The last week of May 2013 was the first five day week I’d worked for a long time. Even at Mad House I’d only worked four days, albeit ten hour ones, and I wasn’t sure how I was going to cope with two day weekends. Still, there was always lunch time for a bit of extra walking and for this one I decided to take a wander around St Mary’s Church, the mother church of the city. Our football team take their name, Saints, from it being originally formed by church members.
29 May 2013
Getting up at five thirty is not my idea of a fun day but Arabella had asked me to get in early so we could work on the schedule so there I was struggling out of bed. I may have mentioned once or twice that I’m not a morning person. This morning I wasn’t even much of a person at all. Why is it that when you go to bed early because you need to get up at some ungodly hour you can never sleep? That was me last night. A good two or three hours were spent tossing and turning with my mind going at a mile a minute all the time knowing very well the alarm would go off just when I was in a lovely deep sleep. It did and dragging myself out of my nice warm bed was a Herculean task accompanied by much groaning and whining.
Despite feeling like sitting staring into space for at least another hour before actually getting on and doing anything I did manage to get clean, dressed and out of the house by seven with a fleeting glimpse of Commando on his way to bed somewhere in there. Of course I had to leave breakfast out on the worktop in the kitchen for Commando Senior because I could hardly wake him so early. The walk to work was a dawdle. For one I couldn’t seem to gather any energy after such a bad night. The other thing slowing me down was the constant need to stop and take photos, I just couldn’t help myself this morning.
First there were the snapdragons trying hard to open alongside a hedge on my way to Gigi’s cut way. Snapdragons were one of my favourite childhood flowers and the odd one still pops up in my garden now and then. These ones were palest green so I’m guessing they will be white or lemon when they open fully.
When I entered the cut way I decided to stop and take a photo of the kerria that has been flowering since February when we were still having snow. Every time I walk this way I see them and every time I walk past without taking a photo because they’re not new. Today I thought they deserved a photo if only for their long service in brightening up my mornings. They may not have been flowering as long as the rhododendron in the enchanted park but, still, they’ve done a pretty good job.
The ragwort were blossoming at the bottom of the slope. Funny because I’m sure they weren’t there when I went for my exploratory walk at the weekend. When I reached the viewing platform there was another surprise in store, the tide was further out than I’ve ever seen it. Almost the whole bay was mud and green alge with just a trickle of river on the far side, almost out of sight. What a pity I didn’t have time for a walk because I’m sure I could have made it all the way round the bay to the shipyard today.
Even further along, close to the bridge, the river was just a shimmer in the distance. A seagull sat on the corner of the rotten old jetty looking slightly confused, probably wondering where all the water went. He watched me walking past as if it was somehow my fault. The old wrecked coal barge, if that’s what it is, I never did find out for sure, sat on the mud quite forlornly, ever single inch of it visible for once. Its ribs and broken, decomposing boards dripping with weed like the skelton of a ship. I can’t help wondering how long it’s been there, all my life for certain, and about the shipwrights who built it, what would they think if they could see it today?
As expected the rock rose flowers I saw yesterday have dropped their pretty petals. A couple had fluttered down onto the path but the others were caught up in the foliage. New flowers were already opening to take their place, each one will last just a day or so but what they lack in longevity they make up for in numbers. On the bridge the whitebeam trees are just coming into flower. Masses of white buds like berries and a few delicate flowers lifting their faces to the morning sun. A few short weeks ago these were just bare branches and who’d have guessed at their stunning floral secret? It made me want to dash down to the river walk just to see what the trees are doing there but of course I couldn’t, I had to go to work. From this week I will be working full time so there will be a lot less dashing down to the river from now on.
From the middle of the bridge the hidden water came into view, shrunken to cover barely half the riverbed but quite beautiful with the blue sky and clouds reflected amongst the ripples. On the mud lots of little boats were marooned, waiting for the tide to turn. They won’t have long because we have four tides here in Southampton. As far as I know we are one of the only places in the world where this double high water happens and, although I was always told the Isle of Wight was responsible there is some evidence that the English Channel, flowing east to west is really the cause. Along the coast Portland has the opposite, a double low tide. Isn’t nature strange?
Yesterday I noticed some oxeye daisies on the grassy verge by the concrete plant. Normally I cross the road long before then and walk along the stadium side but I thought I’d stay on the side where the daisies were today so I could take some photos. There is something about a daisy that seems so perfect in its simplicity, from the tiny ones spattering the grass right up to the giant shatsa daisies in my front garden. It was windy along the road there and the flower heads were blowing about so it took a while to get a decent photo or three. That little area is a veritable wild flower garden and I could have spent a lot longer there snapping away but, apart from the wind, I had to get to work. I did stay long enough to take a picture of a big old thistle though, all evil looking spikes and spines with the purple blush of a flower forming right in the centre.
On the final stretch of the walk to work I noticed that even the grasses are becoming interesting right now as they begin to flower. Walking past the estate I spotted wild barley. As children we used to pluck these hairy darts and throw them at each other. They’d stick to clothes and hair. Round the corner on the grassy verge by the railway footbridge ribwort plantain flowers form delicate crowns around the black knobbly buds just like a bridal headdress. I have far too many of these springing up in my lawn but, when you look really closely, they’re actually quite pretty. Funny the difference a closer look can make.
All too soon the walk to work was over and it was on to the madness of the office. Even with work emails on my phone and iPad there were plenty of new ones to catch up with and I’d hardly started when Arabella breezed into the office like a mini tornado. I always imagine her with a shower of papers flowing out behind her, she seems to have a bundle permanently in her arms. We spent the whole morning working on the 2014 schedule, trying to get just the right mix of entertainers for each cruise. This is a lot harder than it sounds, especially when things like cabin availability, cost and fairness come into the equation.
Howard got stuck in the lift which was a but of a worry. He was in there for almost an hour before the engineer got him out. We didn’t even notice he’d gone until he rang from his mobile to let us know he might be some time. Rather him than me, I have a phobia about being stuck in lifts. For a start I know I’d want to go to the loo as soon as I discovered the doors weren’t going to open. I can’t stand being shut in, especially in small spaces.
Actually I have been stuck in a lift twice in my life but not for any length of time thank heavens. The first time was in Malta in a newly built hotel. I was with a small group of travel agents and when the door didn’t open my heart flew into my mouth. Luckily we were stuck in there with several Maltese soldiers and a couple of them manfully forced the doors open. The lift was about three feet below the level of the floor but they climbed out and lifted us to safety. I was quite a bit fatter then so I’m surprised they managed it.
The second time was in Madeira with another group of travel agents. We had been eating lunch in the restaurant by the pool at the very bottom of the cliff at Reids Palace. It was our last meal of the trip and we were going from there straight to the airport to catch our flight. The lift is a long concrete shaft cut into the cliff and completely separate from the hotel building. We all got in and the lift began to climb, then it stopped and all the lights went out. It was pitch black and, if I hadn’t been in charge of my group of travel agents, I’m sure I’d have screamed blue murder. Luckily one of the agents produced a zippo lighter and we found the alarm button and pushed it. All I could think was how they were going to get us out if it was really stuck fast because on one side there was solid cliff and the others were solid concrete. Thankfully, within a few minutes the lights came back on and the lift competed its journey. I can’t tell you how glad I was to see daylight.
We broke for lunch at about one o clock. The plan for lunch was to dash up to Holland and Barrett to pick up some cherry cordial for Commando but, I was ever so slightly nervous about using the lift so I made sure I went to the loo before I went out. Maybe I should buy a torch too, or get one of those iPhone torch aps. What a shock I got when they told me the price! They must be very special cherrys, possibly individually harvested with platinum clippers and rolled on the thighs of beautiful Nubian maidens. I think I need to get into the cherry juice business! On the way back to the office I decided to take a closer look at St Mary’s Church.
There has been a church, called St Mary’s on this very site since AD 634 when Southampton was still called Hamwick. Of course the building I stood in front of today was not the original church, it has undergone several transformations since those days and wouldn’t be at all recognisable to one of the Saxon inhabitants of the town of Hamwick. In the twelfth century Queen Matilda, Henry I’s wife ordered the small church to be rebuilt and improved. Four hundred years later all but the chancel was torn down when the Rector, Dr William Capon refused to let the government confiscate the Chantry lands. The rubble was used to make the road from the Bargate down to the corner where the church now stands. Until 1711, when rebuilding work began, things remained in a sorry state although the chancel was still used for regular services.
Over the next century bits and pieces seem to have been added randomly until the whole thing was quite a mess and in danger of collapse. Eventually, towards the end of the nineteenth century it was rebuilt. The final chapter in the life of St Mary’s came with World War II. During the terrible blitz of 30 November 1940 the church was all but destroyed by an incendiary bomb and it underwent its final transformation in 1954 although the tower and many of the outside walls were retained.
Now there are leaves on the trees the pretty little building is almost hidden from the road so I walked up the path to the door and took a photo as best I could looking up at the tower. Occasionally I do walk this way to work and have been known to take a route through the church grounds but I’ve never walked all the way round before. Today I decided I would and, as I came round the far side, I was rewarded with a pretty little garden running all along the walls. I’d liked to have spent a little more time there but I really needed to get back to work so I will save that for another day.
Right round at the back I thought I might have got some good views of the stained glass windows but they seem to be protected with some kind of mesh which is a shame. I imagine you’d have to go inside to see their true beauty. Rounding the corner I got a wonderful view of the spire from the back side, as it were. In spring and summer this is really the only way you can see the tower in its entirety. I’d hoped to get a picture of the rose window but, standing by the gate, the trees that hide so much of the church get in the way. Those trees do have their uses however, making a lovely shady path to walk through the grounds on a warm day.
Apart from being the first church in the city and spawning my favourite football team, St Mary’s has one more claim to fame, the bells. A song, The Bells of St Mary’s, was written about it in 1914. This song became quite famous when Bing Crosby sang it in the 1945 film of the same name. I didn’t hear them ring today unfortunately but I sometimes do on my way to and from work if I walk that way at just the right time. Next time I hear them I really must take a bit more notice.
So I’d had a little walk in the sun, seen the church from every angle except the inside, found a hidden garden and even spotted some speedwell in the grass. Now it was time to go back to work. There was one last thing I wanted to take a photo of. Across the road from the church there is a stone wall with a gateway in it. The gate has long gone and the wall is incomplete but wooden posts frame an oasis of greenery. It was well worth stopping for.
We managed to get more or less all the rest of the schedule completed after lunch, despite quite a few interruptions and some brain freeze brought on my tiredness. We actually finished just in time because the old COO broke out a bottle of wine to celebrate his birthday and his last day in the office for a while. There were also nibbles and an apple cake made by Inge, our new Norwegian planning assistant. Sadly I couldn’t stay to sample the cake because Commando had come to pick me up and was waiting outside in the car so I had to dash off. Wonder if there will be any left on Monday?