Nice day for a white wedding?

The morning started sunny, but GG didn't want to go out until two. When she arrived, she beseeched me for Kirby grips and milk. Lockdown is making us all unkempt. I gave her a load of large combs and fake tortoiseshell clips. I do hope she'll turn up looking like a flamenco dancer next time I see her.

Our plan was to go beyond Stonehouse, to walk beside water and examine old mill buildings. When we arrived at a peaceful hamlet by a church, GG announced that she'd brought smoked salmon sandwiches and that we had to eat them immediately! Bit of a step up from last week's creme eggs, I'll be expecting a Fortnum's hamper next time!

We had a brief look around the church, whose library had just reopened, with the easing of restrictions. I was allowed to be the first person to buy a book. Oh happy day!

We then went up to an old mill, Millend Mill, which had been converted into apartments. I couldn't find the footpaths leading to places of interest, though there were plenty of sodden flat fields, and a community orchard. GG stopped to talk to a man collecting twigs about grafting. All this, and the lack of light or warmth, was not helping my blipsearch. It's a blipday, to my great suprise. I joined on July 15, 2012. I'm eight? Have clearly missed more than a few.

At last I remembered a spooky place I'd visited once on a guided walk. A stately home from the Regency era, it has a long drive with working farm animals in a field to the right, and some farm buildings. All that changes at the far end to a more formal landscape, somewhat lacking in features. At the time of my first visit, we were told that it was a wedding venue, hired out a weekends. Even then, it struck me as a white elephant, and had a forlorn air of spirits having flown, but today it felt like a good place for Miss Havisham's nuptials.

Having parked outside the front door, we peered through the windows of the mansion. Tables were set up with floral decorations and white napery. Chairs graced the patio outside. The grass was mown, clumps of daffodils were budding, but no laughter rang out, no popping of champagne corks, no speeches, no adoring couples posing beneath the cupola. Just sky, high winds, and crows cawing in the bare branches.

When will they return, those frivolous wedding parties? Midsummer, at the earliest, for those that can still afford such upscale events. I was reminded of some words from The Send-Off, a poem by Wilfred Owen, one of the UK's first world war poets:


"Shall they return to beatings of great bells

In wild trainloads?

A few, a few, too few for drums and yells,

May creep back, silent, to still village wells

Up half-known roads".


Gloomy, indeed, but it was a chilly afternoon, lacking the adventure that GG craves, apart from our trespassing interlude. Reader, if I ever get married, it will be in Scotland, and not in that mansion of sadness. I will add a snap of the house to extras.


Thank you all for bearing with me, poetry and all, for your comments, stars, hearts, and for generally being there. I don't think these three lockdowns would have been half as bearable without a place to escape to: visions of sunshine and places where people don't wear masks; where pipe bands still march and people can share a picnic, a sunset and a trip to the flicks. Blipfoto is home to all kinds of humans, and it makes 'staying at home' far more interesting!

Lyrics to White Wedding, by Billy Idol: https://youtu.be/x9j6DE6RnSk