inspiration – Page 8 – Hues of Hankinson

Windchime

I hear your voice in the morning as you call me

Beckons me to follow you home.

Where your voice lingers.

I gather trinkets that are reminders of you,

A windchime, a plant pot, a word unspoken

A feather, a seashell, a stray thought.

©Alison Jean Hankinson

This is for Day23 of napowrimo18

The first line is loosely taken from Country Roads, a song I hear in my head often that makes me think of my mum and dad. It will be 10 years this summer since mum passed but I still gather things that she would have liked, and I still don’t know if I gather them for her or for me. Love my family. XXXX

This is also for d’Verse quadrille and the challenge word/thought was gather.

Thank you Jo and Ray…..If you’re stationary, you’re not moving.

I always believed in the ripple effect, it is just that sometimes we don’t get the opportunity to acknowledge the impact that things have on us, and sometimes relatively, seemingly small things have the biggest impact. This is the story of Jo, and Ray and the meaning of life. The link to Ray’s little ride is at the bottom of the page.

In 2014 I had an operation, the risks of the surgery were classed as incalculable and I made my very skilled and wonderful surgeon promise not to let me die on the table…He kept his word but had to fight a little to keep his promise. I got better but lost a few little bits of me in the process. It was just a part of my life that was fraught with struggles and relative suffering, and during this time Jo, an old family friend from my school days had sent me several messages of encouragement and support and she sent me a link to a blog article called The meaning of Life in a blog- Ray’s Little Ride.

I read the story and the message I took on board most was the one that I used in the title- it was the message he wanted to share-If you’re stationary, you’re not moving. The truth is that when things are difficult, and life is problematic this kind of pragmatic way of being is the most useful. Sometimes there is no way of things getting better at this particular point in time and sometimes the only thing you can do is just keep moving and know that however difficult you will adjust as best you can to the new circumstances. Ray had ALS, many of you might know it as Lou Gehrigs’s disease, he went from being perfectly fit and able in 2014 to being very dependent by 2015. He completed his amazing bike challenge of cycling across America between October and November 19th 2015 and it was an amazing feat of physical, emotional and spiritual endurance and he passed away in August 2016. I read the blog and took the message on board and continued to follow the blog, and learned so much from this amazing man in the last few months of his life.

It was this blog post and this blog story that in a sense inspired me to begin my own blogging journey, I felt that if there was anything that I could say or speak or tell that might act as a ripple for someone else then it was something that was okay to do. It also gave me an insight into new things that I could do that would give me a new me. It represented new challenges, new growth and new meaning. It represented moving forwards and not being stationary.

I just wanted to say thank you to Jo and Ray for the ripples they set in motion that day that have continued to contribute to my own journey. And Jo you are right, we have friends and family, and a roof over our heads and can still live our lives well. We have much to be grateful for. XXXXXXX

Ray’s Little Ride- The Meaning of Life.

Ghosts of Heysham past…

Heysham

Vikings village

Basking, Brawling, Battling

Deathly deeds at Brunanburh

Vanquished.

©Alison Jean Hankinson.

The Vikings at Heysham may well have allied with the Scots and Britons at the Battle of Brunanburgh but the English were the victors.

You are beautiful.

You are perfect just the way you are.

Every blemish is a mark of a wish or a milestone

That was part of your life and has meaning.

We wear our scars like jewellery

Ornate adornments of battles we have fought and sufferings we have silenced.

Loves we have lost, dreams that lay smashed at the feet of the soul-less.

You are perfect just the way you are-

So wear your skin with pride, it is your life’s canvas,

And your story unfolds with every step forward and every glance back towards the setting sun.

this is for napowrimo Day 20. It is for my girls. With all my love. Mumma. XXXXX

The Doomsday clock ticks on…

1984 at BRGS

Nervous of a nihilistic Orwellian disaster,

and the truth was the clock was sitting at three minutes to Midnight.

The eighties was bigger and better than it had ever been before

The ra-ra skirts and Club Tropicana

Were our own way of shaking off the pervasive doom of the previous decade,

Punctuated by strikes, unrest, fuel shortages and the three day week.

But the Cold war raged and the doomsday clock ticked on.

Disturbed by the dystopian nightmare of the nuclear propaganda machine.

Is this the return of the nightmare that was? What time is it Mr Wolf?

©Alison Jean Hankinson

A couple of added words but for napowrimo day 19 we were challenged to write an erasure poem, I wrote the piece of prose earlier in the week and have used it to create the poem.

Wintering down

So barren and bare

Sacres me with its sense of isolation

Leave-less trees, dead shrubbery scars the landscape

The wind bites through the boulders that shield me from the sudden snow flurry.

Old Man

Sits atop the slate,

Spoil heaps spill still from the rugged ruins of derelict mines.

Firm footsteps back toward the lake to see the sunset skim the surface of the water.

©Alison Jean Hankinson

I used the image called “Winter trees at Coniston” by Fay Collins.

This was written for poetics d’Verse

It is also Day 17 of Napowrimo.

Spring lingers long….

It feels as though it is winter that has lingered. I look around me daily and wonder at the daffodils just peeping through and everything seems to be a month behind where it was this time last year. The order is the same, but the flowering has been delayed, the rosy red tulips are only just nodding their heads toward the sun and yet April is past midway and almost done.

Then just a sprinkling of sunshine and an early evening stroll and we have stolen moments of pleasure to treasure as the daylight lingers and the smell of spring scintillates the soul.

Pebbles underfoot

Ripples of lingering spring

Sunsets in the west.

This is for d’Verse haibun monday.

Three minutes to midnight-1984 revisited.

In 1984 at BRGS I was the editor of our School magazine “Squirrel”. I wrote a nihilistic editorial referring to Orwellian disaster, and the truth was the clock was sitting at three minutes to Midnight, something not to be taken lightly.

I suspect most of my friends in the same or similar age-group reflect back on what were perceived to be good times of the eighties despite its obvious flaws. The information age was just beginning to emerge and everything we did in the eighties was bigger and better than it had ever been before. The eighties gave us Top Gun wings and we flew, Gloria Gaynor and Sylvester Stallone made sure we would survive even if times were hard. I sent more than one failed relationship out the door in my pink legwarmers. I didn’t get swept off my feet by some Richard Gere, Officer type but I had fun trying. I am still convinced I owe a little bit of my own fortitude and resilience to Goldie Hawn’s performance in Private Benjamin and accepted my own quirks and foibles because of characters like Ally in the Breakfast Club.

Perhaps the ra-ra skirts and Club Tropicana were our own way of shaking off the pervasive doom that had settled on us throughout the previous decade, which had been punctuated by strikes, unrest, fuel shortages and the three day week. We had come together as a nation to celebrate the Silver Jubilee, to protect our territory in the Falklands and to see our magical Princess wed her Prince and yet still the Cold war raged and the doomsday clock ticked on.

The dystopian nightmare of the nuclear propaganda machine, the make-shift attempts at fall-out shelters for Panaorma documentaries and the secret world beneath our cities seemed to be a dark shadow of a murky past once Gorbachev came to power in 1985 as I moved away to University. The cold war was over and just after my 23rd birthday, the Berlin wall came down, to me the very symbol of the spies and lies and iron curtain and all that we had feared.

Have we now come full circle, is this the return of the nightmare that was. What time is it now Mr Wolf?

Link to the original Squirrel 1984.

There is only one video clip I can think off to celebrate/acknowledge both then and now:

The sinking of the Michael Griffith, Fleetwood 1953.

She set sail from Fleetwood with 13 hands on deck

The fishing trawler Michael Griffith, for Scotland her course was set.

Skipper Charles Singleton made the ship return to dock

A faulty pump valve changed their course and caused the trip to stop.

Repaired and ready to be on her way as Friday morning dawned

She put to sea in stormy winds so the journey was not prolonged.

The storm was brewing in the north and forced the tide to rise

The seas were rough, the night was long, and no-one heard her cries

The winds were wild the waves washed high up on the deck

And soon after midnight the mighty Michael Griffith floundered and became a wreck

The last message was received just eight miles south of Barra Head

Will some ship please come help us, full of water, no steam. Am helpless is what it said.

Lifeboats searched in heavy seas but no wreckage could be found

All lives were lost without a trace and in the storm they’d drowned.

This is for Day16 of Napowrimo and is in memory of the lives lost in the storm of 1953.

The image is of Fleetwood and is from Wikimedia under CCSA licence:

Dr Neil Clifton [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

The thirteen lives lost-

Skipper Charles Singleton, Mate Leonard Grundy, Bosun J T Wilson, Chief engineer Harry Anderson, Second Engineer Thomas Burns, Firemen W Hargreaves and R Bodden, Deckhands J Tucker, S J Johns, J Cryson, C Murdoch and G Palin. Cook A Bidle.

The Perfect Storm…reflections on the storm of 1953.

It was England’s worst natural disaster of the twentieth century. A combination of a winter windstorm and high spring tides brought disaster and flooding to Scotland, England, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Between January 31 and February 1st a storm tide in the North Sea raised the water level by as much as 5.6metres above sea level in parts of the East coast. There was catastrophic flooding on a massive scale and huge loss of life.

In the Netherlands there were approx 1836 deaths, In England in the east coast counties of Lincolnshire, Suffolk, Essex 307 lives were lost, a further 19 in Scotland and 28 people lost their lives in the Flanders region of Belgium. A further 230 people lost their lives at sea, on small craft, fishing vessels and with the sinking of the MV Princess Victoria. Many of those on shore were drowned in their beds as they slept. Thousands of people were made homeless.

The entire crew of 13 from the fishing trawler the Michael Griffith from Fleetwood were lost to the storm along with two crew from the Islay rescue lifeboat. They had set sail on the Thursday from Fleetwood under skipper Charles Singleton with the youngest crewmember being the deckhand George Palin. The boat vanished south of Barra Head in the early hours of Saturday morning following a stark radio message in morse- “Full of water – no steam – helpless”. Eleven women were widowed and 20 children were left fatherless.

The car ferry MV Princess Victoria, travelling from Stranraer to Larne was also lost of Saturday 31st January. Just 90 minutes after she left Stranraer a wave burst through the stern doors and despite all efforts the car decks were flooded. There were 44 survivors but 133 others perished. Not a single woman or child survived the disaster. They had all been put together in one lifeboat and it was lifted by a wave and smashed against the hull of the ship and they were all lost to the water. Portpatrick, Donaghadee and Cloughy lifeboats all made attempts to locate and help rescue those aboard. The Donaghadee lifeboat, the Sir Samuel Kelly joined the frantic search for survivors after the ship went down finally at approx 13.58 with her Captain still bravely at the helm. Its crew eventually plucked 33 men to safety. Bravery medals were awarded to many for their valiant rescue efforts that day.

This still remains one of the most little-known tragedies of the twentieth century. Thank you dad for telling me about it.

The featured image is from Wikimedia and is in the public domain- By Wrecksite (www.wrecksite.eu) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

the other image is the memorial at Portpatrick again in wikimedia- andy [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Guardian, the storm in pictures