h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Frank, just read your 'A peaceful Sunday morning' where you reflect on 60 years ago. Years ago I also had a peaceful walk in a strip of wood alongside the Rijn near Rhenen. It was a beautiful day with the sun highlighting the trees. I suddenly noticed something curious, a little above head hight, on one of the tree trunks : round scars. When I looked at the trees nearby the same kind of scars, most of them at that level. The more I looked the more trees bore these witnesses of a bitter fight between the Allies and the Germans. The bulletholes must have been a little lower then.
Peace was suddenly shattered by this revelation and a happy day had turned into contemplative one.
I have not been back since, but if that strip of wood still exists, the scars will be even higher now and people may not notive any more. And that is sad.
love, Rob

Morning Roberte,
Each and every day I walk Benji in those fields and meadows, we take a different route by turning out of the gate in a different direction.
rain hail or shine we walk and I never fail to be moved by it.
My little dog tail erect and full of angst if another dog enters his territory, sniffs and waters anything standing upright including other dog walkers legs if we stop to talk.
He has a thing against Boxer dogs so I have to dive on him and nail him to the ground if I see one coming.
I suppose once you have had a couple of years in a Desert area you come to appreciate the green fields hedgerows and babbling streams of England. With their wild life and ever changing forms from bare branch to blossom then leaf forming and fruit lastly the leaves falling and once again bare branches covered in the frost of winter, it is a wondrous site.
I watch the young walkers dahing round the same area they have to walk the dog then go do what it is they do and never have time to just wander and wonder, to feel the healing balm of Mother nature weaving her spells. If they slowed down a little and took it all in those modern aborations the counsellor's would not be wanted. How did we live without them I ask? Bah I say.
So Rob you see a tough old soldier softened by the lovely sights that unfold as I walk with my little companion and natter to each other, yes Benji lets me know in his own way how much he loves those walks.
In the afternoon we get in the car and go to another area a mile up the road which is thick wood with sunny walks through them and a huge field in which he can run his little legs off. We go home tired but refreshed! yes that is possible, to be pleasantly tired but feel ready for anything.
I too see the scars of war, a bomb dropped there, that was a gun sight, there is an old pill box guarding a road that was never taken down, so we do have reminders that the world was once in the throws of madness. I now look at the news and think it is even worse now than then and I fear for my Grandchildren.
I find my peace walking with my dog and remembering, I have no urge to be back in the world my children live in fighting to exist in the rat race, I guess I had my time and was satisfied.
Regards Frank.

Dear Roberte,
I have been reading some of the back mail at last and notice you say "I once saved Queen Wilhelmina", being around twelve that would have been a real Dan Dare Feat.
It was my neighbour Bob Boiston who was in the Navy all through the war. He got bayonetted while doing so and was lucky to be dragged back aboard ship in the fighting on the dock. The Captain ordered the area cleared with machine guns and it seems most were Dutch turncoats with a few Germans.
He told us the story when I saw his nasty wound still healing but never once mentioned it again.
That is how it was then brave men did brave things and said nothing.
I monitor your chatter but as Dutch is not one of my tongues I have to opt out. Luckily the main parts of Holland I visited on a regular basis they spoke German or English better than the mother tongue so I never had trouble, well apart from Dutch ladies that is, they were never shy or at least I never found them so.
Just putting the record straight, regards,
Frank.

10/9 Dear Frank, you are an old romantic and poet at heart, aren't you? You say the young ones do not stand still long enough to watch all the wonders that nature gives us. Of course they don't, unless they have an early 'old soul'. The here and now is the most important thing to them and their time to slow down and realise the beauty around them, will come in due course. I remember not having much time for the simple things when I was much younger. Materials things and boys were much more interesting then.
Your fields and meadows look a joy to behold, reading your description. I was almost walking next to you and watching Benji.
Thanks for putting the records straight as for saving the queen. I must have remembered it incorrectly when you told me about it. I may be a new member of the 'senior' population as they so euphemistically put it, but things sometimes become a little vague and hard to place and I sometimes forget exactly where I heard it. Blooming nuisance that. They do say names go first, then nouns and that verbs are the ones that stick the most in your mind and you use these to describe what those irritating 'thingemejigs' - you have on the tip of your tongue but just cannot get hold of - do. Something like 'can you hand me that thing that snips things to bits?' Luckily people usually understand you.
Getting older is not the problem, it is the enforced slowing down and inability to do certain things you used to enjoy which are not very acceptable, but we have to swallow.
Enjoy your walks as long as you can.
Regards, Rob

Dear Rob,
Me an old romantic never and the thing that cuts things to bits you cannot remember is usually the wife's tongue.
I think my English teacher at school called believe it or not "Miss English" was the one to open my eye's to the wonders of the word and nature as in her mind the two went together.

Oh many are the Poets that are sown
By nature; men endowed the highest gifts,
The vision and the faculty divine:
Yet wanting the accomplishment of verse.
Wordworth.

To see a world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
Blake.

Who could not have a poetic soul when they observe the wonders of nature each day as I do. Each time I walk those paths I see something I never saw before. Today I saw what I thought were crowberries but they are May June so they must be blueberries, we have pears and plums among those hedge rows. I will start having some of those fruits soon and no one knows they are there.
Kids today do not know the hedge rows as we did, a source of wonderful fruits that stained your hands and clothes then gave you tummy ache when over indulged, wonderful days.
Of course there were girls when I was young, but surely you could take time out whilst laying in the sweet smelling meadows among the wild flowers the scents and the butterflies to admire nature in all her glory.
I was a believer in taking things slowly and savouring all the good things rather than the crash bang thank you mam techniques that seemed to abound. Admire the wild snapdragon or the campion or the common mallow then turn your sun warmed thoughts elsewhere.
All good things need to mature like a good malt or well cured bacon, those herrings we both like taste the better for taking it slowly in the smoking.
I dont think I am different to all those years ago just more time to notice is all.
Accept the slowing down but never give up the enjoyment of still doing the things you always did at a slower pace.
Age can be a lusty winter after a stormy autumn that followed a boiling summer and a balmy spring. I loved all the seasons of life and look forward to my lusty winter.
Regards Frank.