Evidence that horses, bandstands and green folders all have a connection

This week, I have some pictures for you from my phone's camera. I am going to try to find links between them. 




Okay, so let's start this photo-blog with this beauty. I don't know his name. I'll call him Horse because I'm original like that.

I visit Horse regularly. He lives in a field 15 minutes' walk away from my house. When I say 15 minutes' walk, I'm the one who walks to Horse, not Horse to me. I plug in my earphones, select a radio programme, and say to my husband, 'Going up the road to see Horse.'

Horse listens to any problems you have and gives wise, merciful looks. He is cheaper than any other therapist. He does not judge. And you can trust him not to gossip. All he asks in payment is that you stroke him and feed him clumps of grass, which I call a bargain.




This is the bandstand in Leamington Spa's Pump Room Gardens, near my home, and it's currently being restored to its original loveliness by a company specialising in this kind of restoration work.

The old one had definitely seen its best days and, to be honest, had become a haunt for local teenagers, some homeless people, and some who had imbibed substances of various kinds, and I don't mean Haribo. When I taught at a local state school a few years ago, the teenagers used to call it The Banny. 'Meet you down the Banny tonight?' 'You going down the Banny?' It was rather reductive as a name and might as well have been a lamp post or a wall. I'm not sure they were as fascinated by the Georgian elegance of the bandstand as they were by the prospect of lurking about looking suspicious.

You may be interested in the video about the restoration of the bandstand if you like that sort of thing. I found it strangely alluring - all that machinery and maleness and metalwork. Very D H Lawrence. Ha! There's my link with the first picture..I seem to remember, although I can't recall which novel it's in, D H Lawrence writing in a very erotically-charged way about a woman riding a horse. I doubt it was a Horse-type horse. More likely a sweating stallion. Anyway, here's the video.



Here's the third picture.





I found this folder the other day. It belonged to our daughter when she was 12. She used it for her music work at school.

She's 29 this year, and next month is moving permanently to Japan. Don't cry for me, Argentina, but if your name's not Argentina, feel free.

She did Japanese Studies at Sheffield University. One of those years was based at Hiroshima University in Japan. Then she worked for two years for an airline I won't name as cabin crew, flying all over the world, but often between London and Tokyo. She soon found that it wasn't her thing at all, wearing compulsory make-up and heels, and dealing with belligerent passengers. She escaped when offered a job working for the Tokyo Stock Exchange at their London office as an admin assistant/researcher. She has been there for several years now, working solely with Japanese colleagues, and they have offered her a job in Tokyo. She has recently completed an MA in Translation Studies so she's going into the translation department over there.

She promises to return once a year, probably during the Tokyo summer when residents are slick with humidity and sweat and the pollution is at its worst.

And I guess there's always Skype :(

What's she looking forward to? Probably the karaoke! She has a fabulous singing voice and loves the way they do karaoke in Japan - not in pubs with a drunk not-singer on the microphone, but in karaoke bars where you hire a room with your friends and have your own personal karaoke evening social event.

So, how can I link that picture with the other two? Let's say that I have an affection for Horse, for the bandstand, and for green folders and all other stationery  my younger daughter. Soon, though, Horse and the bandstand will be the only two I can see regularly.

Cue tragic music.



Comments

  1. Love the horse, yay for the bandstand but boo hoo for the daughter.

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    1. Completely empathetic responses, OSC. Thank you!

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  2. That's going to be terribly hard having your daughter so far away. But she is pursuing her dreams so I wish her well! I sang karaoke on a Japanese bus once as we were going through the Japanese Alps. Yes, that's how much they love karaoke -- it's even on buses. Well, after all, they invented it -- karaoke, not buses.

    Anyway -- please take Horse a carrot or two or maybe an apple as a special treat. Therapy's not cheap.

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    1. I will tell my daughter about your Japanese bus karaoke experience. She'll appreciate that!

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  3. I feel your pain, as our daughter and her husband and two little boys just moved to the other side of our continent - we live on the east coast of Canada and they're now on the west coast of the USA. Come sit beside me and we'll gnash our teeth and sob into our hankies together!

    People keep telling us that now we have an excuse to travel. But . . . But . . . But I don't LIKE to travel . . . I bet Horse wouldn't say something silly like that :)

    Wishing your daughter all the best as she follows her chosen path. It will be a great adventure for her.

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    1. Thanks, Jenny. You are welcome to pop in any time for teeth-gnashing sessions. It would give you an excuse to travel to England!! ;)

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  4. I'm sure Horse will be happy to listen to all your tales of what daughter is up to in Tokyo. I'm sad for you, but happy for her, what an opportunity!
    Same with my grand daughter, now 25, not overseas, but went interstate to study in her chosen field and will probably never come home except to visit as the work she wants to do just isn't available here.

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    1. Horse is definitely going to hear a lot from me in the near future!

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  5. Horse is wonderful. I met an equally sympathetic horsey friend who I called Jigsaw when I cooked for a team doing kids' work on the beach a few months after losing my dad. I have very fond memories of Jigsaw.....

    Sorry about your daughter. Hugs x

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    1. Thanks, Mandy. I think Jigsaw and Horse would get on well ;)

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  6. Oh, I so much feel your pain about Anna. As I constantly moan, one of our daughters is in London and I HATE it. And our lovely son is in Dundee, which isn't so far away but he (and his sweet little girl, soon to become a big sister) are still visitable only every few weeks for a few hours. I realise that Japan is much further away. The only comfort might be that if you visit her or she you, it'll be for week or two at a time. But it's still very very rubbish. Some people say, oh well, I raised them to fly. But I didn't. I raised mine to live next door. I just failed to mention this to them. I feel for you. Even though you'll have Skype (which doesn't work on the side of the Sidlaw Hills where our son has moved to please his wife, who likes living in the middle of nowhere, sigh).

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    1. Dammit, I knew I'd forgotten to mention something, too - the live next door thing! Still, she's doing well and already has a flat and some friends. And she's messaging us regularly with updates :) (at strange times of the day ...)

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