love – Page 2 – The Countryman's Daughter

You can lead a horse to water

A drawing of Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey from Vanity Fair magazine in 1893. Sir Ralph of Thirkleby Hall, paid for a roadside water trough in the village *(Photo: Leslie Ward, public domain via Wikimedia Commons)*

A few weeks ago I wrote about how my best friend and I celebrate the longevity of our relationship by having an annual weekend away together.

Gurli Svith from Denmark wrote: “Your column on friendship touched me very much because I have a very good friend I have known since I was 14 and she was 12. She was going to start at my school and came to my home to ask if we could cycle together. That was the beginning and now being 76 and 74 we are still close friends. We do not meet very often but when we do it is as if we saw each other just yesterday. We can talk about everything, and we have helped each other through hard times. For many, many years we have given each other birthday presents, but sometimes we have not seen each other for two or three years so it is like Christmas when we are sitting there drinking tea, eating cakes and unwrapping our presents.”

Is it true that many people are closer to their best friends than their own family? The saying goes, you can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family, so if you could opt out of spending Christmas and Easter with relatives, would you? (I acknowledge that I might be opening a can of worms with that question!)

Let’s get back on safer ground with troughs. Regular reader Clare Powell says: “We do have a couple of stone troughs we bought in a farm sale in Rosedale in the 1980s (Paid more than we should have because my husband kept bidding against himself – much to the locals’ amusement!). We transported them in the back of a Volvo. No idea how old they are, so it was interesting to read your article. Like you, I never really thought about who made them, and how. And you’re right, your dad would have had the answer at his fingertips.”

He sure did, and I now have the space to tell you what I discovered inside his old file. There were a few cuttings, columns, and notes, one of which was in Dad’s handwriting dated 15th May 1993. He had written it during a phone call from a chap called Dick Thompson who lived in our village and whose family had made locally quarried stone troughs for years.

“Each trough was excavated with a pickaxe and drawn down to the road on a sledge,” he’d scribbled. “It took seven or eight days to make one trough – all sizes done. Circular pig troughs also made so pigs could eat together.” He added that the troughs were made on spec, bought mainly by farmers, although parish councils paid for communal troughs situated in villages.

Among other things, the file also contained a newspaper cutting from March 1973 written by the esteemed founder of the original Countryman’s Diary column, Major Jack Fairfax-Blakeborough.

“The wayside water troughs were a real blessing both to parched travellers and to horses,” he wrote, “Especially in the heat of the summer when roads sent up a cloud of dust. Many of the troughs were erected by landowners who knew their value to man and beast. Some of them have inscriptions which tell us of their donor and his consideration for horseflesh.”

He mentions one between Burnsall and Appletreewick in the Dales which has a Latin verse ‘De torrential in via bibet propteren exaltabit caput’ which translated means ‘He will drink at the spring on the way, and thereafter lift his head with joy’, which is the last line of Psalm 110 in the Old Testament. The Major (and my dad when he wrote about it 20 years later) could not shed any light on who had placed the trough there. Can any of our Dales contingent add any more detail about this particular trough?

Dad mentions another placed at Thirkleby near Thirsk, paid for by Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey (1848-1916), 3rd Baronet of Thirkleby Hall, who was an accomplished engineer, historian and artist. Its inscription, with a bit of poetic license where the rhyme is concerned, reads: ‘Weary traveller bless Sir Ralph, who set for thee this welcome trough.’

I have a feeling we have a lot more to come on these once indispensable features of our countryside highways and byways.

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 2nd and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 30th April 2025

A little means a lot

My boys always write beautiful and meaningful words in the cards they give me on special occasions

Spring has sprung in earnest now, and as I write this, the sky is cloudless blue and the sun is beating down. Trees and flowers have burst into life, and the chattering birds are furiously building nests in preparation for the arrival of their young. Life is good!

It has been like this all week and is set to continue well into next. In the UK, because our weather is so unpredictable, we are extra grateful when we get a sustained patch of good weather and never take such things for granted.

A few weeks ago I mentioned that my favourite day of the year is the Spring Equinox because it represents a beacon of hope for good weather after a long, miserable winter. It also heralds the arrival of shorter nights and longer days, which cheers me up no end. I also tried to explain the difference between the well-known Spring Equinox and the lesser-known Spring Equilux which resulted in me declaring afterwards that I needed a lie down.

These two annual milestones are determined by scientists who use the rising and the setting of the sun to calculate the length of daytime versus night. They are each measured slightly differently, which is why we have the two.

Alastair Smith, whose wonderful photograph of a sunrise over Runswick Bay accompanied the column, contacted me to say: “Thank you for the credit Sarah. Your explanation of the difference is deserving of a lie down, however make sure it is in the Spring sunshine. Wishing you a great year!”

And Caroline Newnham said: “It’s all a bit mind boggling for me…I need to lie down after reading it. I understand the Latin but that’s as far as it goes!”

I asked if any of you also had a favourite day and for Karl Lynch it is December 25th: “To me Christmas Day is about sharing and creating memories with loved ones. I believe there’s a child in every one of us, and it brings back memories of feeling safe triggered by the smell of Christmas dinner. Merry Christmas, Sarah,” he says.

Although I do love Christmas Day, the fact that it is such hard work for hosts and ridiculously expensive means it lies further down the ‘favourite day’ rankings for me.

Mother’s Day has not long gone, and that too rates highly on my list because it gives me an excuse to lounge about while my boys pamper and spoil me. They also send me cards in which they write really lovely things, expressing their feelings in a way that they are unable to do face to face. In general, girls and women find it easier to talk openly about their deep emotions than men and boys.

That is a sweeping generalisation, but nevertheless it is a fact that suicide is the biggest killer of males under 50, and three quarters of all suicide victims are men. Not unburdening themselves of their innermost struggles is given as a major contributor.

Undoubtedly women can struggle too, but we are far more likely to share our difficulties with close friends and family, who can then offer crucial emotional support.

One thing I taught my boys when they were very little was to say how they felt when they wrote a greetings card. It was a way to get them to express themselves without the embarrassment of doing it out loud or face to face. For example, instead of the simple ‘To Granny, love from Ollie’ I’d ask them to think of something they really liked about their granny to write down, and so the contents of the card would be more meaningful to her.

They continued to do that into their teens and adulthood, and now, with all of them in their 20s, they write truly heartfelt comments in the cards they send to me and their closest loved ones.

I cannot say if it has helped them in terms of expressing their feelings in other areas of life, and they certainly have not escaped their mental health ups and downs, but I do think it has given them a little leg up in the ability to talk openly about their states of mind.

And sometimes, it is the little things that matter.

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 18th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 16th April 2025

Who’s going to watch over us?

Dad signing books in the garden wearing his silver watch

Dad having a cuppa a few years later wearing his smart gold watch

Following my story a couple of weeks ago about some friends who were reunited with lost possessions, Michael Brown from Stokesley got in touch with his own tale. If you recall, one friend, Aisling, thought her diamond wedding earrings had been stolen, only to have them given back to her 10 years later after they’d been found in an old jacket pocket. Another friend, Stefan, was reunited with his smart suit jacket after it had been accidentally donated to the school fair and sold for 50p. Stefan bumped into the new owner wearing it on the street who sold it back to him for 50p.

Michael’s story centres around a Christmas party for members of the National Federation of Retail Newsagents. As District President, Michael was invited to the Newcastle branch’s party in Ponteland one year. He’d been planning to drive back home afterwards but was worn out after a long and tiring journey and on top of that, the weather was awful. Having learned that the pub did not have accommodation, the evening’s host, Richard, offered him a room in his home for the night.

Richard and his wife Karen were very warm hosts and provided Michael with most of what he needed for the night, including a dressing gown.

Michael explains: “The next morning, I slipped on the dressing gown and discovered a watch in the pocket. Reaching the kitchen, I presented my find to Karen. She was overjoyed. Although not hugely valuable, the watch held a lot of sentimental value as it was her grandmother’s and had been missing for quite some time.”

Whenever Michael sees Richard and Karen now, they reminisce about the occasion and Karen’s unexpected reunion with her grandmother’s long lost watch. “That evening has created a special bond between us,” says Michael.

What a lovely tale, with serendipity playing a vital part, as it so often does in stories like this. So many variables had to slot into place to enable Stefan to get his jacket back, for Aisling to recover her earrings and for Michael to discover Karen’s watch. She may never have otherwise found it had she not offered the dressing gown to Michael on his impromptu stopover. Perhaps from above, Grandmother had been influencing the way all the chips fell so that her watch and her granddaughter could be happily reunited.

It makes me wonder how many people still wear watches? I haven’t had one for years and have not missed it because there are so many clocks surrounding me, on my phone, in the car, on household appliances. Having a clock hanging on the kitchen wall that the whole family rely on is no longer necessary thanks to the electronic gadgets at our fingertips.

There’s a fair few of us who will have watches that have been passed down through the generations though. My dad used to wear his own dad’s timepiece, although in later life, a smart gold one replaced it.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked you which is the one item you’d save from a fire and wondered if you’d be practical – like a passport; or valuable – like jewellery; or sentimental – like photos. If I had to choose one of the two watches I mentioned above I’d probably save my dad’s rather than Grandad’s because I remember him wearing it with much pride and therefore has more sentimental value to me. It is a hard choice, though, and I have no doubt that I wouldn’t get rid of either unless I really had to.

Harbouring of items of sentimental value is the reason I have a garage that is still full of boxes I have not unpacked; boxes that contain a load of stuff I cannot bring myself to throw away and yet cannot face sorting out either. How does one make the decision to throw away hundreds of letters sent between myself and my best friend, or my parents, or my siblings? They become even harder to let go once the writer has passed away. But they are in a box, and unlikely to be read by anyone except me, and only now and then. What the heck do I do with them?

It makes me ask again, what you might save from a fire if you had to choose but one item?

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 21st March and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 19th March 2025

Will Satan come down the chimney?

Will Satan or Santa come down your chimney this Christmas?

I had a message from a reader that made me titter. Jean McKendree said: “Regarding your column on spelling errors that get people’s backs up; mine (though I also have to laugh when I see it) is when people write, “Please bare with me,” to which I reply, “I would really rather not.”

This brings to mind those awkward occasions when you fail to properly proofread an email or text message and send something that has an embarrassing mistake in it. With more and more people switching to messaging rather than speaking on the phone, I’m sure it happens a lot, especially since the dawn of ‘autocorrect’, a function which decides what it thinks you want to say, but which is often some way away from your intentions.

A famous one came from a father who texted his son to say, “Your mum and I are going to Divorce next month”. The shocked son was relieved when he quickly received a follow-up text to say “DISNEY! I meant DISNEY!”

One that I experienced myself came on the first anniversary of the death of my friend Ian’s mum. We were on a walk in beautiful Givendale in the Yorkshire Wolds, her favourite place, when a text came through from a close friend. “Thinking of your dead mum,” it read.

“That’s a bit blunt,” said Ian, puzzled, because this friend was normally so gracious and polite. Before he could react any further, the phone rang, and I could hear her apologising desperately down the phone: “DEAR MUM!” she cried, “I meant your DEAR MUM!” We both found it completely hilarious, and were very grateful to her, because for the rest of what would have been a rather sad day, we kept collapsing into fits of giggles.

Other corkers blamed on autocorrect include: “You have my full condoms” (condolences), “Your dog Dexter is dead” (ready), “Sent with love and fried shrimp” (friendship), “Okay donkey” (okey-dokey).

Thankfully, most messaging services now offer you the opportunity to edit your messages after you have sent them, so you do have a chance to correct them if something erroneous sneaks through (although you have to be really quick to catch them before the receiver reads them).

At the moment, there is a fair amount of debate around the topic of AI (Artificial Intelligence) and whether we should be worried about its power or embrace it. Clearly it is being used in both negative and positive ways, but I did love the story about Daisy, the ‘AI Granny’, who has been tripping up ruthless phone scammers who target the old and vulnerable to steal their money. She is driving them crazy with her daft questions, meandering monologues and delaying tactics. She is a joint enterprise between O2 and YouTube ‘scambaiter’ Jim Browning and is on duty 24/7 intercepting fraudulent calls and taking revenge on people who thoroughly deserve it (give her a Google if you want to see her in action).

On the AI theme, I did see one message that read: “Just tried to type ‘probably’ and autocorrect turned it into ‘peanut uterus’. Don’t think AI is taking over anytime soon.”

It has just dawned on me that this is my last column before Christmas. I love seeing all the lights, decorations, and trees going up to mark the festive season, and when the days are short and the weather is as miserable, it lifts the spirits no end. But it is a time of mixed feelings for many. In 2017 we were bracing ourselves for our first Christmas without my dad, when my sister was unexpectedly diagnosed with cancer. Christmas took second place to hospital visits, and she died in the first week of January 2018. Seven years on, I have found happiness in Christmas once more, but that experience means I am mindful of those who are in hospital, those missing lost loved ones, or those spending Christmas with no-one at all.

So with that in mind, I am sending my thoughts and good wishes to you all at this very special time of year, and will leave you with a festive autocorrect classic:

“Taking the kids to see Satan now.”

“Well, I know they’re not perfect but that’s a bit harsh.”

“SANTA!! I MEAN SANTA!”

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me via the ‘Contact’ tab at the top right of this page.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 20th Dec and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 24th Dec 2024

Running round in rings

Have you ever lost a precious ring? And did you find it again?

I’ve had some interesting comments about wedding rings. Janet Pearce, who used to be a theatre nurse, informed me of something I did not know: “A wedding ring is the only piece of jewellery that you can keep on when you have a general anaesthetic…Also the surgeon and operating team can keep theirs on.”

That surprised me because I would have expected in our super hygiene and infection-conscious world that all jewellery would have to be removed. But Janet pointed out that a patient doesn’t need to be sterile and the wedding band is taped over to stop the heat from any cauterisation burning them. “When the surgeon and scrub nurses scrub up they do a very rigorous hand clean, moving the ring about, and they wear gloves, so no risk of infection.” She added: “I have never removed mine since my late husband placed it there and never will.”

After Henry VIII’s Reformation it was decreed in England that wedding rings must be worn on the third finger of the left hand. If you were found to be wearing one on the right, as had been the custom before (and still was in many European countries), then you were at risk of being declared a Catholic and executed.

Lucien Smith said: “Fascinating about the rings. I was well aware that certain countries favour wearing a ring on the right…but not that it was a religious identifier…We had our rings made in Brighton, but as my husband-to-be took a strong disliking to the lady in the shop (he still won’t tell me why!) I don’t attach any real romance to them. Which is just as well, as we have each lost our rings for either 10 mins in a nightclub bathroom (me!), or a number of weeks in a drawer (him!).”

The tradition of wearing wedding bands dates back to Egyptian times and it used to be thought that there was a specific vein known as the ‘vena amoris’ that passed from the third finger of the right hand straight to the heart, and therefore should be the one that bore the ring. But it turns out there is no such vein.

Clare Powell, who suggested the idea for the column, said: “Thank you for the research. I had heard about the link to the heart but always wondered why the Dutch wore theirs on the right hand (years ago I worked with a girl from Amsterdam who did this). Might have known Henry VIII and the Reformation had something to do with it!”

And Caroline Newnham says: “I’ve heard this about the heart connection though as Clare says, most Europeans wear wedding rings on the right so it makes no sense.”

I’d like to know if you have a special story about your wedding ring, or any precious ring. Do your ever take it off? Have you ever lost it? And if so, how did you break the news to your other half?

I hope my mum won’t mind me sharing the following story with you. My dad bought her a beautiful ring set with diamonds and sapphires for Christmas in 2016. We had a wonderful day with the whole family, and as we were clearing up after lunch, my mum came rushing into the kitchen with a very worried look on her face. The ring was no longer on her finger.

While Dad and my sons sat chatting, myself, Mum, sisters, and nieces all surreptitiously tore the house apart looking for the ring. We pulled ripped wrapping paper from bin bags, ferreted down the sides of sofas and chairs, checked beneath carpets, tables and cupboards, looked in bathrooms, bedrooms, and all over the kitchen, all the while trying not to look like we were looking for anything. All seemed lost, until seconds before someone was about to empty it, we realised no-one had checked inside the kitchen bin.

It was stuffed full of the remains of our Christmas dinner and I can’t remember who had the delightful job of searching, but there, nestled amongst the yucky debris, was Mum’s precious ring. I don’t think I have ever seen a look of such relief on anyone’s face as that of my mum when we found it.

And my dad, who had spent a small fortune on it, was never any the wiser.

I’d love to hear from you about your opinions, memories and ideas for columns. Use the ‘Contact’ button on the top right of this page to get in touch. This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 5th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 3rd June 2024.

Band on the hand

Wedding bands date back to Egyptian times

Reaction to my column featuring Australian reader Sarah Tyson’s suggestion of composting dog waste was almost universally one of revulsion. There were expressions of fear about salmonella and e-coli being present in the compost, concerns about lingering unpleasant

odours and a general aversion to handling something that has come from a dog’s back end.

Despite these worries, Sarah assures us there is no smell once it decomposes (don’t forget is is mixed with 50% vegetable scraps), and that it quickly breaks down into an environmentally friendly natural compost. But it is recommended that the site is positioned well away from your regular compost heap. Another reader (also called Sarah) advises that it would be fine to put over flowers and other garden plants but that it shouldn’t be used on edibles destined for the table. She adds: “I can’t say it appeals to me, but apparently if it’s broken down properly it doesn’t smell. I won’t be experimenting though.”

There are plenty of people out there who do it, and lots of help can be found online. It is not recommended that you use waste from dogs who are ill, take medication, or that are fed on a raw meat diet. Although the compost should not be used on edible plants, it is very good as a mulch and also can improve the quality of nutrient-deficient soil. I would recommend reading up on it before giving it a go.

Let’s move on from dog waste to a more pleasant topic suggested by regular reader Clare Powell, that of wedding rings.

“Why do we wear them?” she asks, “Where does the tradition come from? Some feminists refuse to wear them because it’s seen as a chain. When did men start wearing them? Some men won’t wear them, they think it threatens their masculinity, or are they keeping their options open? I have girlfriends who don’t always have theirs on or swap them around. I happen to have four rings on that finger, but that’s because I love bling!”

The tradition of wedding rings can be traced back 5,000 years to the ancient Egyptians, where both men and women wore twisted rings of braided reeds or hemp on their fingers to symbolise the romantic commitment to one another. The 2nd century Greek historian Appian of Alexandria is supposed to have described a vein that ran down the finger directly to the heart called the ‘vena amoris’ or ‘vein of love’. Wearing a ring on that finger meant that a couple’s love for one another was bound by the never-ending circle.

Having done some research, it’s unclear whether Appian actually did mention that vein, but there is no doubt that Henry Swinburne, a 17th century York-born ecclesiastical lawyer, did.

In his work ‘A Treatise of Spousals, or Matrimonial Contracts’ published in 1686 he wrote: “The finger on which the wedding ring is to be worn is the fourth finger of the left hand, next unto the little finger, because by the received opinion of the learned in ripping up and anatomising men’s bodies, there is a vein of blood, called vena amoris, which passeth from that finger to the heart.”

Unfortunately, despite how fitting and romantic it all sounds (apart from the ‘ripping up and anatomising’ bit), Swinburne was talking utter claptrap. There is no such vein, and all the veins in our hands are pretty much the same, with no unique heart-bound one.

What is interesting though, is that he says the ring should be worn on the left hand. Swinburne was a staunch Anglican, and in 1593 began to work for the Dean of York Minster. This was a mere 50 years or so after the Reformation where Anglicism became the state religion and Catholics were persecuted. The Church of England established its ‘Book of Common Prayer’ in which it stated that a wedding ring had to be worn on the left hand. Up until then, in most other religions throughout Europe including Catholicism, wedding bands were worn on the right hand. In England, if you were caught with your ring on the right, you would be identified as a Catholic, accused of treason and possibly executed.

I was married to a Dutchman for 20 years and had always wondered why in the Netherlands they wore wedding rings on the right and not left hand.

And now I know!

I’d love to hear from you about your opinions, memories and ideas for columns. Use the ‘Contact’ button on the top right of this page to get in touch. This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 7th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 5th June 2024.