Mom’s Favorite Reads eMagazine August 2019 by Mom’s Favorite Reads

IN THIS ISSUE...

- -

Momâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Favorite Reads eMagazine is published monthly by Goylake Publishing and designed by Melanie P. Smith of www.melaniepsmith.com

Always Take the Scenic Route Summer Travels by Mom’s Authors ....................................................................... 7

Laughter is the Best Medicine! by Hannah Howe ............................................ 29

The Nullarbor Plain by Graham Clayton ........................................................... 12 Off the Beaten Track A Wedding with a Difference ......................................... 45

Stepping off the hamster wheel by Anthony Randall ..................................... 16 The Case of the Sour Wine, by Cassandra DenHartog .................................... 34

Stan Phillips .............................................................................................................. 56

I Love to Play Rugby by Shane (Age 8) .............................................................. 31

Mate in 2—Supplied by Chess.com ..................................................................... 33 Word Search by Mom’s Favorite Reads ............................................................... 66 Just for Fun Quiz by DM Wolfenden .................................................................. 62

What to Snack on After School to Fight Obesity ............................................. 10 Imaginary Castles by Cyril Lucas ........................................................................ 30 Classic Movies—Serpico by Hannah Howe ..................................................... 32 A Place For Fun: On the Origins of School by Millie Slavidou .................... 44 Postcards from Spain by Hannah Howe ............................................................ 49 Yoga—Something Worth a Try by Jill Hughes ................................................ 50 August—The Holiday Month by Poppy Flynn ................................................ 54 The Carpathia Run by TE Hodden ...................................................................... 57 How to Recall Record Dreams for Dream Interpretation by Val Tobin ..... 60 For the Love of Flying by Nicole Lavoie ............................................................. 64

Spirit of Prophecy by Grant Leishman ............................................................... 48

Connections eMagazine ........................................................................................ 63 Nicole Lavoie, Graphic Design ............................................................................ 67 20% OFF First Book Promotion with the Fussy Librarian .............................. 67

Always Take the Scenic Route Summer Travels by Mom’s Authors The summer season is a great time to take a vacation. The same holds true for the talented authors at Mom’s Favorite Reads. They have graciously agreed to share some of their favorite locations, photos, and thoughts from their most epic adventures.

New York City by Theresa Jacobs… NYC! I love the culture, the art, the uniqueness. There is so much to see and do. Even to walk the streets and talk with the citizens, engage and enjoy every aspect. It should be on everyone's bucket list.

Visiting Holland by Linda L. Thomsen… Holland is situated in the west of the Netherlands. It contains several lakes and rivers and a huge waterway system. But, for the truly hidden secrets you’ll have to leave the beaten path and visit the quieter areas tucked away behind the famous landmarks. Visit the City Archives where you can read an actual police report by Anne Frank concerning her stolen bicycle; or, hop onto the Pancake Boat where you can enjoy and unlimited supply of Dutch-style pancakes. Author Linda L. Thomsen visited the area this summer and has shared some of her favorite spots with us.

-7-

Wilderness by Melanie P. Smith… I have always loved to travel and over the years my husband and I have visited some amazing places. This summer we decided to stick a little closer to home and head out to the wilderness in Ephraim Canyon. Utah (USA) has something for everyone between desolate dessert landscapes to majestic mountain ranges, to lakes, rivers and beautiful red rock arches. There’s nothing quite as beautiful as Mother Nature.

Fitzwilliam Quarries by Ronesa Aveela… In the town where I grew up, we had several quarries. In earlier days, they had been a place where granite had been mined for commercial use. For me, it was a quiet place I could sit and be at one with nature. It was a nice stroll along the railroad tracks to reach one of the larger quarries. It was at this place my father took me and my siblings to fish for hornpout, a local, smaller version of catfish. My mother would dip them in batter and fry them. That was such a treat. It saddens me now that all the granite blocks have been taken away and the quarries filled in. A part of the history of the town has been lost.

-8-

Transformational properties of Water by Lacey Laneâ&#x20AC;Ś Since ancient times, water has played an important role in cultural life. In early Rome, citizens flocked to the baths to find relaxation and social interaction. In Chinese medicine, the water element is crucial to achieve balance and physical harmony. History tells us that rivers were seen as sacred places. In many cultures, water symbolized birth, spiritual cleansing, and salvation. Today, we still turn to water to achieve a sense of calm and clarity. Vacations are spent at the beach or the lake. Families are drawn to the crystal blue liquid to relax or play as they take time out of their busy lives to surf, scuba dive, sail, or just take a dip in their favorite pool. Author Lacey Lane has shared some her favorite examples of this relaxing liquid that somehow calms and rejuvenates like nothing else can.

Lake in Alcudia, Majorca. (Above and below)

Statues by the rock pools in Can Picafort, Majorca.

A beautiful sunrise in Can Picafort, Majorca. This is the view from my balcony.

Cross the meadow and the stream and listen as the peaceful water brings peace upon your soul. - Maximillian Degenerez (Portuguese Artist) All photos ÂŠ the individual author and used with their permission

-9-

What to Snack on After School to Fight Obesity by Christine Ardigo You packed up that great lunch for them, maybe even a snack, but now they’re home, and they’re starving. I recently had a problem where my kids, whom both have an early lunch in school, and are too old to have “snack-time,” would come home from school around 3pm starving, searching every nook and cranny for where I hid the snacks, and eat themselves silly because dinner was not until 7pm.

Special Treats: at that occasional party or gettogether. Let these be special, not a daily thing. When I see people buying bags of candy when it’s not Halloween, I wonder what they’re doing with it. Have an Overweight child? (or adult?) Here are some calorie and portion controlled snacks: 100-150 calories

Understandable. 4 hours is a long time to wait until they eat again and 2 Oreos is not going to cut it. I decided that they really needed to have a second lunch. I told them to start making themselves a sandwich, have a bowl of cereal, a leftover slice of pizza, or even some soup. Something substantial that will fill them up. Still hungry? Then they can have a snack.

1 Cup Low-Fat Yogurt ½ Turkey sandwich 1 Cup Applesauce Sprinkle Parmesan Cheese over Hot Air Popped Popcorn 1 oz String Cheese with 2 Crackers 1 Cup Cereal with Milk

1 Slice Whole Grain Toast with Avocado Spread Hard Boiled Egg with Whole Wheat Toast

Let me show you a 3 tier Snack Pyramid so you can see what they really should be having when they do snack:

Peanut Butter Spread on Half an Apple Fruit Kabobs Whole Grain Waffle smeared with Yogurt and Sliced Peaches

3-4 Times a Week: these foods provide very little nutrition but can be worked in with something healthier. For example:

Handful of Baked Tortilla Chips with Fresh Salsa Scoop of Tuna on a small Dinner Roll

Pretzels with 2 Clementines

Sprinkle Grated Monterey Jack Cheese over a Tortilla, fold/ microwave

Ice Cream with Strawberries Vanilla Pudding with a Banana Vanilla Wafers with Cantaloupe

English Muffin half with Tomato Sauce and Mozzarella Cheese

Pizza Bagels with Baby Carrots Granola bar with an Apple Saltines with Peanut Butter - 10 -

200 calories

Dips Dip Baby Carrots & Cherry Tomatoes into Ranch dressing Dip Pretzels into Mustard Dip mini-Waffles into Cinnamon Applesauce Dip Strawberries or Apples into Vanilla Greek Yogurt Dip Pita Chips into Hummus Dip Graham Crackers into Pudding

Veggies and Hummus or Vanilla Greek Yogurt Dip 2 Brown Rice Cakes & Peanut Butter 1/2 Cup Homemade Trail Mix 1/2 Sandwich with Turkey, Lettuce, Tomato on Whole Wheat Bread Baked Sweet Potato with Plain Greek Yogurt Roll Turkey around String Cheese Banana Rolled in Yogurt & Cereal Pretzel Rod with 1 oz Cheese Cubes Whole Wheat Pita Spread with Hummus or Avocado 1 oz Cheese cubes and Grapes Oatmeal, TBSP Peanut Butter, Berries 1 Cup Yogurt with a Sprinkle of Kashi Go-Leach Crunch Cereal Tomato Soup with 4 Whole Wheat Crackers

So give your children, and yourself, more substantial snacks after school so they won’t raid the fridge every 20 minutes. Make up for what they didn’t eat in school, and provide good nutrition until dinner is ready. What’s your favorite snack here? I love hearing from you!

Examples of Other Healthy Choices: Breakfast Cereals – Less than 8gms of sugar per serving (add fruit to make it even healthier), or for the healthier child, choose cereals with at least 5gms of fiber and 5gms of protein. Cheerios Special K Frosted Mini Wheats Raisin Bran Wheaties Crackers etc. Triscuits Kalvi Rye Crackers Whole Wheat Matzos Finn Crisp Brown Rice Cakes Baked Tortilla Chips

- 11 -

The Nullarbor Plain by Clayton Graham Even the most avid member of Tourism Australia would tell you that the Nullarbor is not one of the most scenic places to visit Down Under—but it is certainly dramatic. The Great Dividing Range may not stretch its panoramic topography to this vast limestone area but over 100 million years ago the great Eromanga Sea certainly did. Much of the land surface around the world was flooded at this time.

The Yalata Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) covers 456,300 hectares of coastal dunes, limestone cliffs, sand plains and shrublands. Originally occupied by Wirangu and Mirning coastal communities, Yalata’s Traditional Owners also comprise Kokata, Antakarinja, Pindiini, and Ngalea western desert peoples. These groups are linked through cultural affiliations and traditional practices. The Yalata community identify as southern Anangu, and speak a Pitjantjatjara dialect.

The name derives from null (Latin for no) and arbor (Latin for tree). By sheer coincidence, apparently, in some Aboriginal languages nulla means ‘none’ or ‘not any’. But perhaps there is some basis to rumours circulated in Ancient Rome about sailors returning home with wild tales about large hopping animals. So where is this enigmatic place? The Nullarbor runs between Adelaide in South Australia and Perth in Western Australia, and at its widest point stretches for 1256 kilometres (781 miles). It is part of the area of flat, almost treeless, arid and semi–arid country of southern Australia, located on the Great Australian Bight coast. The Great Victorian Desert lies to its north. It is the world’s largest single exposure of limestone bedrock and occupies an area of about 200,000 square kilometres (77,000 square miles).

Anangu live mainly in the small township of Yalata, and use the land for hunting and fishing, and for cultural purposes. Archaeological dating of cultural sites shows that Aboriginal people have lived in the Nullarbor area for at least 40,000 years. Surrounded by national parks and reserves, and the Great Australian Bight Marine Park, Yalata forms part of a wider region identified for conservation purposes, and is managed by local Anangu rangers.

No article on the Nullarbor can be complete without mentioning the First Nation peoples who lived and still live there.

Around 20,000 people visit Yalata each year to fish, camp and watch the migration of Southern Right Whales that arrive from Antarctica between May and September. - 12 -

Important breeding grounds for whales and fish are being protected and managed, and viewing platforms and boardwalks have been constructed to protect dunes and beach areas from erosion.

railroads during the 19th century. The railroad workers thought the animals would eventually die off, but they have flourished in Australia’s deserts. Australia is now the only country in the world with herds of feral camels.

The Nullarbor Plain is a former shallow seabed. In areas, the southern ocean blows through many subterranean caves, resulting in blowholes up to several hundred metres from the coast. The Murrawijinie Cave in South Australia is open to the public, but most of the Nullarbor Caves on the Western Australian side can only be visited and viewed with a permit.

Other animals that call the Nullarbor home include wombats, emus and kangaroos. Another occasionally spotted Nullarbor resident is the dingo. Southern right whales can be seen from the clifftops when they visit their winter calving grounds, from late autumn through early spring. Travelling across the Nullarbor is an Australian iconic bucket list item. Sure, it’s best if you have a 4WD so you can go off-road for a while, but it is not really necessary as the long road is sealed throughout. Indeed some hardy people cycle across and others have even been known to run or even walk, camping along the way.

Fossils and Aboriginal artefacts and art have been found in many of the caves of the Nullarbor, the most famous of which is Koonalda Cave. Most other major caves of the Nullarbor are in the Western Australian section. Speleothems (cave decorations) have been found in many caves, and surrounding the water of the underground lakes there are places where delicate crystals have formed.

So what’s to enjoy as you travel the Eyre Highway across this vast, flat land? Do you just put the pedal to the metal and shoot across like there’s no tomorrow. Definitely not! As well as being a danger to wildlife and yourself you will miss out on a great life experience. The recommended drive time is 6 days.

The Nullarbor has a desert climate with arid to semi -arid conditions. Rainfall averages around 200mm per year. Inland, summers can be scorching hot, with daytime temperatures close to 50 °C (122 °F), while in winter nights can drop well below freezing.

While this is a sealed road, it goes through remote areas and the trip requires thorough preparation. You should carry extra petrol and plenty of water and food. A 4WD is recommended so you can venture off the longest and straightest road in Australia.

If you see a camel wandering across the plain don’t worry—you haven’t gotten lost and ended up in Egypt. Camels were imported from British India and Afghanistan to use as transport while building the - 13 -

It is a 34 kilometre (21 mile) detour (via 4WD only) south-east of the Eyre Highway. You'll be rewarded by seeing the likes of silvereyes, singing honeyeaters, brown falcons and the pretty pink and white Major Mitchell's cockatoos.

Do your research before you travel and plan your trip so you can:

See plenty of wildlife, including wild camels, kangaroos and emus (be careful at dusk), meet eccentric outback characters and even discover space junk that has fallen to earth.

Travel to the top of the Hampton Tableland at Eucla, home to the fascinating, shifting sand dunes of Eucla National Park. See what used to be Australia's busiest regional telegraph station, now slowly being claimed by the dunes. Walk to the derelict jetty that used to ship supplies to pioneers, and enjoy the white sandy beach. Visit the small museum and take in the sweeping views from the top of the escarpment.

Go whale watching on a clifftop lookout. At the Head of Bight, the whale watching platform is one of the world's best land-based vantage points to see a whale nursery. Southern right whales, which can grow to 18 metres (59 feet) long, mate and calve in these protected waters. Visit vast cattle stations, and have fun playing the world's longest golf courseâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;an unbelievable 1365 kilometres (848 miles) long, with a hole at each town or roadhouse along the way.

Enjoy a refreshing swim in the pool, dinner and bed for the night at the Border Village Roadhouse on the state border.

Check out the rock formations at Balladonia Rocks, Afghan Rocks and the Caiguna Blowhole.

Check out the Nullarbor National Park, alongside the sheer 90 metre (300 foot) high, 200 kilometre (124 mile) long Bunda Cliffs, the longest line of sea cliffs in the world. See Australia's southern edge drop dramatically to the sea from any of the five signposted lookouts over the cliffs.

Book ahead to visit (you can also stay overnight) the Eyre Bird Observatory, Australia's first bird observatory established in 1977. This unique place is housed in the 1897 stone telegraph station nestled between woodlands and white dunes within walking distance of the beach.

- 14 -

Buy Aboriginal art and craftwork at Ceduna from the Aboriginal Arts and Culture Centre on the sandy curves of Murat Bay.

Explore the night sky to see the Southern Cross and other Southern Hemisphere constellations—there's no light pollution on the Nullarbor.

The Nullarbor Plain is strange and beautiful and unlike anywhere else in the world—so, if you are feeling adventurous, why not explore it on your travels in Australia? Scratch the dry surface and be prepared to unearth many legends, a rich history and stunning scenery.

Take a 55 kilometre (34 mile) detour to the picturesque fishing haven of Fowlers Bay where you can do a whale watching boat tour, on which you will also see fur seals and sea lions. Alternatively, hike along the sand dunes and spot wildlife in Fowlers Bay Conservation Park.

If you take the time to explore and discover, talk to the locals, have regular breaks and absorb the atmosphere, this trip will become one of your life’s greatest experiences.

Visit Penong, where you'll see dozens of old– fashioned classic Australian windmills at the Windmill Museum. South of Penong, you can surf the world–class breaks of Cactus Beach or swim in the netted enclosure.

Clayton Graham—As a youngster growing up in the cobbled streets of Stockport, UK, Clayton Graham read a lot of Science Fiction. He loved the ‘old school’ masters such as HG Wells, Jules Verne, Isaac Asimov and John Wyndham. As he left those formative years behind, he penned short stories when he could find a rare quiet moment amidst life’s usual distractions. He settled in Victoria, Australia, in 1982. A retired aerospace engineer who worked in structural design and research, Clayton has always had an interest in Science Fiction and where it places humankind within a universe we are only just starting to understand. Clayton loves animals, including well behaved pets, and all the natural world, and is a member of Australian Geographic. Combining future science with the paranormal is his passion. ‘Milijun’, his first novel, was published in 2016. Second novel, ‘Saving Paludis’, was published in 2018. They are light years from each other, but share the future adventures of mankind in an expansive universe as a common theme. In between the two novels Clayton has published ‘Silently in the Night’, a collection of short stories where, among many other adventures, you can sympathize with a doomed husband, connect with an altruistic robot, explore an isolated Scottish isle and touch down on a far-flung asteroid. He hopes you can share the journeys. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/clayton-graham - 15 -

Stepping Off the Hamster Wheel by Anthony Randall At the end of a two-hundred metre dusty white Castine drive, hemmed in by thigh-high wildflower meadows, just short of the brow of a hill, reclined a fourbedroom farmhouse. Inch long crickets crippled the silence of a temperate still afternoon bothered only by butterfly flight or the occasional thump of stag beetle fall. We took our time exploring the grounds, an ex-dairy farm long since stirred by bovine action; it had been left to the will of the wild which was performing a splendid reclamation. Everything about the place was mellow, rounded, tumbled or overgrown. I loved it. foie gras and Armagnac brandy, an abundance of oak timber, Charolais cattle, Marmande tomatoes and Côtes de Duras red wine.

Looking east down the valley, blurred by the heat haze, the fortified hilltop town of Tournond’Agenais covered an ancient crossing with a formidable terracotta limestone presence. To the north, about half a mile was the village Bourlens, a small dormant clutter of houses, an infant school and a café that was never open.

I wandered behind the barn across a flat expanse of bramble strewn concrete which was once the base for animal pens. The holes that housed the wrought iron enclosures had backfilled with earth and weeds but were clearly visible, a reminder that this place was once heaving with great steaming beasts, vying for feed and defecating where they stood. I ambled past a tumbled slurry pit to the edge of a spinney that dropped down north to a little brook that marked the boundary on this side and was immediately caught by the delicate essence of Bluebell flower and Cow Parsley flaunting with the air. My wife joined me in quiet contemplation. Together with my in-laws, who were joint adventurers in this project, we had all reached the same conclusion, Labarde was perfect for what we had in mind; the renovation of the large barn into three gites to let out and live off the income, the installation of a swimming pool with a stunning view, and a second barn to renovate later as separate living for Emma’s parents, Sue and Trev. We would make the owner an offer that afternoon.

There were two chunky limestone flint barns on the six-acre plot topped with pantiles. The larger was once the centre of all operations, multiplexing as cowshed, milk parlour, garage and equipment store, its huge oak doors bolted shut years ago and the only parts being used by the present occupier, a laid back hippy called Brigitte, were a small tool shed, proudly displaying an engraved timber plaque above the door brandishing her name, and a corrugated lean-to on the south side harbouring bales of hay for her goats. The view on this side of the hill was uninterrupted panoramic splendour, a rolling patchwork of rural bliss undulating down to the valley floor and rising to the crest of an unending emerald ridgeline, fields of dazzling yellow sunflowers, plantations of tobacco and acres of plum orchards. The Lot et Garonne, a fertile verdant land, is also world-renowned for its prune production, its

- 16 -

If all went according to plan, Sue and Trev’s house sale would buy the French property, while ours would provide the funds for the build. It was a massive undertaking, a project that far exceeded our joint skills and as we were to find out, our budget as well.

The idea of wanting to keep our house as an insurance policy in case things went awry, and also to have an income, was flatly rebuked from my mother -in-law. If I didn’t sell the house ‘I wasn’t committed’, besides they needed the money for the build and living expenses. That was the first of many of my ideas that got rubbished, ignored or shelved, a line of arrogance that continued abroad, which isolated me into a party of one, with Emma firmly sat on the fence, not wishing to go against her parents.

I had worked in the building trade; I’m a professional roofer and can turn my hand to most things, I’m resourceful but untrained. Trevor had proved himself very handy at DIY, but to our detriment, he was a perfectionist who took his time, overengineered things and was hopeless at budgeting a pot of cash.

I didn’t foresee any of this in England; we all seemed to get along just fine. But as the old adage goes, you don’t truly know someone until you live with them.

When the idea of selling up and moving abroad first arose, I was adamantly opposed to it. I was enjoying life, had a very flexible job that allowed me the freedom to pursue music, my passion. I had a seven-piece function band that was doing great guns, working three or four nights a week and getting better and better-paid work. We had a nice little house that I’d worked hard on to make unique, including a loft conversion for my studio; I was recording decent original music with some fine musicians, had a new car, an eighteen-month-old baby and a couple of cats. I was content. Then Emma came home one day with an idea that she and her mum had concocted about packing it all in and relocating to France. I thought she was mad; she had a well-paid job in IT, a new car and a wide group of friends that she socialised with frequently. Why did she want to abandon all that we had, to kill a good thing on an ill-researched gamble? I mean none of us could speak more than a few words of French and none of us had any connection there.

Labarde fitted requirements perfectly and tinted our glasses a rosy hue. The setting was picturesque, the ambience intoxicating, the potential heady. In reality, it was a quixotic black hole for money and a living nightmare for me in waiting. Sue and Trev’s house sold rapidly and before you knew it they, my wife and daughter were all on a plane bound for Bergerac, leaving me to deal with our house sale, pay up all the debts, transfer the cash, send off our furniture, sell my car, finish my gig commitments, hand over the running of the band to my sax player, board our cats (plus the inlaws’ cat), obtain export licenses for them, have them inoculated and transport them and me across the channel. The residue from our house sale left us with just over a hundred thousand pounds. Sounds like a lot of money I know, one would imagine it should do nicely for a bit of renovation to an old barn, and things were cheaper in France, weren’t they? Wrong, paint for example is three times more expensive, and French paint is rubbish compared to good old Dulux. But this large sum of cash sitting restlessly in BNP Paribas was itching to be squandered and a large chunk of it fluttered away immediately on a brand new kitchen for the farmhouse, not that I had any say in that decision, it was deemed necessary, as was the new flooring in the bedrooms.

She gave me an ultimatum, either I went or she would take our daughter and go without me. That should have been a red light for the future, but I didn’t want to lose my wife and daughter so, over time and after a lot of inner conflicts, I relented. I’ve always been up for an adventure and I do relish foreign travel, so the appeal of an idle life in rural France, doing little more than drinking cheap wine, eating good food and tending a small holding in a kinder climate was enough allurement to seduce me. Against the judgment of others who tried to make me see sense, I broke it to the band that I was emigrating. - 17 -

I appreciate we had to live there and why shouldn’t we live in comfort, but come on, we had no income so surely the build should have taken precedence. Get the gites up and running so we had something to live on, we could have made do for a while. In retrospect, so many things should have been done differently, but naively I had this old fashioned respect for my elders who are intelligent people with experience so they must know better, right?

Our buyers had yet to complete, but after the furniture went, I couldn’t stay in my house anymore. Curling up on bare floorboards isn’t my thing, so I went and stayed with my best-friend Shane for two weeks, hence the cats being boarded. I’ve known Shane for more than thirty years; we’ve been in many bands together and written hundreds of songs. We’ve lived in America for a couple of years as well as back here in England for a time, we’re more like brothers and get up to all sorts of mischief when we’re let loose. At that time he was living with his partner and their daughter near Kings Langley in Hertfordshire.

Some points of note: It seems that the rural French in Aquitaine decorate their houses once when they first acquire property and that’s the way it stays until they either depart or shake off this mortal coil. Labarde’s orange and brown floral wall coverings were definitely a testament to this hypothesis and homage to the nineteen seventies. The wiring in the place was fascinating, any colour you like, and you became as nervous as a bomb disposal expert hovering over a wire with a pair of cutters, taking a long shot on which primary to cut. Plumbing too, all different sizes, reduced, expanded, copper, steel, plastic, running into each other, it’s a minefield.

Because Bergerac didn’t handle live animal transports I looked into the possibility of flying them out to Paris and picking them up from there, but that proved to be ridiculously overpriced, so the ferry won out. I bought a tired old Ford Escort intended just for the outward journey and then I had to cough up, not fur-balls, but a pretty penny for a ticket for each of the pussies. Three cages were purchased, blankets, food, etc; all in all three of them cost around six-hundred and fifty quid to get to France. When I did eventually leave, it became a trauma enough to test anyone’s resolve. Getting up at stupid o’clock to drive to the cattery, then on to the vets for the cats to be inspected prior to export, chipped and inoculated against rabies.

There was a British invasion happening at the time (early in the new millennium), and we deluded ex-pats would come along and say, “Ah, a ruin, I can do a lot with that!” And the builder’s merchants would rub their hands together so rigorously they chanced ignition. The way I understood it, traditionally French families would pass down their houses through the generations, but the modern French youngsters didn’t want them anymore, preferring to move into the larger towns and cities, into new low maintenance homes, leaving the old family seats empty and falling down. Estate agents in England were charging between one and one-point-five per cent on the sale of a house, whereas a French Immobillier would squeeze anywhere between six and ten per cent out of you, solely because of the rarity of sales. Then we Brits came along buying up all the wrecks and Agent Immobilliers were springing up faster than autumn mushrooms to cope with the incursion; they’d never had it so good. But I digress… - 18 -

The first thing to happen on the road was Tallulah, the in-law’s cat, decided that crapping in her cage was perfectly acceptable, forcing me to stop and clean out that insidious brown goo twice on the way down to Dover, whilst the utterly stressed out little black attack weapon attempted liberation. This nonsense made me miss the ferry and I had to wait an hour for the next one while the animals and their papers were scrutinized by customs officials. My passengers were utterly freaked out during this journey. None of them had spent much time in a car, it was like they’d been abducted; they cowered in their respective cages, statuesque in shock, refusing to eat or drink. Even though I stopped several times for rest periods and tried to assure them that Daddy was here and it wouldn’t be long now, they ignored me.

On my first full day in my new house, Flossy, the youngest of our cats, peed on the sofa; understandable really, new surroundings, traumatic journey; forgivable. We were keeping her in to accustomise her to her new home. Sue was having none of that and promptly threw her out. That night a horrendous thunderstorm blew up ionizing the air with electricity. The next day, the older cats were found cowering under a car, but Flossy was nowhere to be found. We searched the barns, the woods and fields for miles around; asked all the neighbours, scant though they were, to no avail. She had scarpered, frightened out of her poor little wits, never to return.

I marked a rough route out on a map with a biro, each objective town circled; all I had to do was follow road signs for the next interchange and I’d be alright, surely. However road signs sur le continent, don’t necessarily point in the appropriate direction, not directions that I’m accustomed to anyway So it was amidst the heavy traffic of Rouen, looking for a pointer towards Paris, that I found myself suddenly following a line of cars down into an underground car park. FFS came to my lips; I couldn’t comprehend how I’d got there. Circulating my way swiftly to the exit ramp I was dejectedly barred by a Barber’s pole barrier, with no ticket at hand, and three irate French drivers honking and fist waving behind me in the queue. Flustered, I had to convey with hand signals that they would all have to back up so I could park, buy a ticket and make my escape. That was a frustrating waste of thirty minutes of my life!

I did see her again though, around a year later coming back from a grocery shop in Villeneuve Sour Lot, she ran across the main road in front of me and I almost hit her. Breaking sharply I came to a halt, as she shot into the garden of an empty house to my left. I parked and gave chase, much to the bemusement of the man living next door and his three frantically barking dogs. I tried to explain in very garbled French that I was looking for my lost cat; he just gave the imitable Gallic shrug and let me jump over the padlocked gate. I was so looking forward to catching Flossy and bringing her home, it would have elated Emma, but she was nowhere to be found, I searched and called for a couple minutes, with Izzie all the time on my mind strapped in her booster seat in the back of the car out on the road. I couldn’t leave her any longer. I drove home excited, dropped of Izzie, then Emma and I went back for a more extensive search. We clambered all over the

I managed the rest of the journey without a hitch thanks to Red Bull and Pro Plus pills; but it took me a total of twenty-three hours door to door, and I was driving dangerously on the edge of sleep, arriving in the dark early hours really wired. Emma’s uncle Freddy had stayed up with her to greet me; he was over from the USA on vacation with his sister and her husband; they were the first of many guests to our hotel, over for a sun-blessed holiday.

- 19 -

grounds looking in the sheds and the cellar, in ridiculous places like dustbins and behind closed doors, to no avail, she’d legged it. We went back saddened, but at least our distinctive fluffy little cat was alive, she’d gone feral and had survived against all the odds. From my second day in I knew that this project wasn’t going to work; I was dealing with partners who were the polar opposite of me with old fashioned standards and narrow-minded goals. I was a vegetarian, a friend of the earth, idiosyncratic in their eyes, somewhat insignificant as far as having an opinion. But I’d made a commitment to this and was going to put in a hundred and ten per cent effort to get the gites finished. I’d spend a couple of weeks helping to shape up the farmhouse, then get cracking on the barn. It had to be gutted, walls ripped out, walls built, floors and ceilings created, walls plastered, window and door openings cut out, dormer windows, double glazing and patio doors installed. A sewage system, plumbing, electrics, staircases, kitchens and bathrooms installed; a massive veranda, swimming pool and pool house constructed. We had to get rid of an acre of concrete, landscape the grounds, wall off the gite complex, put in a car park, re-point the entire barn interior and exterior; decorate and furnish the place, all with no plans, schematics or architect drawings and very little experience. What could possibly go wrong? It was an overambitious undertaking and in hindsight, we could have done things in a myriad of different ways, including oddly enough, having an income. Emma and Sue could have got jobs, even if they went part-time, to bring in the housekeeping money at least, but at that point in time the thinking was that they didn’t have to, their input was housework, child care and meal making. We had two acres of field that could have been rented out

for camping, and we should have definitely scaled down our intentions by concentrating on building just one gite, getting that running and bringing in a wage before turning our attention to the others.

None of that raised its head; it was a full-on, blinkered, build the whole thing and “It’ll cost what it costs!” attitude. After a couple of weeks of nothing really happening, I was getting restless; I wanted to crack on with the project. It was a Sunday, I went into the dining room where Trevor was finishing his breakfast and asked him what he intended to do today, hoping he would, in a fatherly encouraging sort of way, say something like “Make a start on the barn old mate.” What he actually said was astounding and nasty “Do what I f… ing came here to do, put me f…ing feet up!” I was stupefied, I’d never witnessed this noxious side of him before; we’d always got on amicably. I supposed naively, our plan was obvious; get going with the build, create an income surely, what else was there, we weren’t on holiday! Perturbed and bewildered, I left the house and meandered over to the barn, entering through the massive oak doors into the dimly lit, straw littered, musty, interior, like I was chancing upon an abandoned fort defended by a swarm of dust mites. But this wasn’t a fantasy, this was our livelihood and I had better get started, even if I were to do it alone. For three days I toiled solo, demolishing the stalls, dragging out abandoned farm equipment and throwing anything we couldn’t re-use, which would burn, on to an ever-expanding bonfire heap in the old slurry pit. The sledgehammer that I took to the dividing wall of the milking parlour was having little effect; it was made of six-inch thick breeze blocks and covered with ceramic tiles, unmovable from the efforts of flesh and blood so a machine would have to be employed. - 20 -

When you don’t have a dumper truck to take away the spoil, it has to be done in a series of manoeuvres; dig out the soil, plonk it in a heap, move the machine, then move the heap again, and repeat until it is where you want it to be. Trevor, watching on and directing proceedings, was getting frustrated about how long I was taking operating the thing. I’d been on it about half an hour, hardly enough time to perfect a smooth dig, grab haul, swing, dump motion. He viciously flipped his lid at me, saying that was f…ing useless, that I was wasting precious time and money, condescending that the digger was expensive to hire and I was causing a longer hire period. I was furious, me wasting time, I’d been at it three days before he could be bothered to move, and I knew how much the bloody machine cost. And besides, it wasn’t me who threw six grand into the kitchen! I snapped. It takes a lot to wind me up, but this was uncalled for. I responded by launching the digger keys at him and saying “do it your f…ing self then!” before steaming off fully intending to quit the project there and then. I’d had enough of his snide comments and bullying tactics. I strode up to the vegetable plot that I had single handily created and got on with some weeding to vent my anger.

Eventually, Trevor put in an appearance. Perhaps he felt guilty, perhaps he was nagged into it, or perhaps he didn’t want me getting all the praise; I don’t know, but we had a conversation and decided that a mini digger was the way forward. We needed to excavate the dirt floors anyway, in order to create a concrete slab, a digger could easily knock down the stubborn wall, backfill the milking pit and perhaps rip up the concrete runway outside. There are many incidents that I can divulge pertaining to our sojourn in France, but for the purpose of this short, I’ll stick to just a few notable occasions, to try to create a flavour of what happened, and why I feel the way I do about the whole experience. Maybe in time, a more definitive memoir will emerge. The rented digger arrived on the back of a low loader and was duly dispatched. Neither of us had ever operated one before and the driver gave us little instruction, so it was going to be a steep learning curve. Briefly, to those unfamiliar with these machines, they have four leavers and two pedals inside the cab that make the hydraulic arm perform, its body rotate and the tracks to move back and forwards. It’s like learning to drive all over again, and a bit mind-numbing to start with, but had the prospect of being a lot of fun, boys with toys and all that.

Ten minutes later he came out hat in hand uncomfortably apologizing for being an asshole. Atonement thinly accepted I returned to the barn to carry on, where I took great delight in watching him erratically operate the machine, juddering and lurching, spilling the contents of the bucket trying to demonstrate how speedy he was. I had made more progress with less haste and he’d made himself look a twat.

We got it inside the barn and effortlessly pushed over the dairy wall, broke up the blocks and shoved them into the milking pit which was the easy bit; I think Trevor did that. Then we swapped over, the idea was to take out six inches of soil from the entire floor area of compacted earth, levelling off a raised corner at the rear. Shift all the spoil outside and dig footing trenches for the internal block walls.

I can only guess at the reasons for Trevor’s animosity towards me. Emma told me years later that he’d wanted her to marry her previous boyfriend, an Italian bloke with whom she’d owned a bar in - 21 -

Bologna, so I never really stood a chance from the off. Also, being a man in his mid-fifties who’d worked hard all his life, he was probably tired and looking forward to an easier life, whereas I was much younger and impetuous, and in a hurry to get things moving which lead me to rash decisions and ill-conceived moves. We were incongruous in many ways; he was a methodical perfectionist, while I tended to dive in and get things done, which wound him up. I was an environmentalist and a naturalist, where Trevor was embedded firmly in a nineteen sixties attitude of affluence and consumerism in spite of the damage it caused on the natural world.. We even manoeuvred out of sync; when working close together I’d go to move around him and he’d step in front of me, blocking me off, so I’d have to change direction. It happened so many times I thought he was doing it on purpose, it was ridiculous. When carrying something long or heavy, he’d pick it up with a different hand, making things twisted, so I’d change to suit him, but even my congeniality would annoy him, to the point where he’d test me just to see if I’d do anything he’d say, even if it was counterproductive. What was the point of that? Trevor was making the project unbearable for me, it got to the point where we weren’t speaking at all, cohabiting, working in the same building, constructing future dwellings without any plans, and now no communication as to how to proceed or what to do next, let alone putting our heads together to work out the best solution to tackle something neither of us had done before. I wasn’t used to it; I’d worked on

many building sites where there’s banter, you have a laugh, lark about and it gets you through the day. Not on this site though! I’m a very amicable bloke; I can tolerate most people and think ‘it’s just their way’, but Trevor’s belligerence was so unnecessary, it was harmful and stupid. We were wasting time and money. In the mornings we would both head off to the barn in our own time and get on with something we each deemed a priority and it became quite painful to have to ask him for assistance or to use his van to go and buy some materials. On top of that, he took great pleasure in observing me mess something up and then smugly say “I wouldn’t have done it like that!” What nonsense. We were in this together for the same goal; surely it would have been advantageous to give advice on a procedure that was obviously doomed to failure, not watch it go wrong, then scoff about it. The no talking thing totally baffled me; I thought that it might be some form of psychosis, because whenever we had people around, friends or visitors, it was back to the old pal’s act with me, like we were the best of mates, only to revert again to the silent treatment the second the people left. Looking back now I realise it was just his flawed personality, he was actually afraid of being seen to fail, so he’d pretend that all was well in our camp, when it certainly was not. I felt quite dejected when Emma’s Brother came out to lend a hand. He was a bricklayer, a brilliant help and much needed. He built all the block walls, helped with the concrete floor construction and pouring and constructed the swimming pool walls as well. Trev and I laboured for him two metres down in a hole in the ground, in August, - 22 -

from a fellow ex-pat called Ray, so all we had left in the way of transport was Trevor’s Mercedes Sprinter van, and we needed that most days for lugging materials back from builder’s yards and the girls needed to be mobile. My daughter, who was approaching two-years-old, was eligible to go to the primary school in Bourlens. When children are toilet trained in France they can go to school. It was brilliant, a mixed age group of around twenty kids, a three-course meal at lunchtime, a bed if they wanted a nap, and a lovely teacher. Taught in French of course, which Izzie seemed to understand, it was ideal. Plus Sue liked to up-sale French bric-a-brac on eBay and needed a vehicle to scour the provinces ‘Vide Greniers’, the French equivalent of a boot sale.

the hottest part of the year. It was sweltering, no wonder the French take their holidays in that month, I found it hard to sleep it was so relentless.

The minute Dean arrived I was ignored by Trevor like I wasn’t there at all and had to follow them around like a duckling trailing its mother, listening to them having a laugh and a joke without actually being present, it was damned uncomfortable. I think that I’ve gone on about Trevor enough to paint a picture of what it was like for me living there, and maybe I’ve portrayed him as a bit of a tyrant, but he absorbed so much of my time in France, like a spilt ink pot on blotting paper he left little space for anything else. He ruined something that could have been wonderful, but I’d just like to add that after analysing his bolshie, arrogant, show off personality I’ve come to realize he might also have seen me as competition. The vegetable plot for instance. Because nobody had made the slightest move toward growing anything for us, saving euro’s and tasting a whole lot better besides, I took it upon my self one rainy weekend to dig a plot down one side of the drive, 5m by 20m. It took me ages, digging up the turf, turning the ground, pulling out all the roots and weeds, raking and tilling, fertilising, mulching, sowing the seeds, putting up canes for the beans and peas, planting potatoes. I grew all the veg we could ever possibly need for a season with no help from anybody. Trevor went and dug his own allotment and grew some of the same things that I had started, so in the end, we had between us nearly a hundred tomato plants and scores of potatoes. It all grew so fast in that warm climate, that we had an abundance of food we could not possibly eat, or even give away because all the local people grew their own as well. So much was wasted and to top it all, the girls were still buying vegetables from the supermarket. It defied logic, I could have screamed!

When Sue wrote off the car one rainy day coming down a steep hill from Tournon, our first concern was to her wellbeing, of course. Thankfully she was okay, and you can’t help an accident, but I couldn’t help wondering why we had lashed out so much of our build money on a motor, only for it to be wrapped around a tree. The insurance paid out a pittance and we had to buy another car, this time something a lot older. Another overindulgence, in my opinion, was Trevor’s insistence on purchasing a ride on mower to keep the meadow down. What the hell for? We should be working on the project, not tending the bloody grounds! A six hundred euro rod for his own back, once he’d started cutting the acres of grass, that I would have preferred wild. He had to keep it up every night, going up and down, up and down, till it was dark, creating perfect green lines, using up gallons of petrol, while I was doing something far more practical and actually saving a few quid, growing food. I guess it made him happy, perhaps it was his ‘me time’, his sanctum for contemplation, maybe he just liked cutting grass. Ghosts: Our kitchen was almost a complete rectangle of cupboards and work surfaces, with just one corner, the space of a unit, left out for access. In effect, the kitchen/dining room was one long open plan room divided by the back of a row of units. The dishwasher next in line to the opening had popped a hose one day and needed to be pulled out from under the worktop to be re-connected.

We bought a newish car, a five-door Renault from a dealership in Tournon, a couple of years old I think it was and cost around eight thousand euro, a huge chunk of our resources. We’d swapped my old Escort for a few days labour - 23 -

I did this and was just pushing the machine back in when I felt, not saw, as if a child had rushed passed me. A change in air pressure perhaps or a sixth sense, I don’t know. Assuming it was my daughter I looked about the kitchen but nothing, I was alone. Shrugging, I carried on pushing the dishwasher home, then right behind me the cupboard door under the sink opened and slammed shut with a loud bang! It made me jump and ice ran up my spine; there was still nobody there.

her granddaughter had ‘poulet pox’, (deep, bewildering French accent in reply) “Poulet pox, poulet pox?”. It didn’t translate. Emma’s long-time friends Claire and Anne came to visit for a week. They both embodied the party lifestyle, good time girls on a mission. Claire had always been cerebrally challenged but was happy and bubbly most of the time; Anne was more of a fairweather friend, intelligent and quick-witted. Both were devout soloists. After a few days and copious amounts of wine, we started to see a change in Claire; she became more and more depressed as the week went on and by Saturday had evolved into a different human being entirely; a frighteningly weird individual, a stranger moping about our house saying the freakiest stuff, laughing hysterically one minute and crying the next. It was scary, a friend you’d known for years suddenly possessed by someone else. We hadn’t experienced it before, she was newly diagnosed, but this was her second ‘episode’ of a bi-polar condition. The Doctor was summoned, a kind mild-mannered chap in his sixties with a decent command of English. He examined Claire up in her bedroom, Emma and Anne were present when Claire, renowned for speaking her mind without a filter mechanism, duly informed the Doctor that he was to impregnate her! He took it in his stride and prescribed her a sedative. She stayed with us for a further uncomfortable week; it was like tiptoeing around a schizophrenic, she would claim to have no recollection of her alter ego as she switched between hyperactive loony and docile sloth. Eventually, her embarrassed Parents had to come out and escort her home.

The hand basin taps (faucets) in the lobby bathroom used to turn themselves on. Maybe it was faulty washers, but you could stand there and watch them slowly turn till they were quite full on so I doubt it very much Another time, in the still of a morning start, in the barn where I was quite alone, I could hear faint voices in the eaves; once again after checking all the rooms, there was no one around except me. I was the only one to experience anything remotely spooky at Labarde, so either I was loopy, or susceptible, you make your own mind up. The only other time I experienced anything revenant was way back in 1988 on the ghost train ride in Disneyland California. Sounds obvious I know, but this particular frightener wasn’t a part of the ride as far as I can rationalize. I was in a carriage with my four-year-old niece Abby, trundling along, subjected to plastic skeletons lurching out from the walls, cobwebs, rubber Bats, thunder and lightning, and echoed Hoo, ha, ha’s bellowing from the speaker systems. I was just thinking to my self this is so lame when a whispered male voice close to my right ear said: “Are you scared yet?” I twisted around convinced that there was someone standing behind us on the car, but there was nothing, just luminous paint rolling by on the back walls and the gentle clack of metal wheels on a metal track. The people behind us were too far away to have leaned forward and prank me, the voice absolutely didn’t come from a speaker cabinet either for I’d felt the breath on my ear. I was definitely scared then.

There weren’t many fun times to recollect; it was all work, eat and sleep for me, with Trevor’s joyless company. Perhaps that’s not fair, he did have a sense of humour, it just wasn’t the same as mine. I’d try and make light of something obscure in my left of field manner and he’d just say “what the f… are you on about!” at which point I’d wonder why I was trying. But there was an occurrence that was both funny and tragic at the same time.

My daughter contracted chicken pox so Sue swiftly descended upon the local Doctors surgery where she tried in vain with her poor French vocabulary to explain to the bemused man in the white coat that

The old farmer who’d once owned Labarde, Hubert, lived at the top of our drive on the opposite side of the road, in a very modest home, engulfed in a vegetable plot and a chicken coup. - 24 -

to exclaim that “Brigitte était morte”. Trevor and I both laughed, yes Brigitte was dead, we’d pulled the old shed down a few days ago, she was no more. He gave us a quizzical look, turned and trudged back up the drive. We learned quite sometime later that in fact the real Brigitte, from whom we’d bought the house, had tragically died in a freak Vietnamese ferry boat accident along with her daughter; they’d both drowned. Hubert must have been thinking these English are a callous sort of bastard, as he made his baffled way home that hot afternoon.

He would from time to time wander down the drive for a nosy and to see our progress on his old residence. On this particular day, I was busy constructing the roof timbers for the wrap-around veranda on two sides of the barn, using reclaimed oak we saved from the demolishing of two storerooms; one of them happened to be the tool shed we’d named Brigitte. Apart from the concrete base, Trevor hadn’t helped at all with this veranda, I had dragged the immensely heavy timbers round from storage, created staddle stones for the uprights to sit on, cut out holes in the barn walls for the rafters to rest into, lifted the monsters up into position using a series of stages and nailed the whole thing together before fixing the battens and eventually the tiles.

One chilly autumn morning, a Sunday I think, after breakfast, I meandered out through the conservatory onto the patio looking for inspiration. The sun had risen over the tree line and was busy vaporizing the overnight dew. To the right of our farmhouse, an old iron Aframe play swing planted in a patch of lawn appeared in need of some company. I hadn’t so much as perched on the neglected rusty old thing, let alone played on it, yet now, to play seemed like the most appropriate action to take.

I inspected it. The metal was solid, not too corroded, the hemp ropes connected to the wooden seat looked sturdy enough to take my weight. A test was in order. Gingerly lowering my posterior into position, both hands gripping the ropes, I kept my legs under me to take the strain. Only when I was convinced that the piece of apparatus was man enough for my 168lbs did I finally release the grip on terra firma. I started to swing, gently at first, I hadn’t done this in decades, the ropes groaned a little, they hadn’t seen any action for a long time after all. I went higher, shifting my weight forwards and backwards gaining momentum. Tournon came into view above the trees, to disappear on my decent, then reappear again on the backward rise. “There’s Tournon, there goes Tournon, there’s Tournon, there goes Tournon…” Thump! Inexplicably I was face down on the wet lawn, a dozen fine grass cuts had lacerated one cheek, my body was out of phase and I had a bizarre feeling of lost time. I have no recollection of the rope snapping, no indication that it might, no noise or replay of the fall, just a sudden awakening

Thinking about it, Trevor refused to even help with the dismantling of the old corrugated sheet lean to because “they are asbestos!” Yes, they were, but they had to go, so I wore a mask and goggles and took them all down alone. I think that they got buried under tons of earth when the landscaping was carried out. Back to the story, I was on top of one of these huge rafters, banging away when Hubert rocked up. He couldn’t speak a word of English, but my French had improved to a degree where I could understand the gist of a conversation. Trevor wandered over from whatever he was pottering about with and the “Bonjour”s commenced, followed by the obligatory “Ca va’s, then the old boy went on - 25 -

from an embarrassing face plant. Forty-one-year-old men shouldn’t play on children’s swings apparently. We met a number of expats, some of whom became firm friends. The intention, of course, was not to get embroiled with all the Brits there but to become French, meld with the locals, get into the system, but it’s impossible not to get involved. Another Brit will hear you talking in a store, especially new arrivals, and make themselves known to you. We’d get invited to a barbeque at their house and Bob’s your uncle, we’d have a new circle of enthusiastic renovators, desperate to show you their ruin and snag some advice. “Go home”, we should have said, “cut your losses”. Most of them went back eventually. One of the few characters that stood out and might actually still be living there is Sandy, a 280lb husky whispering hulk from Aberdeen. He was a digger driver who thankfully had two or three machines with him and put the word ‘Ken’ at the end of every sentence. “…Y’Ken?” Most of the time I didn’t. He had a pervy brother-in-law out there who happened to be called Ken, and I actually witnessed Sandy say one-time “Y’Ken, Ken?” Ken did and I still didn’t.

The leach pit is another story: Because the gite complex would eventually have up to nine toilets, possibly all flushing at the same time (you never know), it was decided to over-engineer the sewage system. Larger than recommended drain pipes were laid under the floor, which ran out of the building at the back, first into a cubic metre grease trap, then into a forty-five cubic metre block and concrete cesspit. The runoff from that piped out to a seventeen metre square by onemetre deep leach pit. The pit was one third filled with pea gravel that had to be laboriously hand shovelled into the back of the Sprinter, brought up from the builder’s yard at Tournon, and again shovelled out of the van into the pit. This took several trips and was monotonous.

Sandy looked like he could crush your windpipe with one hand, he was fairly humourless and had an icy cold blue-eyed stare, but he was as nice a fella as you could meet, to us anyway. And when it came to hiring his services to break up the concrete hard standing at the back of the barn, crush it, bury it, dig out the septic tank pit, the leach pit and the swimming pool, he was invaluable.

Slotted drain pipes were then laid on top of the gravel in a matrix system and connected to the cesspit. The idea was to cover over the pipes with more gravel and then topsoil and grass seed. But, it rained, and it rained, and it rained. The pit filled up to the brim, and the water stayed put, we had created a very expensive pond. The subsoil on our hill was clay; it held water like a freshly fired jug. What use was a leach pit that didn’t leach away the runoff water? We’d end up with a stinking quagmire.

After waiting in vain for a week for the water to dissipate, we called back Sandy, and had him to dig a trench from the side of the leach pit all the way down to our spiny, in effect, a drain for the drain. - 26 -

that he could eavesdrop on a pair of nesting owls, he had his own private Springwatch going on.

Gary, another character of terrific value, was in complete contrast to Sandy, a middle-class scarecrow from Surrey, and king hoarder of the world. Sue probably met him at a boot sale, where he was most often to be found. He would buy, scrounge, accept anything and everything. If you were throwing something on its last legs out the door, Gary would be round in his dilapidated Volvo and gladly lighten you of the burden; I mean he’d take away any old shit.

The months passed, the money pile was exhausted and the project was nowhere near completion. We’d delved into our credit cards for more materials, but they were close to being maxed out. With no income, we were coming to a grinding halt and the realization of having to kill the dream, sell up and move on loomed over us like a freezing black storm cloud.

His house, a lofty stone built semi-castle was hidden away up a long single track road on the opposite side of our valley. Exactly how much ground he had with it I could not tell, but he had several fields, a herd of goats and animals of all descriptions scattered about the ramshackle collection of buildings and pens, including three giant tortoises freely roaming around inside his living quarters, shitting where they pleased, and a hundred other assorted tortoises of various sizes in cupboards and alcoves, warmed by overhanging heat lamps. His fireplace was so big it could house a family of three, and the place was so unkempt, it made Steptoe’s front room look like a show home.

It broke my heart, I’d come to love this place, even with all the grief pressed upon me from my father-in-law. The countryside was glorious, the local people I had met warm and friendly, and outside of the build, life was relaxed and stress-free; the roads were almost void of cars, the days warmer and the summers longer. I didn’t want to leave, but after two years of wasted graft, it seemed I had no other option; I was the only one who could immediately jump into some paid work. We would place the house on the market; Trevor would carry on, aiming to finish at least one gite, whilst I sent money back to keep them all afloat. Emma could not leave her parents to struggle alone so she got a part-time job painting an acquaintance’s house, which would bring in something. Besides, I could stay with my brother in England rent free, whereas if she and Izzie came with me, we’d have to rent a house and that would defeat the object.

His collection of detritus and throw-outs was stacked high in many rooms; and it tickled me as to how he, his wife and family could possibly live in a junkyard such as this. The garden was crammed with broken down machines of various types each with a pile of rusting tools beside it where Gary had abandoned his attempt to repair the thing, apparently just walking away from it and on to the next folly. He had a half-finished new building quite close to his house that was supposed to be his gites in progress. It was filled to the gunnels with reclaimed and scrounged building materials and you just knew it was never, ever going to be finished. The rest of the grounds stretched out to its borders reminiscent of a dismantlers, he must have had six partly disassembled Volvo’s rotting on their axles, hoods up, wheels off, engines missing, you could have filled up half a dozen containers with all his old crap and the place would still look a mess.

As the Ryanair jet lifted off the tarmac at Bergerac-Roumanière and banked to the right over the wide green Dordogne river, I let the tears fall; it was the end of a gorgeous sacrament, an au revoir à un pays dont j'étais tombé amoureux. I couldn’t let anyone see, so continued to look out of the oval hole in the fuselage and watch with the sun stinging my eyes as France diminished beneath me. An old roofing friend gave me immediate work in Buckinghamshire; I lived on thirty pounds a week and sent the rest to France. It took nine months to sell Labarde; eventually, a couple from Manchester and her parents, the same set up as ours, bought it.

For all his eccentricities, I liked the chap, he was honest, no bullshit, and he loved all creatures great and small, so he was alright in my book. He’d even installed a camera up in the attic of his house so - 27 -

The pool was finished, so was one gite and all the landscaping and stone boundary walls, all they had to do was the relatively simple job of second fitting the remaining two gite shells. To be fair to Trevor he did a splendid job on the second fit to the large gite. Alone he laid all the floors, fitted the staircase, finished the stud walls, the plaster boarding, the tape and jointing, the kitchen and bathroom fitting, hung all the doors and did all the decorating to perfection. He also, with the aid of Ron the pool man, lined the swimming pool and finished off the pool area.

Financially we each got back the money we had shelled out for the property, the build and our living expenses, but when you consider my two years of lost wages, the increase in value of our house in England, plus the money I would have gotten from my band, I figured I was down around a hundred thousand pounds.

The place looks stunning now, it’s advertised online as beautiful holiday cottages in Southwest France that sleep’s up to eighteen people, and apparently is fully booked all year round.

My advice for anyone thinking of stepping off the hamster wheel and building a new life abroad; do your homework thoroughly, learn the language first (imperative) and know exactly what the costs are going to be on any building work you are planning on undertaking, then double it! Love the people you are planning on spending a lot of time with, I mean really adore them! Oh and have an income, even if you think you have a heap of cash sitting nicely in the bank to draw from, it will evaporate quicker than water on a sauna stone.

I have the experience and the memory of course, which is invaluable, but I was knocked back to the bottom of the pile again, severely out of pocket and very angry with my in-laws for instigating the whole thing. It’s still a very bitter pill to swallow.

What’s even more annoying, the blurb on their website reads like they’ve done all the renovation work themselves, our efforts obliterated. Thanks, guys! It brings a lump to my throat and sinking feeling in my stomach just writing about it. Our idea has turned out to be a stunning success, we just didn’t conduct our selves in an intelligent manner, and let petty grievances, blinkered ideals and the misuse of cash, foul up what could have been glorious.

Bon voyage. If you’d like to see how beautiful Labarde looks today, here’s a link: https://www.labarde.com

You can discover more about Anthony on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/anthony-randall - 28 -

A young man decided to become a great writer. When asked to define ‘great’ he said, “I want to write stuff that the whole world will read, stuff that people will react to on a truly emotional level, stuff that will make them scream, cry, and howl in pain and anger.” And, guess what, he fulfilled his dream. He now works for Microsoft writing error messages.

When I was a student I acted as a guide at a museum. A tourist came in and asked me about the dinosaur bones.

An old man was riding in the lift with two glamorous women. One woman took a perfume bottle out of her handbag and sprayed her neck. She turned to the other woman and said, “Romance by Ralph Lauren, £300 a bottle.”

“How old are they?” the tourist asked. “Three million years and six months,” I replied.

The other woman took a perfume bottle out of her handbag, sprayed herself and said, “Chanel No. 5, £400 an ounce.”

“Good heavens,” said the tourist, “how can you be so precise?” “Well,” I smiled, “the bones were three million years old when I started working here, and that was six months ago...”

The lift stopped and the doors opened. Then the old man stepped out and broke wind. As the doors closed he looked at the women and said, “Broccoli, £0.49 a floret.”

- 29 -

Imaginary Castles by Cyril Lucas Ronesa Aveela’s introductory blurb describes the strange distinction between novelist “planners” and “evolutionists”. In the case of my comic gothic historical romance “A Windy Night” I fell entirely into the latter category. I had not the slightest idea what it would be about, who the characters would be, or what might become of them. I had some general notions; the romantic background of ancient castles, the ‘tipping point’ of the close of the 17th century when British society stood on the threshold of the vast transformation to come in the industrial revolution, and the birth of social conscience which eventually resulted in the welfare state. Such themes are serious but they are not obtrusive because they are illustrated rather than stated - woven into the adventure through a wealth of interesting historical information. I wanted my story to be fast-paced, humorous, optimistic and enjoyable to read as escapism from the dire prevailing gloom of 21st century politics. One reviewer has called it ‘a delightful romp’ and I am more than happy with that description. Castles naturally featured prominently in the Victorian historical novels of Sir Walter Scott and Maurice Hewlett (does anyone read ‘The Forest Lovers’ today?) but more strikingly have emerged as icons in some of my favorite fantasy literature. My wife gave me Robert Silverberg’s wondrous saga “Lord Valentine’s Castle” as a present before our engagement and in so-doing rightly confirmed my favorable opinion of her exceptional suitability as wife; leading also to our son’s nomination. I have delighted in more than one reading of Mervyn Peake’s extraordinary “Gormenghast” – the ultimate imaginary castle, almost a city in extent, populated by a cast of wildly eccentric characters which dominates gothic Castle conception and achievement. - 30 -

I recommend both without reservation. It is said that ‘castle books’ originated in Walpole’s “Castle of Otranto” (1764), which - unbelievably to my mind has run into more than 150 editions and is still in print in several - because it is really extremely boring. I would simply say unless you are a serious student of literary history … don’t bother! As regards the evolution of “A Windy Night” what Ronesa calls ‘magic’ is that the story was told to me by the characters each in their turn. When I wondered what came next, I waited till next day and someone came forward to tell me exactly what followed: they were all entirely real to me. They hardly ever led me off course and created many internal links to create structure. Of course Lady Lucy dominates. Led on in her imagination by her real-life heroine Lady Mary Wortley-Montagu she emerges – as I think of it from her chrysalis to become a beautiful butterfly – and rises dauntlessly to all the challenges which await her arrival as a new bride in the Isle of Purbeck. I will not reveal their nature because that would spoil my story and I really want you to enjoy its many twists and turns and surprises.

I Love to Play Rugby Submitted by Poppy Flynn I love to play Rugby By Shane (Age 8)

eady to start the game, after our team huddle mpire blows the whistle, the game is in full play

etting ready for the pass to come my way lazing past the other team, stepping left and right es! I have scored the try, my team are the winners tonight

- 31 -

Classic Movies: Serpico By Hannah Howe The story was filmed on the streets of New York City and the real-life Frank Serpico looked on during the filming. However, Sidney Lumet considered that Serpico’s presence on the set would distract and inhibit the actors, especially Al Pacino, and so he was asked to leave. In real-life, Frank Serpico grew his beard and hair, totally altering his appearance from clean-cut police officer to shaggyhaired hippy hero. In the film, this change of appearance was depicted by filming the scenes in reverse order, gradually trimming a hirsute Al Pacino as the scenes moved back in time. Frank Serpico testified before the Knapp Commission, a government inquiry into N.Y.P.D. corruption. The inquiry sat between 1970 and 1972. On resigning from the police force Serpico was awarded the Medal of Honor and a disability pension. With his police career over, but his integrity intact, he moved to Wales and then Switzerland.

Serpico was based on Peter Maas’ biography of New York Police Department officer Frank Serpico, who went undercover to expose corruption in the police force. Directed by Sidney Lumet and starring Al Pacino, the film was released in 1973 and was a great commercial and critical success. Furthermore, Al Pacino won his first Golden Globe award for Best Actor in 1974 for his portrayal of Frank Serpico. Indeed, critics proclaim that the role of Frank Serpico is one of the highlights of Al Pacino’s career. The film covers twelve years in the life of Frank Serpico, from 1960 to 1972. During his career, Serpico uncovered mass corruption in the N.Y.P.D. and he exposed this corruption to the authorities. However, far from being grateful and supportive they turned their backs on Serpico, exposing him to harassment and persecution. This harassment and persecution culminated in a shooting, when Serpico was wounded in the face during a drug raid on the 3rd February 1971.

- 32 -

Mate in 2 - and it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t start with a check or capture! Supplied by Chess.Com Although checks and captures are the best forcing moves, sometimes just the THREAT of checkmate is also forcing. Just make a move that prepares a checkmate on the next move. Often your opponent can prevent it, but in this position, he has no defense.

- 33 -

The Case of the Sour Wine By Dennis Maulsby

he digital temperature gauge in the dash of the pickup read fifty-six degrees, up from the overnight low of forty. It was October in Iowa and the temperature rolled up and down the scale seemingly at random. Fluctuations of thirty degrees or better could occur even within a single day. Father Donahey wasn’t used to such radical changes. His native Ireland could get chill, but the climate stayed reasonable due to the warm ocean currents kissing its island shores. That and his many years in the hot humidity of South American parishes left him with no comprehension of the prairie winter to come. He wondered whether he had made the right decision in retiring to the town of Winterset, Iowa.

The 4 x 4 Ram truck hit a bump in the gravel road and brought the elderly priest out of his reverie. “Well, Father, as I said, I hope you can help us. On the twenty-fifth, we’ll be hosting Octoberfest at the winery. Our finances will be in deep doodoo if we fail. It has taken twenty years of backbreak- ing work to cultivate the finest grapes and ferment the most prize-winning wines in the state. Now we’re about to lose it all.” “Bruno Kurz, I can hardly credit your story. It seems incredible.” “I know, Father, and if we weren’t desperate we wouldn’t lay this at your feet. My wife, one of your parishioners, insisted you’d be the man to consult.”

On top of it all, his brain measured in Celsius, not the foreign Sassenach Fahrenheit. Numbers rattled and spun in Fa- ther Donahey’s head. He had tried to memorize the conversion forFather Donahey knew Ailene mula but doing math in his head had as a member of St. Joseph’s never been his forte. Finally, Father congregation. She’d married Brown, the younger priest, had pulled out of the faith and out of her a conversion chart off the Internet for his use. His Irish bloodline. Ailene’s husband Bruno was of Gerfellow father also warned him of the dangers of the man de- scent and a Lutheran. Well, times change, coming season with below zero temperatures, raghe thought. The day when a non-catholic spouse ing blizzards, and deadly winds. Any one by itself was required to convert or at least promise to raise was bad enough, but the hybrid ferocity of any two any children in the faith was gone. Given the old or all three in combination could be killing. As the country history of religious bigotry, wars, and conmore experienced colleague, Father Brown had takflicts, perhaps it was for the best. en him to the local WalMart to outfit him with long “Well, tell me the story again and leave nothing underwear, flannel-lined jeans, sweaters, a polyesout.” ter-quilted parka, and Gore-Tex lined gloves and boots. - 34 -

“We assembled it in the cellar, covered it with a quilt, and baited it with a bowl of our best rosé. The screeching and yowl- ing that tumbled us out of our bed at 3:00 in the morning let us know we’d captured something.”

“It was like I said. Our wine has made great headway in the last decade, winning prizes and competing with California and European vintages. We are one of almost a hundred licensed wineries in Iowa. At one time, before Prohibition, the state was the sixth largest wine producer in the country. The industry is finally coming back with help from Iowa State University, which has developed the cold-hardy grapes needed.”

Bruno stopped talking. Frowning, he gulped and continued. “Inside the cage, kicking and spitting, was a little man, not one and a half feet in height, dressed all in mottled green clothing.” Father Donahey shook his head and furrowed his brows. It made no more sense hearing the story’s punch line a second

A gust of driven air whistled as it enveloped the vehicle’s side mirrors. Shreds and pieces of cornshucks juggled by the wind rasped over the truck’s blue pearl paint. Donahey shifted his eyes from the miles of yellow-brown corn stubble rolling past to his companion. “Bruno. You don’t need to sell me on the industry. We stock your gold-medal shiraz and silver-medal merlot in the rectory pantry. Let’s fast -forward to the important part.”

time than it did the first. “We were astounded, of course. Ailene was even more shocked when she recognized a few of the words the midget was spouting as Gaelic. That’s when she insisted I fetch you.” The Dodge truck thumped over a cattle guard, ground its way up a sun-bleached asphalt-paved driveway, and came to a stop at the double front doors of the winery. The stoop and two dozen picnic tables in the outside area were festooned with pumpkins, gourds, and fake vines. A platform with tri- pod-mounted speakers stood waiting for the bands the couple had booked for the fall celebration. The building itself rose one story from the ground with a long slanted shake-shingled roof and mustard-colored rough-plastered walls. From the porch, Donahey could see parallel lines of pruned grape vine trunks stretching in long rows over the rolling hills of the farm.

“It was Ailene that noticed the problem two months ago. Our new computer-based inventory system kept reporting shortages — gallons of wine missing. Much more than spillage or evaporation would account for. We investigated and quickly dismissed employee pilferage. Our efforts remained at a stand - still until one of our viticulturist assistants reported noticing a fast-moving shadow among the great storage barrels. We put closed-circuit cameras in the cellar. When Ailene and I viewed the recordings, we spotted a small animal fiddling with the kegs.” Father Donahey raised his hands. “And that was when you placed a trap.”

Bruno continued his tale as they departed the truck and stepped up to the porch. He reached for a brass doorknob in the shape of a horse’s head. “And on top of it all, Father, the wine and the craft beer we brewed for the festival went bad. The wine turned into vinegar and the beer developed such a vile aftertaste you cannot drink more than one gulp. We will be ruined. You have got to help us.”

“Right you are. We ordered a Havaheart model #1081 through Amazon.”

A figure of a large-bosomed woman dressed in armor and pulling back a bow appeared in Father Donahey’s mind. He quickly dismissed the image.

- 35 -

H Father Donahey sat in an antique crosscut oak rocker, elbow on one of the chair’s arms, chin held in his right hand. He stared at the cage and its occupant, now free of the disguising quilt. The creature inside stared back. Legs splayed out in front of him, the captive sat in a box 42” x 15” x 15” made of twelve-gage steel mesh. His dimen- sions true to Bruno’s description: about eighteen inches tall with head, chest, and limbs in proportion. Donahey sniffed; the creature’s body scent similar to fresh-cut hay. However, the breath that whiffed across the space between them a not-so- nice combination of old stale wine and tobacco smoke. The staring contest took place in an underground chamber that ran the length and breadth of the building. A ramp at one end led to a set of doors, which could be opened to load trucks. Around three -quarters of the room’s perimeter stood brown wooden casks, double stacked, one above the other. The remaining wall space held floor to ceiling racks. Hundreds of nondescript long-necked bottles sheathed in brown corrugated paper wrappers lay on their sides, nested on the shelves. A line of fourlamp fluorescent fixtures fixed to the ceiling provided bright warm light. The room was dry and cool; Father Dona- hey guessed 20 to 22 Celsius degrees. Bruno and Ailene had explained the aging wine must be protected from ultraviolet light, humidity, and heat. The couple had provided a wool tartan shawl to warm his shoulders and left him to examine the problem. The little man in the cage continued to stare back, arms crossed and the col- lar of his cutaway jacket turned up. A shirt bound at the neck with a string tie, vest, trousers, and scarred brogans

all in various shades of emerald green completed his outfit. Everything sized to fit a human toddler. Father Donahey decided to wait the creature out. Fifteen minutes passed. The being’s tiny lips pressed together. He stroked his beard, sighed, and spoke. “Dia duit, Sagart.” It is Gaelic all right, Donahey thought. He reached deep into his memory and translated the English — good day, to you, stranger — and replied “Dea-lá a thabhairt duit, choim- hthi-och.” The little man squinted up his eyes and made a nasty ges- ture with his fingers. “Tá mé aon choimhthiock anseo.” “So, you are not a stranger here. You must tell me the entire story. But first, my Gaelic is that of a child’s recollection, and it’s been fifty years since I used it last. Do you speak English? An bhfuiil Béarla agat?”

“Ter be sure, Oi speak the local tongue. Do ye think me a fool?” “Tell me who you are.” “Well now, that’s fer me ter know and ye ter find out.” Donahey noticed that the little fellow had crosshatched burn marks matching the cage grating on the back of one hand and his left cheek. “How did you get those burns? Do you need first aid?” “Oi’m afraid iron an’ me kind have a great dislike fer each other. Let me out, an’ Oi’ll be treatin’ me own wounds.” Deciding to brave the question, Father Donahey threw out the most pressing thought, “Do we have a leprechaun here? One who cannot use his magic when surrounded by cold iron?” “Oi was greedy … an’ shit-faced. The champion rosé — a great temptation.”

- 36 -

Donahey gave voice to a thought that had been bouncing in the back of his mind. “Can we make a deal here? One to benefit all parties.”

“So, you have been hiding in the basement, stealing wine, and now taking your vengeance on an innocent, hard-working couple. They are about to lose their entire life’s work due to a demon sponging off their achievements.”

A clever smile fastened on the leprechaun’s face. “Let me out an’ all will be well.” The tales of his boyhood returned. Making a deal with such folk required clear thinking about the consequences. The little people would honor the letter of their deals, but you could not leave them any wiggle room in the language. Father Donahey pulled out his Meerschaum pipe and tobacco pouch.

“Now, now, Father, suren it’s a fact that Oi’ve paid me way. Me powers have made the grapes grow sweet, adjusted the blend of juice, and perfected the fermentation. Oi’ve even kept away the blight and the fungus that thrives in this wet land. Do ye think that pair a’ blunderin’ blockheads would have won all those medals without me?”

“Let’s start with your name.”

“And the missing gallons of wine?”

The little man licked his lips and drew a miniature hand- made corncob pipe from a vest pocket. “The answer ter that question will cost ye a filled pipe.”

The little fellow wiggled bushy eyebrows. “Only fair rewards for me work.”

Donahey took the little man’s corncob, filled its acorn-sized bowl, and handed it back. Clicking open his ancient Zippo he sucked flame into the Meerschaum. The scent of rum-fla- vored smoke filled the room. The leprechaun stuck his pipe out through the mesh. Donahey held the lighter, yellow -blue flame flickered. “I am Father Patrick Ignatius Donahey and, your name?”

“And the turning of wine and beer into undrinkable dregs?” “Tis a tragedy, such as the bard William used ter write. With me imprisoned behind cold iron the drink turns into what it would be without me.” “So, if we let you out, the contents of bottle and keg would return to their original state.” “Aye, with a wave of me hand.” The little man demon- strated. A tiny finger hit the side of the cage. A puff of smoke emerged, “Ouch!” He sucked on the wound.

With a disgusted look, the captive said, “Tis Bleery,” “The entire name, please.” Father Donahey moved the lighter closer. “Bleery Merry O’ Lanigan.” “Your age and birthplace?”

“That reminds me, what about the three wishes? If a human captures a leprechaun, isn’t the sprite bound to grant wishes? And what about the rumored pot of gold?”

Bleery puffed out smoke. “At me last birthday Oi was one thousand. In yer years, Oi’m in me twenties. Born and raised in County Cork an’ came ter this country durin’ the famine. An’ a nasty rough ocean trip it was.”

“Bah, strictly human additions ter the legend. If Oi had a pot of gold, Oi’d be rentin’ in Trump Tower an’ eatin’ off room service an’ callin’ the escort agencies. Me one an’ only great talent is makin’ things ferment.”

The two smoked and enjoyed some quiet time. Bleery broke the silence. “Ye know, suren it would be grand if we had a bit of spirit ter share — like - 37 -

what’s in that flask in yer side pocket.” Father Donahey’s eyebrows went up. Well, why not, thought the priest. It might even make the leprechaun easier to deal with. He pulled out the screw top, leather-bound flask and took a swig. The Templeton Rye went down smoothly. He found a drinking straw among the festival supplies on a nearby table, which allowed Bleery to take a pull without touching the cage mesh. “Aye, that be splendid stuff. Now, about our business prop- osition, Oi’m thinking’,’ a straightforward approach. Ye let me out, I fix the wine an’ beer, an’ all is forgiven.” “And what’s to prevent you from taking revenge, or running off and leaving the deserving couple with disaster? Now here is my thought: We let you out, you restore the spirits, and you convert to Catholicism. As a good Christian, you would have to obey The Golden Rule.”

Bleery’s lips tightened. He shivered. Tiny drops of sweat appeared on his forehead. Brows furrowed, then relaxed. His arms uncrossed. “Father, Oi can tell yer a fair man. Let me propose a wee contest. If ye win, Oi’ll do as ye please. If Oi win, ye let me go with no obligation.” “What did you have in mind?” “We tell jokes, Irish jokes. A warm-up round an’ then two out of three ter win.” Father Donahey figured he had had many years of telling funny stories in his homilies, lectures, and sermons. He had a whole box of joke books stored back at the church collected over the years. Besides, if he lost they would be no worse off. In addition there was a soul to save here — perhaps his first convert in this new land. “Okay, I’ll do it. Let’s flip a coin to see who goes first.”

Leprechaun cheeks, nose, and lips formed a look of hor- ror. He folded his arms across his chest. Beard f lapping in his haste to reply, he said. “If Oi did that, Oi’d turn into one of yer big-boned, largeassed, short-lived humans. No, no, not fer me.” “Then your chances of leaving that cage are greatly diminished. Of course, we could turn you over to the scientists at Iowa State University. They’d love to have a test subject like you. I can see it now. A cluster of whitecoated men and women taking blood samples, doing x-rays, poking and prodding. A healthy life it will be with no booze, no evil tobacco, and balanced meals. Of course, at some point there would be the dissection. School officials might even be pleased enough to compensate the Kurz couple for their losses.”

“Bejiggers, if ye ain’t a sportin’ man.” Bleery tossed a coin through the mesh. Donahey checked both sides. On one face of the patinaed metal was stamped a profile of Nero, the Roman emperor of around 60 AD. He scratched the surface with a fingernail, revealing gold color. He frowned and looked with lowered eyebrows at the leprechaun. - 38 -

Catching the priest’s thoughts, Bleery responded. “Tis one of a kind, an aureus. Me grandfather found it long ago in the ruins of Vindolanda close up to Hadrian’s Wall.”

“You call it — heads or tails. The loser goes first.” Donahey flipped the coin. A shout of “Heads!” came from the leprechaun. Donahey slapped the coin on the back of his wrist. He raised his hand. “Tails it is. I start the warm-up round.” The Father began his story. “Now, Michael Hoolihan was courting Frances Phelan. The young couple sat in the parlor of the girl’s house night after night, much to the annoyance of old man Phelan. One night he couldn’t take any more. Stand- ing at the top of the stairs, he yelled down, ‘Daughter, what’s that young fella doin’ here all hours of the night?’ ‘Why, Dad, ‘said Frances, ‘Michael was just tellin’ me everythin’ that’s in his heart!’ ‘Well, next time,’ roared Phelan, ‘just let him tell ye what’s in his head, an’ it won’t take half as long!’” The Leprechaun chortled. “Now, that’s a goody but an oldie. Here’s a better.” “For a holiday, Mulvaney decided ter go ter Switzerland ter fulfill a lifelong dream to climb the Matterhorn. He hired a guide an’ just as they neared the top, the men were caught in a snow slide. Three hours later, a Saint Bernard plowed through ter them, a keg of brandy tied under its chin. “Hooray!” shouted the guide. ‘Here comes man’s best friend!’ ‘Yeah,’ said Mul- vaney. ‘An’ look at the size of the dog that’s bringin’ it!’”

“You lost, so you start.” replied Bleery, clapping his hands. “Okay, how about his one. Father Murphy walks into a pub

in Donegal, and says to the first man he meets, ‘Do you want to go to heaven?’ The man said, ‘Oi do, Father.’ The priest said, ‘Then stand over there against the wall.’ Then the priest asked the second man, ‘Do you want to go to heaven?’ ‘Certainly, Father,’ was the man’s reply. ‘Then stand over there against the wall,’ said the priest. Then Father Murphy walked up to O’Toole and said, ‘Do you want to go to heaven?’ O’Toole said, ‘No, Oi don’t Father.’ The priest said, ‘I don’t believe this. You mean to tell me that when you die you don’t want to go to heaven.’ O’Toole said, ‘Oh, when Oi die, yes. Suren, Oi thought ye were gettin’ a group together ter go right now.’” The Leprechaun pursed his lips and winked. “Not bad, not bad at all.” He launched into his next joke. “McQuillan walked into a bar an’ ordered martini after martini, each time removin’ the olives an’ placin’ them in a jar. When the jar was filled with olives an’ all the drinks downed, the Irishman started ter leave. ‘S’cuse me,’ said a customer, who was puzzled over what McQuillan had done. ‘What was that all about?’ ‘Nothin’, said the Irishman, ‘me wife just sent me out fer a jar o’ olives.’” “Those are close to a tie,” Father Donahey said. “Search your heart, Father. You know mine was the better.” “Okay, you have the first round.” As the loser, the priest began the second round.

Father Donahey chuckled, “Well, I have to admit you bested me on that one. Let’s go to the first round.” - 39 -

‘No.’ ‘Well then,’ said the Father, ‘You’ll not be forgiven.’ When the lad met his companion outside the friend asked, ‘So, did ye find forgiveness?’ ‘No,’ said the other, ‘but Oi picked up three good prospects!’”

“Brenda O’Malley is home as usual, making dinner, when Tim Finnegan arrives at her door. ‘Brenda, may I come in?’ he asks. ‘I’ve somethin’ ter tell ye.’ ‘Of course, ye can come in, yer always welcome, Tim. But where’s me husband?’ ‘That’s what I’m here ter be tellin’ ye, Brenda. There was an accident down at the Guinness brewery....’ ‘Oh, God no!” cries Brenda. ‘Please don’t tell me....’ ’Suren I must, Brenda. Your husband Seamus is dead an’ gone. I’m sorry.’ Brenda reached a hand out to her side, found the arm of the rocking chair by the fireplace, pulled the chair to her, and collapsed into it. She wept for many minutes. Finally, she looked up at Tim. ‘How did it happen, Tim?’ ‘It was terrible, Brenda. He fell into a vat of Guinness Stout an’ drowned.’ ‘Oh, my dear Jaysus! But ye must tell me true, Tim. Did he at least go quickly?’ ‘Well, no Brenda... no.’ ‘No?’ ‘Fact is, he got out three times ter pee.’”

The joke produced no response from the Father, not even a smile. “Oh, oh,” said Bleery, “Oi think Oi lost that round.” “That you did. The score now is one to one. Since you lost you need to go first.” The leprechaun bit his lower lip, knuckled his forehead, and took a full minute to prepare. “Two leprechauns went ter the convent an’ begged an audience with the Mother Superior. ‘Well, how can I help you little people?’ asked Mother Superior. The larger and more intelligent of the leprechauns asked, ‘Oh Mother Superior, would ye be knowin’ of any midget nuns here at the convent?’ ‘No,’ says Mother Superior, ‘I don’t have any midget nuns here at the convent.’ ‘All right then, Mother Superior, would ye be knowin’ of any midget nuns in all of Ireland then?’ ‘No, no,’ replied Mother Superior, ‘I don’t know of any nuns who are also midgets in all of Ireland at all.’ ‘Well then, Mother Superior, in all of nundom, in the whole world of all nuns, would ye be knowin’, then, of any midget nuns?’ ‘No, I would not, there are no midget nuns in the whole of the world!’ replied Mother Superior, an’ would you please tell me what this is all about?’ The askin’ leprechaun turned sadly ter the stupid leprechaun an’ said ‘See, tis as Oi told ye all along, ye’ve been datin’ a penguin.’”

Slapping his knee, Bleery’s chuckle turned into a long stut- tering laugh, joined by Father Donahey’s. A male voice shouted down from the upstairs. “Are you two all right?” Donahey answered, “Bruno, we’re fine. Situation on the way to resolution, need a few more minutes.” The door shut. “Okay, Bleery, your turn.” “Well, Father, remember our agreement, if Oi win this round, Oi get me freedom. This is one of me best. Two Irish lads had been out shackin’ up with their girl friends. One felt guilty an’ decided he should stop at the church an’ confess. He went into the confession booth an’ told the priest, ‘Father, Oi have sinned. I have committed fornication with a lady. Please forgive me.’ The Father said, ‘Tell me who the lady was.’ The lad said he couldn’t do that an’ the Father said he couldn’t grant him forgiveness unless he did. ‘Was it Mollie O’Grady?’ asked the Father. ‘No.’ ‘Was it Rosie Kelly?’ ‘No.’ ‘Was it that red-headed wench Tessie O’Malley?’

Donahey smiled and spoke, “It’s not an old Irish joke, since they didn’t commonly know about penguins long ago. But it’s reasonably funny. Let’s see what I can do.” “Padraic Flaherty came home drunk every evening toward ten. Now, the Missus was never too happy about it, either. So, one night she hides in the - 40 -

“Pat and Mike were city employees an’ one warm day they were workin’ on street repair. Just across the street was a house of prostitution. As they worked, they saw the Baptist minister walk down the street an’ enter the house. Pat says, ‘Mike, suren did ye see what that dirty hypocrite of a Baptist minister just did? He went into that house of ill repute.’” Mike shook his head and said, ‘Yer can never tell what ye might see around here.’ A few minutes later, a Methodist preacher walked up an’ entered the house. Pat slaps his head with his hand, and says, ‘Mike, did ye see that? Did ye see what that heathen Methodist just did? Suren, he went into that house.’ Mike just shook his head an’ said, ‘What’s this world comin’ ter?’ A bit later Father O’Brien, from their parish, entered the house, an’ Pat said, ‘Mike, tis like Oi been tellin’ ye, there’s somebody sick in that house.’ ”

cemetery and figures to scare the bee-jeezus out of him. As poor Pat wanders by, up from behind a tombstone she jumps out in a red devil costume screaming, ‘Padraic Sean Flaherty, suren ye don’t give up yer drinkin’ an’ it’s ter Hell I’ll take ye.’ Pat, undaunted, staggered back and de- manded, ‘Who the hell are ye?’ To that the Missus replied, ‘I’m the divil, ye damned old fool.’ To which Flaherty remarked, ‘Damned glad ter meet ye sir, I’m married ter yer sister.’ ”

Father Donahey had been waiting for this moment, his final joke already selected from the beginning. He hoped it would do. This last one of Bleery’s would be difficult to beat.

Bleery’s hands trembled. He let out a half hiss, half titter. “Oi like it, but Oi can’t make up me mind. It seems like a tie ter me. We need ter go another round.”

Sweat soaked through his shirt and into the armpits of his jacket. He removed the shawl and laid it aside. He clasped his hands together for a brief silent prayer, whispered “Amen,” and crossed himself. He began his last joke of the last round with a voice increasing in confidence.

“I think I had the edge on you this round, but not by much. To be absolutely fair, I’ll agree to a substitute round. The score remains one-to-one. You first.’ With a wan smile and a bit of despair in his voice Bleery launched into his next joke.

- 41 -

“As soon as she had finished convent school, a bright young girl named Lena shook the dust of Ireland off her shoes and made her way to New York where, before long, she became a successful performer in show business. Eventually she returned to her hometown for a visit, and on Saturday night went to confession in the church, which she had always attend- ed as a child. In the confessional, Father Sullivan recognized her and asked about her work. She explained that she was an acrobatic dancer, and he wanted to know what that meant. Lena said she would be happy to show him the kind of thing she did on stage. She stepped out of the confessional and within sight of Father Sullivan, she went into a series of cartwheels, leaping splits, handsprings, and back flips. Kneeling near the confessional, waiting their turn, were two middle-aged ladies. They witnessed Lena’s acrobatics with wide eyes, and one said to the other: ‘Will ye just look at the penance Father Sullivan is givin’ out this night, an’ me without me bloomers on!’”

Donahey made a grab. The buttons on the leprechaun’s shirt popped off. He rolled his shoulders, leaving the shirt in the hands of his pursuer. “Bejiggers, man, will ye strip me buck naked?” The two danced back and forth, Donahey keeping his smaller quarry from gaining the exits at either end of the aisle. The little man turned and dove between the stacked wine casks, his small size allowing him sanctuary. Donahey stretched an arm into the space. Bleery slapped it away. He slipped off his suit coat and tried again. This time the imp bit his index finger. Donahey jerked back his arm. “Well, suren if we don’t have a standoff Father.” Donahey pressed his lips together and retrieved the bottle of holy water from his coat. “Tis not as much of a standoff as you might believe, me bucko.” The priest unscrewed the cap. He began to recite a blessing and squeezed the plastic bottle, spraying its contents over the trapped sprite.

There was a choking noise; the leprechaun’s body was shak- ing. Both hands covered his mouth. Father Donahey laughed aloud. The contagious mirth beat down the last of Bleery’s re- sistance. A great bray of a guffaw announced his surrender.

Donahey retrieved a bottle of Evian water from the supply table and blessed it. He opened the cage door. Bleery danced out and dodged between his legs. The Father grabbed his col- lar. The imp pulled his arms out and left the jacket in the priest’s hands.

Father Donahey sat in his favorite leather wingback chair, a journal open on his lap. He had taken to writing down his experiences with the supernatural. So far, there were two separate cases, the first featuring a Pooka, the second a leprechaun. The adventures had avoided disaster and seemed to work out in the end.

“Hold now, you need to live up to your promise.”

He mused about the ending of the latest story. The little man had lost the joke contest and emerged from his cage to be converted and blessed. No longer submerged in magic, in a few months he put on weight and grew into a healthy human male five foot four inches tall. The ex-sprite had kept his talent

The little man ran past the stacked wine barrels, the priest in close pursuit, and shouted over his shoulder. “Oi will Father, but we didn’t say when Oi would convert. Like O’Toole in the story, Oi’m not ready to go yet.”

- 42 -

for fermenting wine. Donahey thought of it as the ‘green thumb’ some humans seemed to possess. Plants of all kinds grew large and productive in the presence of those blessed with the talent. Lacking the ability, Father Donahey had always thought of it as a form of magic.

The priest in Father Donahey looked forward to hearing some interesting confessions from the former leprechaun in the future. He closed the journal and knocked out the dot- tle remaining in his pipe into a woven bamboo wastebasket. He finished the last drops of the winery’s prize merlot in the glass on his side table, rose, and walked over to his old roll top desk. The journal went into a drawer locked with a key. He rattled down the top and locked it as well. Donahey stretched his arms wide, yawned, and left the rectory study. On his way upstairs to bed, he wondered again how this fertile land could grow such wondrous crops, people, and enchantments.

Recognizing his contribution, the Kurnz’s had given Bleery a share in the business. Their Octoberfest was a great success. The three of them formed a fine partnership and the winery continued to prosper. Bleery (now known by his baptized name Blair) had also retained his gift of gab, and when the glamour was upon him could attract the women.

Dennis Maulsby is an author and a poet. His poems and short stories have appeared in The North American Review, Mainstreet Rag, The Hawai'i Pacific Review, The Briarcliff Review (Pushcart nomination), and on National Public Radio's Themes & Variations. Learn more on his website here: https://www.dennismaulsby.com/

- 43 -

A Place for Fun: On the Origins of School By Millie Slavidou Let's take a look at the Old English: […] on scole wǽre áféd and gelǽred (at school were fed and taught) The interesting thing is that in Latin, the word did not refer just to the place where people went to learn. It also meant ‘leisure time for learning’ as well as ‘debate, lecture’ and even ‘scholarly conversation’. So you can see that the meaning has narrowed down considerably over the centuries! Let’s go now to the word in the original Greek: σχολή [skhole]. This word only came to mean what it does today by transferral, or association, if you prefer. It meant ‘spare time’ or also ‘leisure, rest, thing to do for fun’. So how on earth did it get from one meaning to the other? It is simple. In ancient Greece, learning was highly prized, and people would spend their spare time holding debates and discussions; this really was their idea of fun. Eventually, the word became associated less wih the activity and more with the place they went to carry it out. And as you can learn a lot through a discussion, especially with a knowledgeable person, the activity was seen more as learning than as ‘having fun’. Thus, the word was transferred from the activity to the place where it happened.

Do you view school as a place of enjoyment? Is it the first place that pops into mind when you hear the word ‘fun’? This might seem like a strange question, but all will quickly become clear. The word we use today to mean ‘place of learning/ teaching’ developed from a word in Old English, in which the word was scól, or sometimes scole. You may notice that the spelling is considerably different – they felt no need to put an H after the C. So why do we do that today, since the pronunciation would be the same without it?

The word became extremely popular, and was borowed into many languages. It is used in French école, Spanish escuela, Welsh ysgol, Italian scuola, German Schule, Swedish skola as well as others. It seems a pity that it has lost its meaning of ‘leisure time activity’, but it is intriguing to note that there is still a word in Modern Greek today meaning ‘activity’ (ασχόληση [ascholisi]) which derives from σχολή. So who knows: if school is enjoyable, then perhaps this meaning will once again be associated with the word. Let’s hope the government gets the memo.

The answer is that during the Renaissance, which was from the 14th to the 17th centuries, classical learning was very popular. By classical learning, people meant Latin and ancient Greek. People wanted to show off their scholarship, they wanted to display their knowledge of the origins of the word. So they put a CH in ‘school’ to show their awareness that it came from Latin schola, which was borrowed originally from Greek σχολή [skhole]. The Old English word came into the language from Latin.

- 44 -

Off the Beaten Track: Wedding with a Difference By Grant Leishman I’ve now lived and worked here in the Philippines for the past eight-and-a-half years, based in Manila but occasionally having the opportunity to venture out into the more wild and adventurous parts of this beautiful island archipelago. With well over 7,000 islands to explore, I’ve never been lacking for choice – just budget. In my time here I’ve been fortunate to participate and experience a number of Filipino weddings. To be perfectly honest, Filipino weddings differ little from Western weddings in that they are heavily influenced by the 350 years of Spanish Catholic rule in these islands. The vast majority of Filipinos are, in fact, still practicing Catholics and their wedding ceremonies mirror those I was familiar with in New Zealand, apart from a couple of small differences, such as the veil and the cord. A veil is placed over the married couple’s head as they kneel and then a cord placed on top of each of them, joining them, together and symbolizing the linking of two lives and two spirits. I’d always found this quite a beautiful ceremony and have always enjoyed the opportunity to attend a wedding here.

over-developed and frankly, over-rated. The opportunity to get right out into the hinterland and meet the local Igorot people was something I greeted with great anticipation. The term Igorot is an old Tagalog word which means “people from the mountains” and is a catch-all term to describe the many tribes of the Cordilleras. It is important to note that within the Igorot people there are many varied ethnic groups and dialects. They are certainly not a homogenous people. In fact, the term Igorot was shunned by these people themselves, in the past, as during the Spanish rule it was deemed to be pejorative and was taken to describe the people of the Cordillera’s as savages and backward. This dissension among the people still exists, as to the term, however Government funding to celebrate and educate their culture has some locals very proud of their Igorot heritage and relearning their cultural songs, dances, rituals and words. The trip past Baguio, to get to Kabayan was an adventure in itself. Fortunately, we were travelling in a comfortable, air-conditioned van but the long, winding, mountain road, prone to landslips during the wet season (which it was when we travelled) is both scary and magnificent. The scenery is ruggedly beautiful with massive areas of virgin, native, forest and very few settlements… and terribly long, steep drops off the side of the, at times, very narrow road. It’s a three-hour trip from Baguio to Kabayan but worth every second of the journey. We stopped regularly to view the amazing vistas, along with a quick side-trip to a bubbling mud pool where the sulpherous stench of an active geothermal area was too much for some of us Manila residents although coming from New Zealand I was well used to the familiar smell, so prevalent around places like Rotorua.

When we received an invitation to our Nephew’s upcoming nuptials, my wife and I were quite excited. Ken’s bride comes from the mountainous region of Central Luzon, known as the Cordilleras, in the province of Benguet and the wedding was to be held in Heide’s home town of Kabayan, Benguet. I had never been to Benguet before but was well aware of the region’s famous rice-terraces and was looking forward to visiting this rugged and beautiful region. The furthest I’d been up into the mountains of Northern Luzon was a few trips to the “Summer Capital of the Philippines”, Baguio, which had always struck me as over-populated,

- 45 -

The wedding itself was a wonderful affair, with numerous bridesmaids, groomsmen, flower girls and ringbearers, which is very typically Filipino. The number of participants in the “wedding party” probably outnumbered the guests in the Church. It was a traditional Filipino wedding in every sense of the word, full of colour, gaiety and excitement but for me it was the things that went on prior to and after the actual ceremony that had me the most excited. We were deeply privileged to be able to watch and participate in many of the rituals and activities that accompany a wedding in this part of the world.

I was struck by one of the lady elders who was leading the ceremony. She apologized for them not having the whole ritual down “pat”. Our parents knew these ceremonies intimately but, for us, many of us left here for schooling or to go to Manila or elsewhere to find work and we never had the opportunity to learn our culture to the same depth our parents did. We’re just learning it all now, at our age and we hope to be able to pass it on to the younger ones, she told us. As the elders were chanting advice and blessings to the couple-to-be, one of them was assiduously pounding away at a large jar, in front of us. I was curious as to what he was making and was soon to find out as he scooped some freshly made rice wine from the jar before passing it to one of us and I waited with bated breath for the cup to arrive at me, hoping there would still be some left for me to try. It was delicious and I hesitated to pass it on to the next person as I was enjoying it so much but a quick admonition of “don’t drink it all”, from my beloved wife was enough to force me to hand it over. I think all of us there were moved deeply by the elder’s commitment to keeping their cultural heritage alive and passing it on to the next generation. Fortunately, Central Government has belatedly realized the importance of keeping the culture relevant to the new generation and has made funds available, for cultural exercises, education and expansion. Long may it continue!

The entire family of the bride welcomed us interlopers from the big smoke with open arms, incredible warmth and deep love. We were all genuinely moved by the feeling of welcome we received from not just the family but from the entire Barrio of Gusaran. The barrio of Gusaran is about ten minutes further on from Kabayan itself and is nestled into the mountains, just a small collection of houses, a church and a few Sari-Sari stores. The main source of income for the region is farming – principally gulay (vegetables). It is a small but incredibly tight community that welcomed us wholeheartedly into their midst and immersed us in their culture, right from the beginning. The night before the wedding we were summoned up to the parent’s house, we were told, for a “ritual”. We had absolutely no idea what this ritual entailed but were excited to be able to witness it. When we arrived, we were given the seats of honour within the main house as we watched the elders of the tribe practice a pre-wedding ritual which goes back literally hundreds of years. Most of the elders, fit, healthy, energetic men and woman in the seventies and eighties, participated in the chanting that prepares the young couple for their wedding day.

As I said, the wedding ceremony itself was fairly typical for a Filipino wedding but the same cannot be said of the “wedding breakfast”. Held at the parent’s house, it appeared that the entire barrio was in attendance. The drink flowed, the food piles were immense and the dancing began not long after the meal, at around 3pm and never stopped. My wife and I finally begged off at around 11pm and went to bed but when I awoke at 4am, the music was still blasting down the hillside and the sounds of merriment were still ringing through the valleys. They do love their celebrations, that’s for sure. - 46 -

One of the absolute highlights for us, of the celebration, was the opportunity to participate in a local dance, which is for couples getting married. I think it is called “The Eagle Dance”, although it did have a local name, which escapes me now. It is a simple, rhythmical dance, where the musicians dance around in a circle, beating against a metal pan, while someone also plays the drums. The female dancer is dressed in traditional dress and the male also, although I did forgo putting on a loincloth, much to everyone’s relief, I imagine. Neither Thess nor I had a clue what we were doing or even if we were dancing it correctly but the whole experience was immense fun and everyone roared their approval at us and others in our party, for trying and taking part.

There was one particular conversation that stuck with me and perhaps signifies the immense gap between those from Manila and those from Kabayan. The whole function was full of children of all ages and being white, I was often the centre of interest for many of them. They would frequently stare, smile shyly and sidle up to me, hoping for a word, or a blessing. They also like to practice their English, so when one young lady (about 12, I think) sidled up to me and began to talk, I smiled and listened intently.

Even the day after the wedding there were more cultural rituals planned that we were supposed to take part in but we sadly had to beg off as we still faced an eight-hour drive back to Manila, with most of the party having to work the next day. We will not soon forget our adventure into the Cordilleras – it was something I can truly say was one of the biggest highlights of my eight years here, so far.

“Is it different to weddings where you come from?” she asked me.

I knew she meant New Zealand but I answered. “Yes, very different from weddings in Manila, that’s for sure,” I replied.

As we tearfully left our incredibly gracious hosts, with hugs, kisses and promises to return soon, I looked at Thess and said; “honey, we have to come back. There is so much to see and do that we didn’t have a chance to, this time around, with the focus totally on the wedding.” She smiled, nodded and added, “we will, darling, we will.”

“You have to send out invitations there, don’t you? Here, everyone just turns up,” was her response. I looked around at the immense gathering of people and laughed, “yep, that’s for sure. In Manila, once the food is eaten, everyone just goes home.”

I look forward to that day and the opportunity to explore fully one of the richest, most diverse, stunningly beautiful areas of the Philippines.

“Oh, not here, they’ll be dancing, singing and drinking all night,” she added. And, they were!

- 47 -

Spirit of Prophecy (The Psychic Detective) Review By Grant Leishman Spirit of Prophecy (The Psychic Detectives Book 1), a debut novel by J.J. Hughes was a stunningly unexpected surprise for me, as a reader. What I initially thought was a serial-killer hunt turned into so much more than that.

J.J. Hughes has produced an incredibly fast-paced and exciting debut novel that not only offers mystery and mayhem, but also give the reader pause to think about values, about relationships and about the impact of karma on our individual lives. What I particularly liked about this book is that it didn't allow the writer's obvious passion for these esoteric topics to impact too greatly, on the process of telling a good story. There is plenty of romance and no small degree of twists and turns to keep the most ardent romantic mystery reader engaged, but the addition of the psychic detective Barrett and her fascinating organisation, EPIS, lifts the story to another level and engages not only our imaginations, but our thinking brains as well. I doubt one can give a higher accolade to the writer than to say she has scored a bulls-eye on both aspects of this story.

When Olympic Three-Day-Event Gold Medalist Juliet Jermaine's prize horse Gothic is killed, along with its young stable-hand rider, in an apparent road rage incident, the search is on to find the killer. Was Juliet the target of the attack or was it indeed just a simple case of someone losing their rag over horses riding on the roadway? Enter psychic detective, Rosetta Barrett, who although working for the British police is actually, also a member of a top-secret research foundation that studies all sorts of paranormal, extraterrestrial and psychic phenomenon, world-wide. Rosetta is convinced that there is a long-past karmic link to this murder and believes she can unravel the mystery that happened so long ago to an Apache Indian, whose ripple effect is still acting on our world in 2021.

For me, the number one criteria, in rating a story that is clearly intended to be part of a series, is - will I read the sequel? With Spirit of Prophecy the answer is a resounding yes. In fact, I'm on tenterhooks waiting for the sequel to come out. The characters she has created are fascinating and there are so many questions about Barrett's alter-ego, as a psychic investigator that beg to be answered. Hughes has written a winner for her first novel and has ridden a faultless, clear round, in my opinion. This is clearly a new author to follow, with interest.

What follows is a classic "whodunit" mystery that delves into all things wiccan, psychic, paranormal and extraterrestrial, all wrapped around the exclusive and wealthy world of three-day-eventing, along with the rogues that inhabit the world of horse breeding.

You can take a look at this superb book Spirit of Prophecy on J. J. Hughes' Amazon page: http://viewauthor.at/JillHughes

You can discover more about Grant Leishman on the Momâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/grantleishman - 48 -

Postcards From Spain By Hannah Howe The Spanish Civil War, 1936-9, was a conflict instigated by the fascist forces amongst the landowners, political elite and Church who waged war against the democratically elected government of Spain. That government intended to raise the living standards of the Spanish people, many of whom where existing on the breadline. The conflict inspired many working class men and women, particularly from Wales, to flock to Spain where they risked their lives in the fight against fascism. These Postcards From Spain tell the remarkable stories of these brave people.

The most famous of these sea captains was David John ‘Potato’ Jones, captain of the cargo steamer Marie Llewellyn. ‘Potato’ Jones also ferried 800 refugees to safety. In total the Welsh sea captains ferried 25,000 refugees on their return journeys. Cardiff International Brigade veteran Tom Williams described the pitiful scene at the port of Cartagena. “I have seen women and children begging for crusts on the quays by the ships. The fight for democracy in Europe is carried on by the British ships carrying predominantly Welsh crews, and we are known on the continent as the ‘Welsh Navy’.” Three of the four Welsh sea captains bore the surname Jones so the locals named them after their cargos: ‘Potato’ Jones, ‘Corn Cob’ Jones and ‘Ham and Eggs’ Jones. All displayed great courage and saved many lives during their missions of mercy.

In the spring of 1937 four sea captains from Wales attempted to break the blockade at Bilbao and deliver much needed food and supplies to the Spanish people. These supplies included fuel, medicines, guns and ammunition.

Pictured: Captain David John ‘Potato’ Jones and his ship the Marie Llewellyn

- 49 -

Yoga– Something Worth a Try? By Jill Hughes yoga, just different methods and sometimes different sought outcomes from the practice.

If you’ve previously read any of my articles, you’ll be well aware I am a firm believer in the “holistic” approach to health and wellbeing. There are so many ways to achieve peace and enlightenment and what I like to do is expose my readers to some of the options out there that they may not have considered previously. Yoga is something that for many seems too hard, too physical, and perhaps too timeconsuming for them but, in reality, you only need do as much as you feel comfortable with.

Why is Yoga Useful to Us? Yoga can be beautifully dovetailed into a regime of meditation which I believe is an essential part of wellbeing and centering ourselves. I’ve recently had an article on meditation published in the exceptionally fine, FREE Emagazine, called Mom’s Favorite Reads. You can access the magazine and my article on meditation here from SmashWords: http:// bit.ly/2NiTZ3e Yoga and meditation are intrinsically linked – one complements the other perfectly. But why do yoga at all?

Where Did Yoga Come From? As with so many of the practices we have adopted in the West, yoga came out of the practices of the peoples of ancient India. There is much debate, in the academic world, about the actual origins of the practice but there is consensus that it originated in India probably around 3000BCE. Carved figures, picturing practitioners in various poses have been dated to this period. It was developed as part of the overall purpose of life – achieving enlightenment. Although most scholars are agreed that the principles of Yoga probably developed during the Vedic period of Indian history, there is some evidence that it may even be earlier. The Pashupati Seal discovered in an earlier Indus Valley civilization, excavation site, depicts a figure in a position that resembles an asana (a Hatha Yoga body posture) used in meditation. Yoga aimed to achieve harmony between the heart and the soul. Incidental to the practice of yoga came the realization that is was especially useful in controlling certain illnesses and diseases, such as hypertension, diabetes, and chronic pain.

For most people the idea they would have of yoga is that it is (a) physical and therefore helps with your general level of fitness and (b) mental, in that it helps you relax and gain peace of mind as well as allowing you to zone out from the worries of life, at least for a short period.

It is precisely these benefits, perhaps, rather than the search for enlightenment that saw yoga begin to take off in Western civilization toward the middle of the nineteenth century. One of the results of this rise in popularity of yoga in the western world has been the many differing offshoots and schools of practice that have developed. It is important to understand there is no right or wrong way to practice - 50 -

It certainly appears there is little to no downside to practicing yoga.

The experts, however, paint a different picture of the benefits of yoga. They would argue that the aim of yoga is to actually transcend those things of the world, meaning to move your consciousness away from the day to day hassles of life and actually discover a higher, more spiritual plane of thinking. They would suggest that other forms of exercise can achieve fitness and mental wellbeing, like running, the spin-bike or lifting weights, whereas yoga is seen as food and exercise for the soul. Whatever the reason for doing Yoga there are definitely some real benefits to be had from it: • • • • •

Increased flexibility Stress relief Circulation improvement A general feeling of wellbeing Physical fitness

Medical reviews, such as one published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology have shown that practicing yoga will reduce the risk of heart disease as much as any of the conventional forms of exercise. On average, people taking part in yoga regularly (weekly) lost five pounds, decreased their blood pressure, and lowered their LDL (Low-density Lipoprotein) Cholesterol – also known as “bad cholesterol” by 12 points. Research is now starting to show many more health benefits of practicing this ancient art, including: controlling obesity, reducing chronic pain, asthma relief, minimizing fatigue and aiding irritable bowel syndrome. In addition to these findings, neuroscience, using MRI’s (magnetic resonance imaging) of the brain have shown yoga reduces the decline in gray matter brain volume, especially apparent in older people. Interestingly enough, most of this brain protection appears to occur in the left hemisphere, which is the side of the brain most associated with positive emotions and the rest and relaxation response. Perhaps we have finally found the true cause of “grumpy old man and grumpy old woman syndrome”?

One of the interesting things that Yoga instructors and most students who progress further in the practice have noticed is that their reasons for doing yoga, change over time. What started out initially as a physical activity slowly morphs into a more spiritual and mental activity – a journey of self-discovery, self -actualisation, self-fulfillment, and reflection along with a greater capacity to care for themselves and practice self-love. By reaching back to the very spiritual roots of yoga, people, it seems, actually begin to discover the true purpose for which the practice was developed. - 51 -

How Do I Get Started on Yoga?

One thing that is known to put off newcomers is when they see an expert twisted into some “pretzellike” shape and they immediately say: “OMG! I can’t ever do anything like that – what’s the point of trying?” Like I said earlier – patience and determination and who knows what you can achieve in the future.

The first thing to remember is it DOES NOT MATTER what age you are or what fitness level you currently have. Clearly, if you are in a major city or town, there may well be a yoga studio available for you to consult and join. If this is not an option, or you feel uncomfortable or shy, training initially with others, you can totally start to learn on your own. • • •

•

Finally, a couple of beginner poses for you to try that absolutely will not send you running to a chiropractor or requiring your partner to call an ambulance to take you off to the emergency room to be untangled.

Wear comfortable and lose clothing (yoga pants are absolutely not a requirement) Get yourself a non-slip yoga mat Enter the process with an open mind and be prepared to be patient – it takes a little determination but you can do it. Get yourself a quality “beginners” DVD or view a “beginner’s class” on the internet. (YouTube is great for this).

Some Beginner’s Poses You Can Try: •

Initially, the key to success is breathing and determination. Don’t give up just because you can’t make the pose shown on your video instruction. Do as much of the pose as your body feels capable of and breathe, always breathe, through the nose, filling your belly and keeping your body relaxed and controlled.

•

Sit on the floor in a relaxed, easy position with your legs crossed and your back and neck straight.

•

Concentrate on your breathing – regular, slow, peaceful breaths.

•

Once you are relaxed, stand up straight and stretch your arms as high above your head as you feel able to comfortably – breathing evenly all the time.

•

Cat-Cow: A great pose for stretching the back and abdomen.

• •

Exhale as you reach down to the ground. (Don’t get discouraged if you can’t touch the ground initially – just go as far as you feel comfortable without straining yourself).

•

Once you feel good with this, you’re ready to move onto a few beginner exercises which will be on your DVD or your YouTube Channel you are watching.

•

- 52 -

Begin on your hands and knees, with your wrists directly under your shoulders and your knees in line with your hips. Keep your spine flat, like a table – the neutral spine. Keep your neck in line with your spine. Don’t lift it up or drop it down. As you inhale, drop your belly toward the floor and look up. Curl your toes under if this helps you reach the stretch. As you exhale, pull your spine toward the ceiling, rounding your back. Your head will drop down and you can focus on your navel. The tops of your feet will lay flat against the floor. Repeat this action as you continue inhaling and exhaling, working on your breath.

So, there we have the basics of yoga. I hope I’ve excited you enough to give it a try. Always remember two things: 1. Nobody (and I mean nobody) cares what you look like at the moment. It’s none of their business, anyway and they, like you, all started somewhere. Everyone will be impressed with one thing – that you are giving it a go. So, don’t be afraid to try. 2. Like everything worth having in life, it takes time, practice, and determination to achieve the tangible results you are looking for, so don’t be discouraged. I can promise you, though, if you try yoga and apply it diligently, you will start to see the incremental benefits very quickly.

Downward-Facing Dog: Another really easy yoga pose, to start with.

•

There are a ton of resources out there to help you (thank goodness for the internet!) so don’t be afraid to look and if you join a structured yoga class – don’t be afraid to ask for help. We’re all ultimately seeking the same thing.

Begin on your knees, as with the Cat-Cow pose, your wrists under your shoulders and your knees under your hips. As you breathe in, push your hips toward the ceiling, straighten your legs and place your feet flat on the ground. When your legs are straight, spread out your fingers and let your head hang down between your arms. Use your quadriceps (thigh muscles) to take the pressure off your arms. Once you are in position, continue working on keeping your breathing steady and rhythmical.

If you are interested in all things spiritual and esoteric then please do visit my website and sign up to receive my regular blogs which cover many aspects of spirituality, alternative lifestyle, other esoteric topics and fascinating insights into the world of science and the paranormal. You can join here: http://eepurl.com/cUQrGX

You can discover more about Jill on the Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/j-j-hughes/ - 53 -

August: The Holiday Month By Poppy Flynn The original name for the month of August was Sextilis the Latin word for ‘sixth’. Under Romulus, the legendary king credited with establishing the early fixed calendar in 753BC, it was the sixth month in the ten month Roman calendar which started the year with March. In about 700 BC, it became the eighth month when January and February were added to the year, ahead of March, by King Numa Pompilius, who succeeded Romulus and who also gave the month of August 29 days.

Traditionally, August's birthstones are the peridot, with its distinctive lime green colour, believed to instil power and influence in the wearer and spinel, a little-known stone sometimes referred to as a ruby, which it is not. It may be colourless, but usually comes in various shades of pink, red, blue, green, yellow, brown and black or, more uncommonly, violet. It is believed to protect the owner from harm and soothe away sadness. Some texts will also list sardonyx as an additional third birthstone. This is a form of onyx which features distinctive layers of sand.

Later, in 46BC, Julius Caesar added a further two days when he created the Julian calendar, thus giving it its modern length of 31 days. It wasn’t until the year 8BC, that it was renamed in honour of the Emperor Augustus (born Gaius Octavius Thurinus, maternal great-nephew of Julius Caesar and named in Caesar's will as his adopted son and heir)

According to a text emanating from the senate in Ancient Rome and quoted by Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius, a Roman provincial primarily known for his writings, this month was chosen because it was the time associated with several great triumphs, including the conquest of Egypt. The word August itself, while obviously originating from the Latin word augustus, means respected and impressive. In the Southern Hemisphere, August is the seasonal equivalent of February in the Northern Hemisphere but in many European countries, August is the holiday month for most workers. It was also a time of numerous religious holidays which occurred during August in ancient Rome. There are quite a few meteor showers which take place in August. The Kappa Cygnids dates vary each year between 3rd and 25th, but in 2019 it will peak around August 18th. The Alpha Capricornids meteor shower takes place as early as July 10 and ends at around August 10, and the Southern Delta Aquariids take place from mid-July to mid-August, The Perseids, a major meteor shower, typically takes place between July 17th and August 24th, with the days of the peak varying, but this years’ peak is about 12th August, This is the kind of meteor shower which produce what are popularly known as ‘shooting stars’.

It may be colourless, but usually comes in various shades of pink, red, blue, green, yellow, brown and black or, more uncommonly, violet. It is believed to protect the owner from harm and soothe away sadness. Some texts will also list sardonyx as an additional third birthstone. This is a form of onyx which features distinctive layers of sand.

Also recognised in August are: International Clown Week (1st – 7th) Simplify your Life week National Breastfeeding Month National Picnic Month And Immunisation Awareness month.

Famous Augusts: •

August Floyd Coppola was an American academic, author, film executive and advocate or the arts. His son is actor Nicolas Cage.

•

August Anthony Alsina, Jr. is an American recording artist from New Orleans signed to Def Jam Recordings.

•

August Chełkowski was a prominent Polish physicist and politician.

•

August Stramm was a German poet and playwright who is considered one of the first of the expressionists

•

August von Finck, Jr. is the son of August von Finck, Sr. He is a German citizen but resides in Switzerland. He is one of the richest men from Germany.

•

August Herman Andresen was a lawyer and politician from Minnesota. He served in the U.S. Congress as a Republican for thirty-three years

•

August Kopff was a German astronomer who discovered several comets and asteroids.

12th – International Youth Day

•

13th International Lefthanders Day

August von Gödrich was a German racing cyclist.

•

August Kleinzahler is an American poet.

•

August Schmölzer is an Austrian actor and writer.

•

August Güttinger was a Swiss gymnast and Olympic Champion.

•

August Lindbergh was a Swedish American farmer and politician. He was the father of the U.S. politician Charles August Lindbergh, and the grandfather of aviator Charles Lindbergh.

•

August George "Gus" Desch was an American track and field athlete.

The flowers associated with August are the gladiolus which symbolises moral integrity and the poppy which stands for beauty, strength of character, love, marriage and family. The zodiac signs for the month of August are Leo (until August 22) and Virgo (from August 23 onwards). August celebrations: 1st – Spiderman Day 2nd – International Beer Day 4th – Chocolate Chip Cookie Day 4th – Friendship Day th

5 – Underwear Day 8th – International Cat Day 9th – Book Lovers Day

15th – Chant at the Moon Day 16th – Tell a joke Day 20th – World Mosquito Day 23rd – Ride the Wind Day 27th – Just Because Day 28th – Red Wine Day 30th – Beach Day

- 55 -

Poem By Stan Phillips We are all sprung from the same source. And destined to become stardust. Just our few short years To love and laugh. Drifting days to maintain ourselves. Reproduce ourselves. And enhance ourselves. So when will we stop the vanity of others, The vainglorious dreams of the mighty, The misbegotten ambitions of politicians and warmongers, Getting in the way of our own glory. When will we decide to choose peace Over conflict. Love over hope Life over death.

We are all sprung from the same source. With the same blood flowing in our veins. Hearts beating with the same rhythm. Eyes seeing the same world. We are all sprung from the same source. To breathe our limited lives away the best we can, as we walk our way towards inevitable death. And yet we fritter our few years away on conflict and war. We are all sprung from the same source And destined for the same end. But we create divisions between us, By land that was never given us by anyone, But was just there for us to live with, and upon. And we divide ourselves by gender. By colour. By enthnicity. By religion. And fight our futile wars over our differences that, with the passage of years, are seen for the nonsense they always were. Nothing more than the egoistic strutting of small men and women. But those peacock displays are paid with the lives and blood and tears of wasted children. Innocent lives gone forever. Weeping echoing down the days and night.

It is surely up to each and every one of us To celebrate that which unites, rather than divides us. For we are sprung from the same source And destined to breathe our final breath one distant day, Before vanishing forever off the face of this earth. And will we spend our few days embracing each other? Or fighting each other? Surely we all know what we really want. I just wonder why we find loving each other so challenging? Stan Phillips 2014ÂŠ

- 56 -

The Carpathia Run By T.E. Hodden It is the early hours of the fifteenth of April 1912, and we are currently stood on the deck of the SS Californian, somewhere in the Atlantic. Yesterday the crew encountered ice, and broadcast a warning. They had a brief contact with the Titanic, a ship that seems to have passed some miles away.

Shall we go and watch? Sorry about that bump. I’ve missed a little, as the chronometer flies. We have landed in 1903, and although this isn’t her maiden voyage, we must be on one of the Carpathia’s early passages. Here she is fresh and new, and beautiful, as far as a ship can be. Let’s see, she is a bit shorter than her sister ships of the Cunard line. She has four masts, from which cranes can be hung to haul aboard more and heavier cargo than her rivals, and that one smoke stack, that looks unwieldly and tall, to divert the smoke of the engines away from the passenger decks. You can’t really tell from here, she just looks like a ship, but her design is quite clever. Her superstructure gives her a low, stable, centre of gravity, and is balanced to perfection.

If you squint at the horizon, you can just about see the lights of that great ship, passing closer and closer to the horizon. It looks as though she is steaming merrily on her way, and it looks as though very soon, she will be gone. With the hindsight of the history books, of course, we know the reality is quite different. With the Californian cruelly unaware of the fate befalling the Titanic it seems that fate has been decided. The Titanic is slipping deeper into the waves, and will soon break, and tumble down to the abyss. Fate it seems has decided that for any of the hundreds whose lives are now in the balance to survive, it will take a miracle.

Hold on, let’s see if we can hop back to the night in question… Quick! Over here! Look in there, the wireless room. A transmitter, a desk, a Morse key, and that man scribbling away is Harrold Cottam. He was meant to be off duty at midnight, but it’s about ten past now, and he’s listening to the traffic out of his own interest. What he is writing at the moment is a message from Cape Cod, trying to reach the Titanic with private traffic. Cottam tries to be useful and relays a message to the Titanic.

Sleeping soundly, fifty eight miles nautical miles, sixty seven regular miles, past the Titanic in that direction is the man who will give the Titanic that miracle. His name is Captain Arthur Rostron, and his is about to do something quite amazing.

- 57 -

Watch his reaction. Watch for the moment he hears the response from the Titanic. That they have struck ice. That they need immediate assistance, and the international distress signal.

First, before he is finished dressing Rostron orders a course be set to the Titanic’s coordinates. Furthermore he orders his chief engineer to gather another watch of stokers and make every ounce of steam for all possible speed. Heating and hot water supplies are cut off, so everything can be diverted to make more steam. Spare hands are mustered, to act as look outs.

I’d step aside if I were you. He’s about to bolt from his room, and… yes, there he goes. Shall we follow? Our first stop is the bridge. Cottam tries to convince the crew of the urgency of the distress signal, but they are sceptical, and want more information before they decide on a course of action. Frustrated Cottam comes… up here! Quick! After him up that ladder! Yes! Here we are, the Captain’s cabin, where he’s hammering on the door.

It takes just three and a half hours to reach the coordinates where the Titanic should have been, and not one moment, not one second of that time is wasted. Public areas are laid out to receive the survivors, hot tea, coffee, and soup are prepared. Oil is placed by the lavatories, so it can be flushed out over the sea, to still any choppy waters that might hamper the rescue attempts. Doctors are roused for their assistance. Cargo doors are opened, and the nettings ready to be deployed.

Rostron questions Cottam while he’s dressed, on what the message said, and if he was sure. That Cottam has taken such drastic action seems convincing in and of itself, so the order is given, to turn the ship around. Now before we consider the precise nature of the orders, we should consider the nature of what it is that Rostron is considering. First we know it is a dark night, that would be later described as smooth as plate glass. We know the Californian reported ice in the ocean, and we can have no doubt that there is at least one berg out there capable of felling a large ship. On top of this we have all the complications that the ocean itself brings. Nothing is truly at rest, it is at the mercy of the tides. You can only be certain of where the ice was, when reported, and if the search is for lifeboats, they may already be scattered away from the wreck.

Do you feel that shudder? That is pure speed. The Carpathia is rated for fifteen knots, but has not had reason to pass fifteen since her test runs, before she came into service. We have just passed seventeen knots. That… on the other hand was a growler, a small iceberg scraping the hull. If you are uneven on your feet it is because we are dodging and weaving as the lookouts spot ice.

Good. Now, let’s pay close attention to the orders. - 58 -

Down in the wireless room, Cottam is trying to turn away all messages, keeping the air clear for if the Titanic can offer more information. For some time now, however she has been silent.

We have one last jump to make…

Let’s pop up on deck. We are now amidst the lifeboats, and they are making their way to us. Over the next few hours seven hundred and five souls, whose fate had already thought to have been sealed, are taken aboard. By nine o clock, there are no more signs of life. There are fifteen hundred souls that have not been rescued. That there any survivors, that there are so many survivors, is itself a miracle, and one made from the pluck, skill, and determination of the Carpathia’s crew. The crew, and the ship herself will be recognised as heroes for their effort.

Right. This is the bridge of a very different ship. It’s July 1918, and this is U55, a German submarine hunting a convoy near the Southwest Approaches. The ship she has just targeted in the Carpathia, who has been ferrying the American and Canadian expeditionary forces to war. At the moment she is on her way to Boston with fifty seven passengers, and one hundred and sixty six crew. Two torpedoes fell the Carpathia and send her into the depths, where she still sleeps. Of the two hundred and twenty three aboard, she is survived by two hundred and eighteen. It would be the year 2000 before author Clive Custler and his NUMA organisation discover and catalogue the wreck.

T.E. Hodden trained in engineering, and works in a specialized role in the transport industry. He is a life long fan of comic books, science fiction, myths, legends, and history. In the past he has contributed to podcasts, blogs, and anthologies. You can discover more about T.E. on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/t-e-hodden/ - 59 -

How to Recall & Record Dreams for Dream Interpretation By Val Tobin

Some dreams, such as nightmares, are easy to remember. Other dreams are more elusive. You wake up knowing that you had a dream but can’t recall any of it. Some people claim they do not dream at all. But with consistent practice, anyone can kick-start the process of dream recall. It just takes some training and self-discipline.

Tools for Dream Recall

The tools necessary for dream work include a notebook or dream journal, a pen, and a flashlight within easy reach of the bed. The flashlight helps you see what you’re writing without disturbing anyone else in the room who is trying to sleep. A digital recorder can be used to record dreams instead of a notebook, but the noise of speaking into the recorder may disrupt another’s sleep. When turning in for the night, it is important to set the intention to remember any dreams. If you work with guides or angels, ask them to help you have and remember dreams. You can also state the intention to dream by saying an affirmation, such as “Tonight I will dream and I will remember my dreams.” Dreams dissipate quickly, so write about the dream immediately upon awakening. This is why it is important to keep the dream tools within easy reach of the bed. Sometimes, while one dream is being recorded, other dreams or further details about the dream will come flooding back.

Goals for Recalling Dreams

Initially, the goal will be to simply remember dreams. As you become experienced at dream recall, you can set secondary goals for dream time. When stating the affirmation to have and remember dreams, include a question you would like answered or request specific guidance on a problem that you are trying to solve. Use dreams as tools to connect to the higher self and take advantage of the messages contained within them. Sometimes when dreaming, you may become conscious of the fact that you are having a dream experience. When this happens, there is an opportunity for you to influence the course of the dream. This is referred to as “lucid dreaming.” Some people are quite proficient at this, but for others, it takes practice, as most people will wake from their dream when they realize they are dreaming. The ability to lucidly dream is particularly helpful when you are having an unpleasant dream. You can quickly change the dream from bad to good by manipulating the dream. This manipulation encompasses more than

- 60 -

Dream Dictionaries and Books on Dream Interpretation

Books exist that are designed to help you interpret the symbols and messages received from dreams, but they should only be used as a guide. Sometimes the interpretation is one that is personal and specific to the dreamer; the personal meaning may vary dramatically when compared to the traditional interpretation or symbolism of a particular dream. Some dream interpretation handbooks provide methodologies for interpreting dreams, thereby guiding you toward a deeper understanding of dreams. Many will present the idea of archetypes, a term made famous by Carl Jung. Archetypes refer to representations of different aspects of a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s personality. The Hero is an example of an archetype.

Reviewing the Dream Journal

Regularly review dreams recorded in your dream journal in order to see if there are any obvious themes. If you repeatedly dream that your house is flooding, you should investigate what this represents. Some believe this is the unconscious mindâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s way of attempting to bring attention to an issue. Some dreams may have been prophetic, but you might only realize that upon reviewing the dreams after the predicted event has come to pass. Some dreams may even be a glimpse into past lives or events. Dreams can provide a glimpse into the unconscious, and the effort and practice it takes to recall and record them are worthwhile. Anyone interested in personal development and growth may wish to consider taking the time to set the intention to remember any dreams and record the experience immediately after having each dream. Then you can begin to interpret the dream to learn what messages are emanating from the subconscious mind.

References

Andrews, Ted. Dream Alchemy: Shaping Our Dreams to Transform Our Lives, St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1991. Ball, Pamela. The Illustrated Dream Dictionary: What Dreams Reveal About You and Your Life, London: Arcturus Publishing Limited, 2008. Hamilton-Parker, Craig. Remembering and Understanding Your Dreams, New York: Sterling Publishing Co. Inc., 2000. Johnson, Robert A. Inner Work: Using Dreams & Active Imagination for Personal Growth, New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 1986. Disclaimer: The information in this article is not intended to substitute advice from your physician or health-care professional. Before beginning any health or diet program, consult your physician.

Val Tobin writes speculative fiction and searches the world over for the perfect butter tart. Her home is in Newmarket, Ontario, where she enjoys writing, reading, and talking about writing and reading.

https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/val-tobin - 61 -

How Well Do You Know the Classics? by DM Wolfenden

1, Written by Marcel Proust and has also translated as Remembrance of Things Past. - In Search of Lost Time

15, Atticus Finch is the hero of this story. 16, 1865 novel written by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under a pseudonym

2, The Ingenious Gentleman written by Miguel de Cervantes.

17, Charles Dickens thirteenth novel

3, Written by James Joyceâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s book was first serialised by the American journal The Little Review.

18 This classic was published in 1847 under the pseudonym "Ellis Bell

4, 1925 novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

19, Jake Barnes is the hero of this story.

5, Short story writer, and poet Herman Melville wrote this classic.

20, Anne Shirley is the heroine of this story.

6, A tragedy written by William Shakespeare.

7, It is said to be one of Leo Tolstoy's finest achievements. 8, Fanny Price is the heroine of 9, A major ancient Greek epic poem by Homer. 10, 1967 novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. 11, Italian long narrative poem by Dante Alighieri. 12, The Artful Dodger is one of the heroes of this story 13, Serialised in the Revue de Paris in 1856 14, A dystopian novel said to have been written in 1948

- 62 -

Brought to you by...

The August issue of Connections eMagazine is dedicated to the winners of our annual Reader’s Choice Awards. We had some amazing books from some talented authors. I hope you will take a minute to check them out.

Marketing seems to be one of those areas that every author struggles with. It’s the same struggle companies world-wide have been dealing with for decades. How do I get my product in front of my target audience? Connections eMagazine can help. The publication is free to readers, bloggers and to authors looking for a little extra exposure. Visit our website for details. https://melaniepsmith.com/

https://melaniepsmith.com/emagazine/

Connections eMagazine is a FREE quarterly publication founded by authors Melanie P. Smith and Rhoda D’Ettore. It is currently produced entirely by Editor, Melanie P. Smith. The Over the years, the magazine has evolved, and it now features promos, freebies, blog articles, and short stories in every issue.

Discover more about Connections eMagazine on their website here: https://melaniepsmith.com/emagazine-landing/ - 63 -

- 64 -

- 65 -

Word Search By Momâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Favorite Reads

- 66 -

We are excited to announce that Goylake Publishing has teamed-up with the Fussy Librarian and in partnership we are offering you 20% off your first book promotion with the Fussy Librarian. To qualify for this promotion, your book must be either permafree or listed free during a special offer. In our experience, the Fussy Librarian is the best book promoter in the business. When we promote with him, our free books always reach the top five of Amazonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s genre charts, most often they reach the top three. We promote with the Fussy Librarian every month and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future. Prices start from as low as $15, minus our special discount of 20%. Click here: https://authors.thefussylibrarian.com/?ref=goylake for full details. And, at the checkout, be sure to enter this code: goylake20 to claim your 20% discount. Thank you for your interest. And good luck with your promotion! - 67 -

Editor In Chief—Hannah Howe The Editor-in-Chief is the key figure in every publication. Hannah Howe works closely with the editorial staff to ensure the success of each publication. She is the author of the Sam Smith Mystery Series, the Ann’s War Mystery Series and Saving Grace. Get to know more about Hannah, her projects and her work on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/hannah-howe/

Executive Editor | Graphic Designer—Melanie P. Smith The Executive Editor / Graphic Designer is responsible for developing the layout and design of MFR eMagazine. In addition to the editorial staff of Mom’s Favorite Reads, Melanie P. Smith also produces Connections eMagazine. She is a multi-genre author of Criminal Suspense, Police Procedural, Paranormal and Romance novels. Get to know more about Melanie, her projects and her work on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/melanie-p-smith/

Managing Editor—Ronesa Aveela & Denise McCabe Our Managing Editors oversee the physical content of the magazine and coordinates the production schedule. There are two Managing Editors for Mom’s Favorite Reads; Ronesa Aveela and Denise McCabe. Get to know our Managing Editor’s on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here:

Ronesa Aveela— A freelance artist and author of mystery romance inspired by legends and tales. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/ronesa-aveela/

Denise McCabe— A children's book author and blogger. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/denise-mccabe/

Cover Designer—Nicole Lavoie Our Cover Designer works closely with Mom’s editorial staff to create a design that captures the essence of the each publication. Nicole Lavoie developed the initial layout for MRF eMagazine,. She specializes in book layout and design with an emphasis in Children’s books. Get to know more about Just Saying Dezigns on their website here: https://justsayingdezigns.com/

- 68 -

Art Director—Sylva Fae, Kelly Artieri and Christine Ardigo Our Art directors are responsible for organization and commission of all the art work that will be included in the publication We are lucky enough to have three talented and creative individuals who work hard behind the scenes to make our magazine creative and professional Get to know our Art Director’s on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here:

Sylva Fae—Mum of three, fairy woodland owner and author of children’s books. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/sylva-fae/

Kelly Artieri— Western New Yorker, lover of animals (especially dogs) and author. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/kelly-artieri/

Christine Ardigo— Registered Diatrician/ Personal Trainer and author of contemporary romance novels https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/christine-ardigo/

Feature Editor—T.E, Hodden As Feature Editor T.E. Hodden works diligently to provide content that is interesting, informative and professional. He is a trained engineer and a life-long fan of comic books, Sci-Fi, myths, legends and history. Get to know more about TE Hodden on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/t-e-hodden/

Marketing Director—Grant Leishman Our Marketing Director, Grant Leishman, oversees marketing campaigns and social media engagement for our magazine. After an exciting career in accounting and journalism, he now focuses on his true calling—writing. Get to know more about Grant on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/grant-leishman/

Content Editors—Rachael Wright, Poppy Flynn, Elizabeth Hull and Kate Robinson Our Content Editors are responsible for acquiring articles, short stories, etc for the eMagazine. We have four content editros who work hard to make our magazine interesting and professional. Get to know our Content Editor’s on Mom’s Favorite Reads website here: Rachael Wright—Journalist and author. Believes in Big Ideas, Helping Others and Soulful Conversations https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/rachael-wright/

Poppy Flynn— Mother of six, lover or readring and author of Romance, Erotica and Contemporary novels. https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/poppy-flynn/

Elizabeth Hull— Blogger and author (CN Lesley) of Fantasy and Science Fiction books https://cnlesley.com/

Kate Robinson— Kate is the Children’s book author of the Breezie Boo Adventures. https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17661436.Kate_Robinson

Discover more amazing authors… https://moms-favorite-reads.com/moms-authors/ - 69 -

- 70 -