The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1672 by Angharad Copyright © 2012 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

We watched some of the cycle racing. It stayed fine, mostly, so we dashed in early to the shops--supermarket —and dashed home again. Then, I got to watch a bit of the cycling. Of course afterwards they were all psyched up to race each other, so I had to take them out on the bikes while Jacquie watched the baby and Simon worked from home. I did point out that Good Friday was a bank holiday, he simply remarked that all that meant was the banks were closed to punters. It made a sort of sense.

After his exoneration from any underhand dealing regarding the bank in Kansas, Simon had been allowed to do some trading again–this on top of heading the retail sector of the bank. He claimed it was like therapy compared to trying to advise large scale customers about the state of the euro. I took his word for it because it was easier than arguing, purely on the grounds of common sense.

We rode up near Southsea and along the bike lane towards Hayling Island. It was ages since I’d ridden round there, I must do it again. Sadly it was too far for this lot. I was quite surprised when Danny agreed to come with us; but delighted as well. He doesn’t do much with the girls except argue.

We rode up as far as we could, and I pointed out the Mulberry harbour which had lain where it was for sixty years, probably longer. These were concrete constructions which were intended to be towed across the channel during the invasion of Normandy and they were then flooded and used as harbours to protect shipping. For some reason this one wasn’t needed or used and lay in the channel between Hayling and Southsea.

For a moment I tried to imagine the chaos and manic activity during that short period when D-Day got underway after months of preparation, when all the south coast ports were used by the military to carry men or equipment over to France. The atmosphere must have been amazing, sadly, so was the carnage on both sides.

I’ll never understand war, it seems the ultimate in stupidity of human behaviour, and perhaps the highest in the realms of heroism, requiring great sacrifice from all sorts of people. Why we have to fight them, I’ll never understand–I suppose that WWII was fought to stop a couple of opportunist bullies from carving up the world between them. As we’d done similar sorts of things a hundred and fifty years before, didn’t seem to stop us branding the Axis powers as evil. Still they say, the mote in your own eye is harder to spot than the speck in someone else’s. I knew the term long before I understood the word. I’d always thought a mote and a moat were the same things, so I could never quite understand how anyone could get a channel full of water with a drawbridge over it, in their eye. Then I came across the spelling MOTE and the definition was a beam or plank of wood. Suddenly the old adage began to take on meaning, and as it’s a biblical saying, that annoys me.

Still, if people paid any attention to the Bible, we wouldn’t fight wars any longer because we wouldn’t act against, Thou shalt not kill.” I mused on this for a few moments before one of the kids brought me back to matters in hand–to fix Trish’s chain which had come off. I have a piece of thick wire I use specifically for doing that and it works a treat each time. So in two ticks, I had Trish’s chain back on the sprockets.

I spent some time answering the children’s questions about the war and the Mulberry harbour in particular. For someone to whom that period is ancient history, I was possibly the wrong person to ask, especially given my anti-war leanings. They might as well have asked me to explain about different types of gun. I did have a history pass at O level, which included the period up to the end of the Second World War, and I saw the wonderfully informative TV series, The World at War which showed a combination of contemporary newsreels from both sides and diagrams explaining what was happening.

I made them stand in silence for a minute in memory of all those who’d died in that war–okay, I’m not original but I do have feelings for those who paid the price of sacrifice of their own lives for the cause of their country and the defeat of fascism. Thousands of British, French, American, Canadian, Australian and other countries of the Allied alliance, died to stop the Axis from controlling much of the world. I was grateful for their effort and pleased it worked.

As we cycled back the sky darkened and it threatened rain. It didn’t actually happen, but it was real enough for me to suggest we travelled a little faster. Meems did really well to keep up.

Once at home and bikes wiped down and put away, after a general handwashing, I managed to find a tub of ice cream in the freezer, so we all had some of that. Si came to see us and Meems sat on his knee and explained all about, Mubbewwy Harbours. He managed to keep a straight face, besides if you listen carefully, she knows what she’s talking about. As he’d shown me the piece of archaeology I’d pointed out to them, he knew exactly where we’d been.

He sat and told them the story of the Mary Rose, Henry VIII’s flag ship which keeled over in the harbour while chasing off a French fleet. It was due to a combination of things including open gun ports which shipped water and down she went with massive loss of life. She’s now in a museum at Gun wharf quay, having been raised from the sea some three hundred years later. I promised I’d take the kids one day soon.

While Simon regaled them with stories of old Pompey, I went up and showered still humming the Wagnerian music they’d used in the television series, The World at War, Seigfried’s Death and funeral march.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f27SlOFJ55M