For Tony

Definitely run out of that placebo energy...I planned to have a rest this weekend but didn't expect to spend quite so much time asleep. Apart from gratitude for the luxury of this, most of my thanks is for the TV I glimpsed in the gaps when there were gaps between my eyelids. Drifting into doze with the pause button at the end of Nothing to Declare and during fast forward images thinking I spotted someone holding up a urostomy bag. I did...it was a programme about Jade Goody's influence on awareness of cervical cancer. I didn't want to watch the whole thing but I did watch the bag bit in total astonishment (and some relief that a prime time and mainstream offering had a wearing of two sorts of bags telling viewers about them) before catching up with Coast...

...and getting rather envious of footage of Scilly islanders wading between St Martins and Bryher across Tresco during the lowest September tide... The next item was about Branscombe which made me further misty eyed with longing for another favourite spot...and then there was an overhead railway shot of a track curving right inland under a road bridge and I had to rewind and pause that as well, realising it was here! Just where I was on Friday waiting for planes. Bet they took it ages ago when they filmed Dawlish at the start of the programme. Doesn't it gladden the heart when you see somewhere you know on TV? Well, somewhere you like anyway and there are always bits I like on Coast!

I give thanks for the strength to keep myself fed and clean and the laundry done and the pots washed, if nothing very much more. Anything more is always a bonus. Anything less an indignity. I give thanks for another cool, wet, grey day so I don't feel like missing out on summer fun...

But most of all today I give thanks for having 'known' Tony Songhurst, even if only virtually, and Ann his lovely mother. He was a strong proud man with lots of wisdom and kindness to share, but his illness beat him yesterday. I give so much thanks that he and Carole got to meet up when they were both well enough. Thinking of her too today, her birthday. Even if you don't believe in an after life, even if you do but don't think it's like this one, it's hard not to imagine her waiting for him with tea and birthday cake to share. I give thanks for all the lives both these two people enriched while they were here...