Wrexham County Borough 19 - Day 344/a gradual opening up of non essential shops/an old Geography book found in an attic

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Day 344 - It is Friday and we are hurtling through February . We are into the second month of 2021 and still in lockdown . Nearly a year has passed by . Like water under a bridge it has floated away. Next month we will reach a milestone . A whole year since Boris first locked us down warning us not to go out . Shops closed . Panic buying and quiet . What has changed I wondered as I walked .? Not a lot . We are still under lockdown. Hairdressers and barbers closed . Gyms and swimming pools shut . Is there light at the end of the tunnel ? Perhaps as the first minister of Wales has announced a gradual opening up of life . Schools may go back next week after the half term break . Only a handful of years . Not the whole lot of them . In another three weeks he will look to gradually open non essential shops . Perhaps I will get a haircut and Glenn will get to the barber . Perhaps we will be able to buy a pair of socks or some knickers . Who would have thought I would get excited to buy a new pair of shoes or a new pair of socks ? Life has been strange . Perhaps we will be able to take Gabby out for a drive and fill her with diesel . She is driving on fumes for the time being . She has been insured for another year . You would think the insurance company would have had the decency to lower our premiums this year due to the lack of use of Gabby due to lockdown . She has barely added many miles to her clock in the twelve months since we renewed in 2020. A trip out in April to Northumberland and a trip across Nottinghamshire to get her MoT and her habitation check completed . A long drive down to Wales . At a guess less than a thousand miles added to her this year . No long trips to the near continent and few in this country . We yearn to get her back on the drive , fill her up, check her over and get her out on the road again .

Day 344 - taxed Ziggy for another year . She like Gabby has done fewer miles this year . Her longest trip the one to Wales just before Christmas .

My walk took me along the river bank . There were still signs of the detritis which had been washed downstream in the recent floods . Some locals had taken to the roads with their black bin bags and were litter picking . Leaving notes to passers by that these bags were left by inconsiderate motorists who threw their McDonalds bags out of the car windows instead of taking them home . I saw a wood pecker up in a tree . There is no sign of the blue and orange flash of the Kingfisher yet . It appears they are about and can be heard but not seen . The sightings will start to take place as they become parents and spend all day trying to feed their hungry young . I saw a couple of pheasants . I disturbed them . I heard them before I saw them . A carcophany of noise. An ugly sound and then a flash of colour . Brown , gold and green . The males ran off trying to avoid me and my gaze. I passed a couple of young girls walking two very excited dogs . The dogs rushed backwards and forwards , fighting with each other , racing away from their owners and then going as fast as they could to catch up. They raced to me and made a fuss . I walked past the racecourse . All forlorn . There had been no National Hunt racing for over a year . The February meeting had been cancelled due to Covid again . Perhaps later in the summer we may get the opportunity of a day at the races .

There are signs of Spring everywhere . The catkins flutter in the breeze, the mallard ducks swim along the River Dee and the celandines are beginning to bloom . I saw one yellow Primrose . I didn't need another one . One was plenty to make me smile . The graveyard was awash with the dainty white snowdrops . Somehow when you see these dainty but hardy flowers they make you think that spring is in fact just around the corner . I left the footpath along the river and headed home to find a blast from the past . Five old school books rescued from the attic of an old house I once lived in . They were distinctive books with the corner reserved for the school badge , my name and form number . Inside as I started to read memories flooded back . February 1965 , Mr Jones the Geography teacher who gave me a love of maps and a love of faraway places,. Names to conjour with. I flicked the pages and saw maps I had drawn of the density of sheep in Australia compared to human beings . The distribution of cattle across the country . The railways of Sydney and the sea journeys you could take to Valpariso and Panama. No wonder I love travel and miss it so much .

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