Costa del Sol

The Costa del Sol, the southernmost coast of Spain sits in a sun drenched space between the mountains and the glittering sea. A place where Britons come to retire, to rest and recline in beach chairs under aging woven umbrellas. Where the burnished brown of leathery aging skin is everywhere and women not out of place in the high street back in London put on their gold and tight tee shirts and go out in packs. Where men, whose accents shout of back street deals and lives learnt the hard way drink in silent camaderie.

There is so much alcohol here. Every lunchtime and evening slides down over another glass of wine, another rosado or beer. Dreams are created and destroyed at the bar as yet another potential fortune is sunk down the throat. And outside?

Outside the children play in the sand, jump over the waves in a game of 'catch me if you can', oblivious to the pain and desperation in their parents' fingers clasped around yet another glass of wine.

Minerva

Heatwave

London is famous for its rain. Ask anyone and they will tell you - England is synonymous with rain just as Spain is for sunshine. I remember reading somewhere that the Inuit have over 50 words for snow, and we, here in London, surely have the same amount for the water that falls from the sky.

Today, however, rain is not our problem. In fact, if only it were. No, today temperatures in London have got to 33 degrees C and I am hot, really hot, bothered, hot, and very out of sorts. It seems to me that everything is going not quite right in my life right now and whilst I know, rationally, that that isn't true it FEELS true. I feel disappointed, cross, antsy and brittle and annoyed with myself that I do actually feel that way which of course only exacerbates the problem further.

I suspect, in truth, that the true problem lies in tiredness. I have never had huge reserves of energy, and having only just returned to work, having had a full day at a theme park with 195 children in boiling hot temperatures is probably enough to make anyone feel slightly crotchety.
Added to which my beloved computer died on me yesterday and I mean died...Not spluttered, but died....and sadly, it is irredeemable.. Having just returned to work, I can't afford to just go out and get another one, especially with the holidays for the children coming up but it is amazing just how much one relies on one's computer now as it sits dark and silent under my desk.

Naturally, I hadn't backed it up for ages so my music, my photographs and all my documents including the first two chapters of my so called novel were on there but as data recovery is really only valuable when one has a computer to transfer it to, all is calm at the moment...

Let's hope tomorrow is a better, cooler and happier day,

Minerva

Hiatus...

Forgive me, dear readers, but I have decided to have a break. I am finding blogging really difficult at the moment; indeed, just maybe, this blog and Minerva have outlived their useful span. I may be back sporadically, but for the moment, I am living, loving and enjoying...

Keep well and happy,

Minerva

A year ago

A year ago our city was torn apart by the scream of sirens. Four bombs hit our beautiful streets, the life blood of our town, striking at our transport arteries. 52 people died, 52 families torn apart by terrorists, 52 families waiting for news, 52 families for whom 7th July 2005 will always be a day of mourning, a day of sorrow, a day of regrets.

I remember the day in school. The shocked faces of the boys as the news filtered in. The constant checking of computers to find the latest news, and the way rumours of homes, people, places, newly attacked flooded in...

And my own particular memory. A boy, a quiet, good kid in the office tears streaming down his face asking if he could call home. His father was a tube driver, normally an unremarkable profession made extraordinary by events and this boy was distraught. Having spoken to his mother, all was well. Dad had called home and reassured mum and consequently son...but imagine, if the news had been different....

My heart shrank in my chest with worry and then grew with relief....

Minerva

Back to work.

I love my job. No, listen, I LOVE MY JOB. I am the luckiest woman on the planet because not only do I LOVE my job but I am appreciated at it too...

Listen whilst I tell you the story that we were told yesterday in assembly. On the 6th August 1945, an atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. As a result, millions of babies and young children got sick from the radiation fallout. One of these children who was a baby but seemed to have escaped the radiation was a little girl called Sagato. She grew up into an eleven year old and had loads of friends and was a very popular little girl. A keen sportswoman, she was racing one day and at the end of the race felt a little dizzy. Courageous, she shook it off and said nothing to anyone...but after the next race, little Sagato collapsed and was taken to hospital. Shaken to wake up in the Atomic Medicine part of the hospital, she was even more shocked, as were her family, to be told that she had leukaemia, a cancer of the blood.

The next day Sagato's best friend came to visit her, and brought her hundreds of pieces of paper and showed her how to fold them into cranes, origami birds. There is a superstition in Japan that if you fold 1000 cranes, then a person who is ill will get well again...Sagato started folding.. By the end of the day, she had made eighty, by the end of two weeks, she had made 500 and when, a few days later she died, she had made 641. Her classmates made the other 359 and started a fund for a memorial for this brave little girl.

Every year on the 6th August, the statue of Sagato is swamped by cranes made by children, cranes that have become symbols of hope and courage against overwhelming odds.....

It was then that my wonderful Head of Year turned to me and said that today, we welcome back someone who is also a symbol of hope, someone who has also faced huge obstacles and showed tremendous courage...

A boy from my tutor group presented me with a paper crane all of my very own.

I am lucky indeed,

Minerva