The House at Pooh Corner

I once knew someone who had never read any A.A. Milne and had no real conception of Pooh, Christopher Robin, Eeyore, Tigger, Piglet, Owl, Kanga and Roo, let alone Hundred Acre Wood.

This, to me, was like the the Unimaginable Sadness of Cristiano Ronaldo. In fact, it’s worse.

Wind on the Hill

No one can tell me,
Nobody knows,
Where the wind comes from,
Where the wind goes.

It’s flying from somewhere
As fast as it can,
I couldn’t keep up with it,
Not if I ran.

But if I stopped holding
The string of my kite,
It would blow with the wind
For a day and a night.

And then when I found it,
Wherever it blew,
I should know that the wind
Had been going there too.

So then I could tell them
Where the wind goes…
But where the wind comes from
Nobody knows.

A.A. Milne

You can put off reading classics, I suppose. Or you can re-read them in a different context, but I don’t think you can catch up with A.A. Milne’s world after childhood. It just wouldn’t work. Parents, read your children a little of it, please, before it is too late.

Eeyore was nudged to the front by E.H. Shepard

A lyric poem

If you look at a word long enough it can start to look strange, alien even. I only need to glance briefly over the words poet, poem or poetry for them to start to look very discombobulated indeed. And then, for some stranger reason, I can only recalibrate my brain by thinking about Winnie the Pooh who also says something about the word poem, but I am sure has the letters in the wrong order. I am hoping for an explication of this phenomenon from the Winnie the Pooh expert after she has finished ambulance duties for the day.

Which is all a rather long preamble to what I originally intended to say which was this. Amy Winehouse was a lyrical poet and that’s why, as my friend Jamie has observed, all her words have meaning. Not every artist can do this: expose their own feelings directly in the work. Does the authenticity of this process take more out of them, or was the taking out of them already done. I don’t know, but I do know this is a heartbreak of a song to listen to and a very fine lyric poem.

Hundred Acre Wood looks like this…

Loo with a View

…in case you were wondering!

The actual turning of the number 40 did not go exactly as planned, but I can thoroughly recommend the place where we stayed!

In a Eeyoreish echo the eldest alreadyadiva dragged a found burst balloon on a string round with her and spent the afternoon trying to catch a koi carp or two with it!

Ups: Champagne, roasted chestnuts, apple wine, toasted marshmallows
Downs: Kids with dysentry, launderette, caravan park, various scorchings

Overall, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world x

Eeyore’s Birthday

May or may not be today, which would make him a Scorpio, like me – moody and introspective! Which is why I have retreated to Hundred Acre Wood for a quiet lie down whilst I turn 40 today. So you see, thanks to the wonders of modern online publishing and just to annoy James Murdoch, I am not actually online now -this is one I prepared earlier! In terms of birthday celebrations I was thinking along the lines of a burst balloon and empty jam jar, therein no disappointments, tears or tantrums…

Then when researching the image I wanted for today I came across Eeyore’s Birthday Party Yank-style, an annual festival fundraiser in Austin, Texas. Many of the images were a bit bare and body painted – nice. So I have a changed my plan a bit. Still the Hundred Acre Wood with the family, ditch the balloon, but as today is expected to be extraordinarily warm…

Photos to follow! In the meantime

My woodland retreat