boys had been her responsibility. She died within a year of her release. 

Twelve-year-old Sarah Hone was sentenced to hard labour for stealing a scarf. Soon after her release, she was sentenced to five years in a reformatory school for sleeping in somebody’s back lavatory in order to escape her drunken father. Rehabilitation clearly worked for her; she died in a Monmouthshire workhouse in 1899.

Jane Ann White was given three months hard labour for stealing some rashers of bacon, Randolph Pearcey six months for stealing six sticks of wood. Gardener George Peglar was given three years for stealing a pair of brass candlesticks. Olaf Hansen, a sailor, stole a mouth organ and was given seven days, and ragman, Will Wiltshire, blew a horn in the street and was sentenced to seven days for disturbing the peace.

One's first instinct is to recoil at the harshness of a previous penal code but, it raises some obvious questions when you consider what now prevails: shoplifting increasingly a lifestyle choice with instances of staff being sacked for trying to prevent it, and whole areas of the country where it is not safe to be out after dark. Will Wiltshire, given seven days imprisonment for blowing a horn, would give a rueful shake of the head if he was to wander Newport now on a Saturday night. 

There is no obvious answer as to whether we are now too lenient or the past over harsh, but it would be foolish to ignore Thomas Hobbes’ dictum that life is ‘nasty, brutish and short,’ and that left to themselves, people pursue their own interests at the expense of everyone else. His solution was a social contract whereby an authoritarian state would enforce obedience in exchange for peace, law and order. 

Different countries offer different solutions. The San Salvador approach might have some merit, at least for those not incarcerated.

The Chinese have adopted a different approach to the problem with its surveillance society and social credit system. There, good behaviour is encouraged by an all enveloping 'stick and carrot' approach.

For me the worst solution is just to ignore the problem. So, what is my solution? I have none other than a warning. In Thomas Hobbes’ Social Contract, the people should no longer feel obliged to obey or accept a government that fails in its part of the bargain. 

 

 

Mr Toad's Folly (No, not really)

 

Last week I discovered my tumour had increased by 2 millimetres. The same day I bought a 65inch wall mounted TV. The alternative could have been worse. A 2-millimetre wall mounted TV would be poor compensation for a 65inch tumour. 

The two events were not directly related, the decision to splurge having been taken a week earlier. We were visiting friends who had one and, rather like Mr Toad, immediately fell in love. I remarked wistfully and with a degree of resentment that our inoffensive and perfectly adequate 43inch Panasonic—twenty years old and still going strong would likely outlive me. The grievance was sharpened by the fact that over the years I had squirrelled away money to buy its replacement when the Panasonic finally flickered and died.

“Then we’ll do it,” my wife said. “We’ll go out and buy one.” She wasn’t too happy about the size, preferring I suspect its smaller 55inch equivalent. 

I spent a deliriously happy week researching technology I’d never heard of before, accessed Which and scoured obscure YouTube videos on the merits of Oled screens vs those powered by RGB min-leds, organic, inorganic, screen burn,  so that when we finally descended upon our shop of choice, Richer Sounds, I wouldn’t look a complete and utter idiot. That was the theory at least.

To my intense relief, my wife was immediately seduced by a large screen—yes 65 inches eye-stopping in its clarity and richness. We both were, until a salesman intervened to reinforce our decision. Yes, he said RGB mini-led technology had its merits. It was less reflective of light, a bonus when watching on bright sunny days, but there’s a price. Such TVs lack the richness and clarity of OLED. He directed our gaze back to the TV we had already set our hearts on—which came with free speakers and a soundbar. 

“Why the good price?” I asked. 

“They’re 2025 models,” he said. “The 2026 model is almost twice the price for—” he shrugged, “fairly minimal enhancements.” 

And so now we await delivery and installation. And my mind goes back to my first TV experience in the mid-fifties when the appearance of an aerial on a chimney denoted an immediate upgrade in status. No. 10 Ribblesdale was the first in our street to boast a small 14 inch black and white TV. From that moment on we wiped their front window clean with our noses, catching glimpses of Rin Tin Tin and Robin Hood. Little did I suspect then the future — nor the future Mr Toad who tends to prefer books to the screen but had to have a 65-inch TV!

My newly buffed feet

Last week I was visited by a chiropodist. In all my life, I never suspected that such a thing would happen – and it took months of persuading. One of the results of immunotherapy is muscle inflammation and a consequent inability to reach my toes. My wife is an angel in every respect but one: toes. She doesn’t do toes. Everyone has their breaking point, and my toes are her Rubicon. 

As a result, weeks passed and my toenails continued to grow until they resembled the fingernails of Cixi, the late Empress of China. She carried on the ancient tradition of long nails denoting status and wealth. Her fingernails were six inches long. My toenails were getting there and denoted nothing but holes in my socks.   

But a chiropodist?  I’m reluctant to get my hair cut or pay for a dentist. Toenails for God’s sake.

Anyway, the great day came. A shiny white car pulled up outside the house. A trim, clever-looking blonde stepped out and immediately reassured. The white uniform helped. Within minutes I was putty in her hands. 

She admired my feet and then set to work with her various implements. Nails cut. Job done? No, not at all.  This was but the beginning. They were next filed and buffed, the crevices between my toes explored, rough skin sanded, and each foot gently oiled. A grown man purring with pleasure. This was indeed the life. What had I been missing all these years?

Buffed feet for one. I now have buffed feet. 

Essence of Kali

 

Algernon Blackwood, Arthur Machen and M R James were the premier horror writers of their day, though Blackwood perhaps the more prolific. He shared a deep interest in the occult with Aleister Crowley, and H P Lovecraft regarded him as a formative influence. One of his more interesting creations was the Occult Detective – Dr John Silence. Think Sherlock Holmes fighting demons and ghosts. With his mischievous black cat named Smoke and a world-weary golden collie called Flame, he battled ‘malevolent ghosts, astral werewolves, fire elementals, the cult of Asmodeus, and other fiends.’ 

I remember enjoying the stories on first reading them and being disappointed that he wrote only six! It’s why I was intrigued by a new and unexpected challenge, and one that paid: an anthology of new John Silence stories. Could I master the mannered Edwardian prose of Blackwood himself – never mind write a convincing story of the occult?

Glad to say, I could, and my story—Essence of Kali is one of seven in an impressive new anthology:

SILENCE

UNTOLD TALES

OF

ALGERNON BLACKWOOD’S PSYCHIC DOCTOR

The World at his Feet

 

Sir William Blathwayt (1649--1717) had the world at his feet and made a small fortune as a result. It was a case of energy, ability and chance, or perhaps luck. Born in the year a king was executed, an event which signified the dawning of a new age, he prospered under James II as Secretary of State for War and chose the winning side when William of Orange came on the scene and drove the old king into exile. He was lucky in his choice of wife, Mary Ann Wynter, the heiress of Dyrham Park, whom he married in December 1686. Between then and her death in 1691 she bore him four sons and a daughter. The two events may not be unrelated.

His greatest piece of luck was being born when he was and achieving office when he did. The late C17th and early C18th witnessed a global transformation and the underpinnings of the British Empire to come, and William Blathwayt knew exactly how to tack his sails. When William of Orange came to the throne, all things Dutch became the rage; aristocrats competed as to who could most slavishly imitate the new king—few more effectively than Sir William Blathwayt who demolished Dyrham’s dilapidated Tudor mansion and replaced it with the present Dyrham House and gardens, which copied almost exactly the new king’s palace and gardens. 

Mary, however died from her various exertions and never lived to see the house completed. She was buried in the adjacent medieval church, where her husband and children in due course also took up residence. It was a salutary experience walking from the house and  family portraits to their graves, where my feet are artfully shown.  

From the second portrait in order: William Blathwayt, Mary Wynter, William Blathwayt II (1688- 72) John Blathwayt (1690-1754) soldier and musician who fought at Culloden, Anne Blathwayt (1691-1717)

St Peter's Church

Before then, however, they had a life, and what a life. 

The Dutch fashion of panelling up to the ceiling

The Dutch fashion for embossed leather wall coverings

The Diogenes room named after the central figure in the tapestry

The State bedroom. No monarch actually slept there, but every great house had one just in case and as a status symbol. Out of picture to the right are two ornately carved armchairs for important visitors to any in-bed monarch. To the left are two armless chairs for the less important. And two stools at the foot of the bed for nonentities. 

The Tapestry Bedroom richly furnished with Flemish tapestries

Best Staircase, so called because it led to the best rooms. Made from red cedar wood, it was shipped from Carolina at enormous expense - perk of the job. Sir William was Surveyor and Auditor General of Plantation Revenues at the time, amongst other positions. The cedar wood oils left a strong and pleasant odour. Sir William had only one complaint: it took longer for the wood to travel from Bristol docks to Dyrham Park than the time it took to sail the Atlantic. You wonder at the number of horse and carts it took to carry it all - and at the state of the pre toll gate roads of the time. 

Old Staircase and the rooms above. As a high ranking government official, Blathwayt used British diplomatic, military and colonial networks to source his materials from across the world: Carrara marble from Italy, pine timber from Sweden,  rare and valuable timbers for his staircases; in particular, black walnut and red cedar from Virginia. Dutch east Asian networks sourced him fine porcelain, damask and silk.

The National Trust, to show their sensitivity or to make a point, ask you to avert your eyes or even take an alternative route as you reach the first floor. The reason are the two side tables in the picture below showing two enslaved men each holding a large scallop shell. You may stop reading here if you wish or take it as being part and parcel of the age.

I had to avert my eyes from some obscure exhibition of modern fabric art scattered randomly across the house and covering some very fine paintings, and wonder why no part of the exhibition was shown below stairs, ie the kitchens and servant quarters. 

There were however these very fine bells. Before the C18th it was the custom to have servants within hearing distance. Later on a complex system of bells were created whereby upstairs communicated with downstairs. In some houses servants could tell by the sound of the bell which room required service. In Dyrham the marker pendulum continued swinging after the sound stopped, again allowing the servant to know which room required service. 

A mind unto itself

I was no longer a pale and tubby boy in spectacles, naked but for khaki shorts and plimsols. I was Lone Eagle, lithe and bronzed surrounded by other small boys immersed in the same delusion; Cheyenne undergoing one of a series of rites: endurance running. The red-brick terraces of Ribblesdale Avenue had changed into canyons, Colorado or Utah, we weren’t choosy. On other occasions, I’d be Little Feather, a Mohawk pursued through northern forests by Iroquois; a cowboy on a blood-red plain surrounded by menacing buttes watched by the silhouettes of distant Indians. 

The images came from the Westerns that dominated the 1950s and early 60s. So vivid were they in our minds, it was easy to layer them over red-brick and tarmac. We could even turn grey skies blue.

All this coursed through my mind as I stared at my wife, unwilling, unable to believe. “Are you saying—” I paused to get this straight. “That you can’t picture this cup when you shut your eyes?”

“I can’t visualise anything,” she said. “This apple.” She held it up to remove all doubt she meant this apple; positioned it in front of her face and closed her eyes. “Gone.”

“In your mind’s eye,” I urged. “You must be able to imagine it.”

“No. I can’t. There’s nothing.”

I closed my own eyes and saw a whole bowl of them, an orchard in a sun-kissed valley (visualisation comes with cliché) I imagined eating one, heard the crunch, salivated at the sharpness of its juice.

This was my first introduction to Aphantasia and a whole new world I never knew existed. Mind you, as she confessed, she’d only recently discovered it herself. Until then she’d assumed everyone shared the same inability. For her it was normal. For me it would be like living in a prison cell – but only because I’d know what I was missing. 

“How do you recognise people?” I asked.

“I remember faces when I see them. I know exactly what I see. I just can’t visualise you when you’re not there.”

Later, I googled it, and there it was. Aphantasia—the opposite of Hyperphantasia, the tribe to which I belong. I wonder how many live and work together unaware of the other’s ability/inability to visualise things. It’s not exactly a conversation starter. It just doesn’t come up? Why should it if each assume things are as they are? 

Aphantasia (I love the name, a good Rom-Fantasy title) tends to cluster around those gifted in Stem subjects like science, computers or maths. It may have some evolutionary advantages; PTSD tends to be less severe for example. I on the other hand have to stop people in mid-flow when they describe a broken arm or a tooth extraction gone wrong. I immediately feel it, and a wince becomes a shudder of imagined pain.

The brain is a weird and wonderful thing, a mind unto itself.