In the background I'm listening to "Canterbury Cathedral Evensong February 17, 2025" on YouTube and reading the biography of the Brontës by Juliet Barket, c. 2010.
I am just now starting chapter three in which the Brontës have all been born -- six children, five girls and a boy. and Patrick, the dad, has just accepted his third parish. The first was Hartshead, the second Thornton, and the third Haworth.
Had I known all this then, it would have been exciting to re-trace
those steps from Hartshead to Thornton to Haworth over a period of five
or six days, staying in pensions or inns or BnB's along the way with
you.
The distance would have been maybe 15 miles total, eight miles from Hartshead to Thornton and seven miles from Thorton to Haworth.
After a very warm day today and to some extent yesterday, it's going
to be relatively cooler and colder this next week. Already, walking from
the Bat Cave to the apartment was not particularly pleasant. The wind
was truly picking up and it was getting very, very cold.
Now, I'm
in a comfortable chair next to the bed in the bedroom -- all I lack is a
fireplace and a golden retriever -- reading a short biography of
Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. I can easily finish it in one
sitting but the writing is so good, I do not want to rush it. I will
stop for the night and finish it later.
I really have it quite nice -- a beautiful, cozy apartment, and in good health. One of these days I will fall off the cliff but right now
-- knock on wood -- I'm doing well -- in every respect, I suppose.
Super
Bowl Sunday tomorrow. I have no plans to watch it. I will check in at
half-time and if the score intrigues me I may watch a bit of the game.
Now, after putting the biography of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas aside I need to find another book before heading to bed.
We never did spend time together apart, did we.
Sitting in the same room, reading separately, just enjoying each other's company silently.
Hi, Pat. I'm sitting here in north Texas reading Christmas cards, working on my blog, and watching / listening to Dana Del Rey videos on YouTube in the background.
It's a Yorkshire evening outside: pitch black, light rain, a bit of wind. It reminds me of our brisk midnight walks along the River Nidd twenty-two years ago (?).
**************************** Reminiscing
On my public, main blog, I just wrote the following; it's in draft. It won't be posted for several days.
Although it was the "original" that haunted me for years, I would rather listen to Lana Del Rey's cover.
I
had probably just experienced the most intense three months of my life
up to that point in my life, and even at age 73, that summer may still
be the most intense, most complicated three months of my life. I was on
my way home, late August, via West Virginia, late summer, 1971. John
Denver's Take Me Home Country Roads was the hit song that summer,
released in the spring of 1971. I was torn between staying on the east
coast and returning home to the Dakotas. I really had no choice, but it
was incredibly difficult. To this day, I wonder how it would have been
had I taken the other fork in that road.
I graduated from high school, like you did, in the spring of 1969.
I attended Augustana College, Sioux Falls, SD, 1969 - 1973, before going on to medical school, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, starting in the fall of 1973.
The most intense three months of my life I refer to above were the three months I spent selling dictionaries door-to-door in New Jersey. It was a most intense summer -- had it been just selling dictionaries it would have been "enough."
But it was also the summer I met the first love of my life, though she did not know it, and we saw each other in passing maybe a total of 90 minutes that entire summer.
It was the most difficult thing I ever experienced leaving New Jersey: she did not know how much I had been smitten, and I did not even say good-bye when I departed. For two years, I thought of no woman other than she.
Two years later I traveled along to Europe, hitchhiking from North Dakota to NYC, to catch Icelandic Air, to Luxembourg. It was a trip I had to take, to see Europe on my own, on "$4 a day." But deep, deep down, I took the trip with the hope that I would see Linda again when I got to the New York City area.
I did and we reconnected. For the next two years -- maybe eighteen months -- we had the most intense, geographically-separated relationship possible.
We separated for good after eighteen months -- she was graduating from medical school and headed to an internship. I was starting my clinical years and she decided it was time to "take a break." She said it was temporary; I saw it as permanent.
I often wonder how it would have turned out had I taken another fork in that road.
The same I often wonder about you and me.
Circumstances are such that it was for the best. No regrets. But I think about you often. In fact, not a day goes by that I'm not thinking of you.
I went for a short walk this evening, north Texas, the DFW area.
The evening was just like a Yorkshire evening when we went on those long walks along the River Nidd into Pateley Bridge and then across the bridge to the other side of the river. No rain, but misting. No wind, quiet. As dark as it could possibly be. Cool but not cold. Exactly like the Yorkshire I remember. Only one "thing" missing. You.
