You can choose your friends - but would your family choose you?

 

A FAMILY OF STRANGERS

I think it's fair to say that we were never a close family.  While I knew all four grandparents, they weren't a regular presence in my life.  There was even, very briefly, a meeting with one great grandfather.  But the older generation figure who featured most in my childhood was my mother's great aunt, who was more of the 'granny figure' in my life than my actual grandmothers, for reasons that would take too long to explain here, but are also the cause of my mother not seeing much of two of her three sisters.  And while there were five aunts and two uncles, only two of the former still lived in Edinburgh, while the rest were relative strangers, or even unknowns.  One I only met once, another I have no memory of, despite being told I'd seen her when I was three.  

A couple of weeks ago I attended the Genetic Clinic, as part of the ongoing investigation into the various bits of me that seem to going a bit wrong.  Before going I was asked a lot of questions about family members, and my ignorance ensured the process was over surprisingly quickly.  While I knew what my parents died of, I had no idea about their parents.  Having no siblings or offspring meant that was out the way quickly.  And other than one aunt who was a heavy smoker and died in her forties from lung cancer, I hadn't a clue about the others.  I knew at least one was dead.  But the last time I saw one of them was over twenty years ago, at my dad's funeral.  

Did I have cousins I was asked.  Oh yes, eighteen of them.  But I last saw one almost forty years ago, and had had no contact with any of them since.  Several I never met, I've forgotten most of their names, and I think there may have been two I never did learn what they were called, as they always seem to be talked about as 'the twins' (they were over in the US).  So I couldn't be a lot of help about their health conditions.

Two days later something a bit weird happened.  I was contacted, on Facebook, by someone called Jonathan Crawford, asking if I was Harry's son.  Maybe Jonathan was one of the cousins I never met, or whose name had refused to lodge in my brain?   I had a look at his Friends list and amidst more Crawfords than I'd seen in a long time I recognised three names.  Fiona, Catriona and Murdoch were the children of Liston, the one sibling my father always spoke warmly of.  Liston had long since moved to Australia, but I called him for a chat after my mum died in 2005, and enjoyed talking to him.  I remember liking him and his kids when I was in my early teens, as we met a few times, but I hadn't seen or heard from this trio of cousins for half a century.  

It turned out that Jonathan wanted to tell me that his dad, Jimmy, had died a few days before.  And I definitely remembered Jimmy.  But I wasn't about to tell my new found relative why - he was upset enough already.  I already associated Jimmy's names with funerals.

I'll be entirely honest before I relate the next part of the story - I am an unreliable witness.  My memory of events in my childhood is inconsistent and, I'm sure, highly selective.  Looking back at old diaries has confirmed I forget much, and distort what I do recall.  The first part of what I'm about to write happened not far short of fifty years ago, and there's nobody left who I can ask to confirm or deny my version of events.  But I think I recall enough to have good reason not to trust Jimmy.

My paternal grandmother died in 1975.  My father, the only one of her family still in the city, was named executor.  Both his brothers came up from their homes in England to attend the funeral.  Liston travelled by train, and must have stayed in a hotel or with someone he knew.  Jimmy drove up, in his Volvo estate, and spent the night in his mother's tenement flat.  The morning after the funeral Liston was still around to say his goodbyes, but...

You might have been wondering what the photo at the top of this post could possibly have to do with family.  By now you may have started to make a guess.  Come the morning of the day after and Jimmy was gone.  And his Volvo.  And most of the carpets and rugs in the flat.  Volvos were big cars.  My dad was not impressed.  OK, he was livid.  I don't think Liston thought much of his departed brother either.  The bad taste never really faded away.

Fast forward twenty seven years and here's Jimmy at a funeral in Edinburgh again.  My dad's. 

 No, he didn't nick anything this time, but he hung around longer than he needed to and pissed off my mother, who'd never really liked him anyway.  I found him too full of himself, pompous and brash.  And that was memory number two of Jimmy.

Jonathan doesn't need to know any of this.  He has own version of Jimmy and he should keep hold of it.  I have no intention of keeping in touch.  (He looked like a tory in his profile pic, but maybe that's me being a bit too unkind!)  However I did contact one of Liston's trio, Fiona, the eldest.  And we had a wee online chat.  She gave me email addresses for the others, and we've had a short exchange.  And I learned that Liston is still alive and independent, out in Oz, the last of the bunch.  

Will we be in touch in future?  Will I ever meet any of them?  I don't know.  Maybe it was a flash in the pan, or perhaps something will come of it.  It might be interesting, but I'm of the view that you can't miss what you never had.  I was happy enough without family before, and that won't change.

But a part of me keeps thinking it was a shame none of this happened before I got asked all those questions about relatives.  I'd have been able to tell them I actually had some!

A good goodbye to 2022

 HAPPY HOGMANAY HOCKEY

There have been a lot of aspects of 2022 to be unhappy about, from both a personal and wider point of view.  Some of the personal I've documented here previously.  More widely the greatest worry I see is the steady growth of the far right in our society, which appears to have been boosted on Twitter by the takeover of the idiot Musk.  

So it's good to end the year on a proper high note.  I've written before about the return of Edinburgh Capitals into our lives and the pleasure of going back to be hockey fans.  Since that first post on the subject the team has improved, the results have started to come, and we're up into the top half of the league, still with a couple of games in hand.  But it's the experience that counts, the lows and highs and tension and excitement and being part of something bigger for a few hours.  Back in the day the highlight of the season was always the Hogmanay game against local rivals Fife Flyers, when our ageing freezer of a building saw the biggest and noisiest crowd of the year.  Now, playing at a lower level of the sport, the local rivals still come from the same rink in Fife, but now it's the Kirkcaldy Kestrels we face.  

Caps v Kestrels, Hogmanay, and, once again, by far our biggest crowd of the year, probably close of even over four figures.  Lots of new people coming along, hopefully with many to return.  That possibility greatly helped by a thriller of a match.  Not many goals, but end to end stuff, great performances from both goalies, and a superb goal to settle the matter.  twice Caps came back from being a goal down, and it was two apiece at the end of regulation time.  And so we went into the nerve shredding period that is three on three sudden death overtime.  Cue our captain, Joel Gautschi, who tipped in a floated lob of shot from the new guy (first match today) Ryan McFarlane.  The poor keeper didn't stand a chance and suddenly there were lots of happy Caps fans.

If that isn't enough to win us some new supporters...

I'm pleased I also decided to give a first airing to my worst-taste old Caps shirt, the Xmas special of 2017.  And that it won't come out of the cupboard again until next Hogmanay.  Happy New Year folks!

The lion in the freezer

 BACK IN THE FRIDGE

When we first moved up (and in my case back) to Edinburgh the dominant element of our winter social life was in Murrayfield Ice Rink.  From September until March there would be few weekends when we wouldn't be in our regular seats, shouting on the Caps, and getting to know more and more people in the crowd.  But after March '18 there was no more Caps to go and support.  They lost their contract for the ice time at the rink, and were replaced by Murrayfield Racers.  We did try a couple of visits to see the latter, but it wasn't the same.  I knew too much about the way their management, and that of the rink, had gone about things and it neve sat well with me.  I couldn't become a Racers fan.

In 2020 the rink closed due to lockdown, and thereafter failed to reopen, due to a combination of technical and financial problems.  This summer brought the surprise move that not only would it be opening, but the new owners were involved with the Edinburgh Capitals, and they would be back on the ice for the 22/23 season.  Not at the same pro level they had been back in the old days, but in Scottish National League.  A lower, slower standard of hockey.  But still hockey.  And still our team.

For various reasons there were delays in getting the rink operating again.  The team had to travel to train and play only away matches.  But they were back, and starting to win some games.  We went up to Dundee to see one match and enjoyed what we saw.  But it's never the same as being at home.  Last night reminded us why.

We wondered what sort of crowd would turn up.  If there would be anything like the same enthusiasm and passion that the fans had always brought, even when they were watching defeat after defeat.  If the spectacle would be as engrossing, and emotionally involving, as it had been.  And if they really still were 'our' Caps.

There was, it was, and they were.  I don't know the numbers, but that was one of the biggest crowds I've ever seen at a hockey match in The Fridge of Dreams.  The crowd were behind the team, and there was still the same emotional connection.  It'll take me a few games to be able to immediately recognise all our players.  I can happily accept that the standard of play is lower than that which we'd once been used to, because there's still that sense of involvement in the game itself.  That feeling of being a part of something greater than yourself.  Belonging.

There have been a lot of improvements to the place itself, but mostly it remains the old barn we both laughed at and loved.  The same old rickety seating, the same dodgy PA system, and, very definitely, the same temperature that earned it the name Freezerfield.  And, for this game, same old Caps.  Looking like they were going to get hammered, suddenly generating a surge of hope, and ultimate disappointment.  From 0-5 down they got back to 3-5, and all seemed possible again.  Until the next goal.  It ended 4-6.  Against the league leaders, so we can't complain too much.  There will be wins coming soon...

Plug me in and make me young again

 SHOCKING

I realise it's a bit early for any kind of end-of-year review, but, even with a couple of months left to go, I think I'm safe in saying that I won't look back on 2022 as one of my favourite years.  There have been many good things about it, including the return of our much-missed Edinburgh Capitals to the ice, but even that's not much good if I'm too decrepit to enjoy it.

OK, 'decrepit' is maybe an exaggeration, but this has been the year when I started to feel properly old, and not just because the arrival of my state pension gives me formal OAP status.  The process of ageing has been something I've been more conscious of for about fifteen years, ever since I noticed that there were lots of people who walked more quickly than I did, something that almost never happened when I was younger.  My solo perambulations had always been brisk.   But I was rarely ill, other than the obligatory colds.  Even the arrival of gout in 2015 didn't really make me feel old, despite the olde worlde connotations of the ailment.  I changed some behaviours and went on as normal.

Now I'm somebody who has to remember to take their medication on time.  I know that's the case for many, many people, some from an early age, but it's still a bit of a shock when it's you having to do it.  You are no longer as you once were.  You're one of those people who can go on at boring length about your health conditions, should you choose to do so.  (I do hope I don't...)  First it was a bit of breathlessness.  That became a slightly misfiring heart, and the first of the pills.  A further scan revealed no more about that problem, but resulted in a conversation which included words like 'major surgery', 'stroke' and 'death'.  Tends to grab the attention a bit.  Not that any of that trio are imminent, just vague shadows on the edge of my consciousness.  And another daily pill to take.  

There was one more pill, a blood thinner that the medics were insistent I never missed a dose of.  Certainly not for the 28 days running up to last Friday.  Nor for the next 28.  Because on that day I might have received a small measure of rejuvenation, time will tell.  And my first time in a hospital bed for nigh on four decades (and even that was only due to a panicky GP).  Not for long though.  They had me into one of those hospital gowns - fortunately the tie up the front type rather than having my arse hanging out the back.  Then on to the bed, back at a jaunty 45 degree angle, and wheeled up to surgery.  Followed by what felt like a team comedy routine.  To my right the anaesthetist and his assistant, trying to get a needle into me and commenting on how my tan made my skin tougher to get through.  Had I been on my holidays?  (No.)  Over my left shoulder a face appeared, introduced herself, and proceeded to stick patches over my torso.  The surgeon stood on the left, her paperwork spread over my legs, asking me all the same questions she'd asked when she came to see me a couple of hours before.  And, beyond my feet (which overhung the short mattress by a good thirty plus centimetres) a silent young man stared, taking it all in.  

I can recall the papers being shuffled back into order, but not them being taken away. But they were gone when I next knew anything.  "It worked" said the surgeon.  Which was good news.  I asked how many goes they'd had.  Only one, which was another positive.  Could I see the ECG print?  Yup.  And what a difference from the same thing the day before at my pre-op checks.  A regular heart beat, bigger gaps between the spikes and a consistent wave pattern.  All from one electric shock.  I said thanks, and got the silent man to speak.  I hope he learned something from his observations.

Four days later and I'm not yet able to say how beneficial it's been.  Still easily tired, still aching a bit, but steadily getting stronger.  Back for further checks in a few weeks, to see if it's 'taken'.  Sometimes the heart rebels and goes back to it's poorly functioning state.  But maybe not, and I will breath a bit easier, be a bit quicker again.  There's a lot of criticism thrown at our NHS these days.  But I think they're bloody wonderful.  Even if they can't stop me getting older...

Walked the walk

 THAT'S THAT THEN

Another Kiltwalk completed.  Possibly my last.  Or possibly not.  It was an early start by my usual standards...

I walked with Darren, who I didn't know very well before.  We both know a lot more about each other after four hours plodding along.  

And that helped a lot.  Chatting away takes the mind of what the body is doing, or struggling to do, makes the time go quicker, and he even put up with me saying how much I was looking forward to a hot bath for most of the last half of the walk...  We didn't really have a stop, other than when forced to at road crossings, and when we picked up a banana.  He could, I suspect, have gone quicker without me, but he never hinted as much.  Good lad - treating old people with respect!

The route was a bit different from past Kiltwalks, and surprised me a couple of times.  Which was also a bonus, as I was busy taking in my surroundings rather than the aches developing in tired muscles.  I did try to take a few photos along the way.  But was so determined to keep walking that most of them were truly rubbish, so here's the best of a bad bunch.  The final pic is really awful, I know, but shows the time we were about to cross the finish line.

So  that's it done.  Many, many thanks to those who donated.  And if you'd like to join them, here's the link.  It's available for another few days.

The day before the day

 

AND THEN THERE WERE TWO...

Tomorrow I don tartan and walking boots, and head off on a bit of a trek round North Edinburgh.  Kiltwalk day has finally arrived.  I am as well prepared for it as I'm going to be, and ready to punish my body in the name of Advocard.  Not without a couple of surprises though.

I had, foolishly, assumed the route would be the same as the one in 2019.  Only in the past week did I realise that we'll be starting, as well as finishing, at BT Murrayfield, and won't be going to Musselburgh at all.  The upside of this news being that the distance is only thirteen and a bit miles now - easy, eh?

The second surprise arrived this morning.  For the first time I was due to be walking as part of a team, with a couple of the guys from the office also doing the distance.  Only to hear that one of them has managed to fall down the stairs and one ankle is considerably bigger than the other.  So now I'm walking with the youngster (well, thirty something...) so I might end up walking on my own again.  I don't want to hold him back.  

But there's always the wee hot meal to look forward to...

News of the outcome to follow tomorrow.  

Meanwhile... if you're tempted to sponsor me to help raise funds for Advocard...  Here's the link.  Every penny is welcome folks.

This shit just got real

 

NO FRAUD THIS TIME

At the end of this post I will be asking you to sponsor me.  Again.  It's for a good cause - honest.  I've written about the work of Advocard in previous posts, so I won't bore anyone with that again, but they provide an increasingly essential service in Edinburgh.

Despite which, in the previous three years when I've done the Kiltwalk, I've always felt a bit guilty about asking for money for what I was doing.  We see enough people asking for support for doing things that are effectively their hobbies, and I have always done a fair bit of walking.  Maybe not the fourteen and half miles required here, but if walking to my destination seems a feasible option then that's the one I'd go for.  Walking that bit further required a bit of effort on my part, but I enjoyed it, both for the challenge it provided and the actual walking itself.  So my guilt was really because I felt a bit of a fraud.  The 'challenge' wasn't really great enough to stop me feeling a bit of a fraud.

Yesterday I did the full Kiltwalk course for the first time in 2022.  And I I won't feel like a fraud this year.  It will probably be the last time I attempt this distance, because my recent health problems have turned it into a genuine challenge, and I admit I struggled.  Had to sit down a couple of times.  Had to stop and do some stretches.   Had to convince myself to keep going whenever I passed a tempting bus stop.  Even that first glimpse of the endpoint, BT Murrayfield, didn't gee me on like it once did.  I got there, but the fun of past years is just a memory.

All of which is a long winded way of saying that if you ever thought about sponsoring my efforts before then this could be the last chance.  I realise it's hardly ideal to be saying this at a time when UKGov is ensuring that so many people are wondering if they can have food or heat this winter, but a lot of those people are the ones Advocard provides advocacy help for.  So anything you could spare would be much appreciated and going somewhere it will be of use to others.

Please click on this sentence to find my donations page. 

Still trying...

 

AS DEBBIE HARRY ONCE SAID...

You know the old joke about hospitals - you go in with one thing and come out with something worse?  Turns out the best jokes are based in truth.

In 2018 and 2019 I did the Kiltwalk charity walk, of around fourteen to fifteen miles, to raise funds for Advocard.  In 2020 there was no mass walk, but I did my own virtual Kiltwalk, down the Water of Leith Walkway, for the same charity.  The 2021 walk only took place in Glasgow, so I skipped last year, but was quick to sign up again for 2022.  Maybe too quick.

I've already posted a couple of times about my efforts so far, here and here.  In previous years there would usually have been about half a dozen posts, all pleading for your money.  My relative reticence is, as the previous posts suggested, a reflection of my own doubts, and lack of faith in these steadily declining physical abilities.  I've mentioned the breathing problems, which continue to make it hard work up even gradual inclines, and the minor heart problem.  This week has brought new revelations.  Some more heart tests on Wednesday unveiled another problem, potentially more serious.  Fortunately walking, and the aerobic exercise it provides, is beneficial in holding this at bay, so that's a relief.

But another walk today also reminded me how slow I will be.  I still haven't done the full fourteen and a half miles - twelve and a half is my longest so far, so there remains a nagging doubt about my ability to complete the distance.  Today's efforts suggest that rather than the three and a half hours I'd hoped to be aiming for, I might struggle to make four and a half.  Oh well...

In the past I've always done these walks solo.  This year, on the day, there will be three or four of us.  All considerably younger than me so I have no intention of trying to compete!  They might even walk with me for a bit until they find themselves bored with crawling speed.  

So here I am again, looking for sponsorship along with the motivation that provides.  And come the eighteenth of September I will make it to the finish line in BT Murrayfield - one way or another.

You can go to my donations page from this link.  

Time is just a concept...

 

TORTOISE 1, HARE 0

A month ago I wrote (here) about my struggles to get up to speed for the Kiltwalk in September.  Time for another update.  And another plea for people to donate a bit for the worthy cause I'll be walking for.

I've done another four walks since then, and keep learning about what my body can do now (hint : a lot less than it used to...).  The first three were shortish, well under ten miles each.  But last weekend I headed out to Balerno, and The Water of Leith Walkway.  

That was the route I used for my 'virtual' Kiltwalk in 2020, which was also the last time I walked the whole of that route.  It's slightly shorter and easier now, for the work that was taking place around the Dean Village has been completed and that avoids the trek up and down the hill which was previously required.  Near enough twelve and a half miles if you do the full distance.

I did.  But slowly.  Very slowly.  On previous Kiltwalks I've always walked non-stop.  No loo breaks.  No halts to have some water, just sling the bag off, slug from the bottle, and bag back on, with only a little drop in pace.  Even at the provided pit stops I'd be shouting "Banana please" about 15 paces before I got to where volunteers were distributing goodies, so there'd be one held out for me as I passed by!  

Not any more.  If I hadn't had a few stops (I can't now remember if it was 3 or 4) I'm not sure I'd have made it to the end.  Most were no more than a minute, a quick sit down to reset the limbs, and off again.  Except the last one.  By then my route was passing close to home, my back was aching, and I was soooo tempted to pack up and go back to comfy chair and a hot bath.  So tempted.  But around 3 minutes on a park bench changed my mind.  Aches diminished, spirit restored.  I walked on to the end.

Which meant I did the distance in around 3 hours 48.  In 2020, on the slightly longer route, it was 3 hours 17.  Oh well.  This is who I am now.  And accepting that, and forgetting about who I was three years ago, is going to be the key to doing the walk.  That and trying to age semi-gracefully....

In 2019 I promised myself that in 2020 I'd try to break 3 and a half hours.  I never got the chance to find out if I could, and now it's gone.  It would be good to at least beat the 4 hour mark.  Or maybe not.  It no longer matters.  Last weekend at least proved to me I will still be able do the distance, as long as I'm 'sensible'.  (Yuk!)

But it's only worthwhile if I raise some money for Advocard, where I'm still a volunteer and providing advocacy for people who have difficulties being listened to.  So if you've read this far... maybe you'd be ready to head over to my donations page and press the big blue 'GIVE NOW' button?  

I did enjoy the walk.  Being back on the Walkway made me realise that I've missed it, with so many lovely views along the way, and the impressive murals in Colinton Tunnel.  If you're in Edinburgh and haven't been I recommend it.  

Walk smarter, not quicker

 DON'T ASK HOW LONG IT'LL TAKE, JUST IF...?

Two days ago I became a proper OAP.  Yesterday I walked more than ten miles.  Today I ache.  Spot the obvious connections.

Once again I have signed up to do the Kiltwalk charity event in September.  My first, in 2018, my sole aim was to get to the end.  For the next I wanted to be quicker, and did the fourteen and a bit miles in three hours thirty three minutes.  Frustratingly close to three and a half hours, so that was to be my aim in 2020, if the same course was in use.  But we know what happened next.  And again in '21.  So here I am, trying again.  The route has yet to be announced, but I know one thing.  I won't be doing it in three and a half hours.

Three years older, complete with the subtle physical modifications that gradual decrepitude  brings.  A clear thickening around the middle.  Two bouts of the oh-so-fashionable covid virus, leaving me with (my GP suggests) a few breathing problems from long covid.  I have finally entered the world of daily meds, for a mild heart condition.  And the dodgy left knee gets ever dodgier.  Intimations of mortality

But the optimistic part of my brain still goes "you've done it before, you can do it again".  While the inner realist reflect on all those changes, and wonders...

I haven't tried on the kilt for a long time. Will it still fit, comfortably enough to wear for so many hours?  I can always get another kilt though. I can't get another body, so I'll have to make the best of the one I've got.

I've now put nine walks behind me, from less than five miles, up to yesterday's first effort at passing the ten mark.  I've learned that I have to pace myself - as the one attempt to push on at something like my old speed resulted in me feeling like shit for all of the day after!  Yesterday's ten and a bit felt comfortable enough.  But took over three hours.  A pace that would take me over the four hour mark on the day.  

It's not as if it matters.  If anyone is going to sponsor me I'm sure they'll not make it conditional on my pushing myself to the point of exhaustion, or covering the distance in a certain time.  The most important thing is to collect some money for Advocard, my chosen charity once more.  And this year, for the first time, I won't be alone in my kilted effort, with at least one other and possibly more joining in.  But there's still this stupid pride thing that us humans do.  And knowing that the one thing about getting old is not actually wanting to feel like you're getting old.  I just wish that optimistic wee voice I mentioned within would learn to shut up.

Click here to be taken to my donations page.