Today we walked into the centre of the village where we live to get some library books, go to the bank, and so on. Although I’ve lived here for over six years or so, sometimes things strike me as strange, or wonderful, or a combination of them both.
1. I really liked that people queueing (is that even how you spell that?) in our old bank, lovely with marble and carved wood, have their dogs with them on leads. I’ve seen an old man in a flat cap going into a pub with his border collie (back in the days before the smoking ban when you could have a pub that just did alcohol, no posh pub food).
2. We went into the old-fashioned sweet shop to buy a few things. These shops always remind me of Honeydukes, lined with shelves of huge jars full of every sweet that you can imagine and also some very old-fashioned ones that you probably cannot. We asked for something that wasn’t readily apparent, and she said “It’s just around the corner – it’s not quite Narnia, but it does go on a bit.” Lovely. :)
3. There’s a snack van that sells burgers and chips and things, and when I used to work at the college nearby, I’d come there for gorgeous drippy bacon and egg sandwiches. They may not have seen me for a year, but if I do go there, the husband will ask me what I’d like, I’ll tell him, and the wife will smack him on the arm and say “Well, of course she does”, like he should have known what I wanted. I love it.
Overall, I’m so happy here…so many things about this place just fill up my heart.