Lockdown week 7 - Friday

For a change, we went into town today. Most of the time, the main road wasn't really as empty as this picture suggests.

A chap was doing something to the river bank - can you see him? - in a white shirt. I think he's probably the same chap that we saw the other week. We were on the other bridge, nearer him. On that day, I was just taking a photo of him for the blog when he turned round and saw me. Embarrassment! I hope he thought I was just taking a general view of the river. We had a little chat. His house was on the river there and he was just building up the bank to make it less likely to flood his garden.

We then passed a pub with various chaps outside it. The top banner said, "There's only one Gogsy ... " surname, which I can't remember. The green banner is about Hibs football club. We know nothing about football but assumed that Gogsy was a Hibs player. However, talking to someone on our side of the road, we discovered that he was a supporter who frequented this pub and has recently died of coronavirus. His funeral cortege was about to come along. Sad, but nice that his friends went to this trouble.

And then we walked on into the New Town, with its terraces and crescents.

I always think how much nicer it would look without cars, so was pleased to be able to take this carless photo.

There are lots of private gardens in the centre of the crescents, which you can rent a key for, but only if you live or work in one of the adjoining streets.

The building with the scaffolding used to be the French Institute, but that moved a couple of years ago further into town. However, before the French Institute bought it, it was a private house belonging to a family to whom Mr L's great aunt Chris was the housekeeper. She was a real character - unmarried and very jolly. She lived to the age of 91. She was at Daughter 1's first birthday tea and told me that I must tell Daughter 1, when older, that her great-great aunt had been present at this event. Sadly, she had a stroke at Daughter 2's christening party. She never fully recovered and died a few months later. But she had a nice life. The family also had a country house outside Edinburgh, which Mr L visited on occasion with his parents when the family was away and she was dog-sitting. They called her Fyfe (her surname) - very Upstairs, Downstairs.

Then round the corner we go, towards Queen Street,

admiring the bluebells,

In this street, Mr L began his working life,

behind that big black door, in an accountant's office.

Meanwhile I was at school, virtually opposite, where this rather horrid sixties building now stands. Our school buildings were demolished - it wouldn't happen now. The school then moved to the site with the 18th century house, quite near our house (see blogs of a week or two ago). This modern building contained offices but then, quite recently, it became a hotel. It was very odd to pass it and see people sitting in the window eating their breakfasts, suspended in mid-air, so to speak, quite unaware of the ghosts of schoolgirls, where our classrooms had been.

Clearly there's been a plaque there for the past 11 years, but I don't think I've walked past it during that time.

A rather mournful teddy sat on the street side of these shutters to entertain passing children during lockdown. Or maybe he just slipped behind them, tired of being shuttered in.

All the side streets have views of the sea.

Four and a bit miles today.

There have been various programmes on tonight about VE Day, which was 8 May 1945, 75 years ago. My father was in the army and was not going to be demobbed at this point, but instead was told he was being sent to Japan. This didn't happen; the atomic bombs were dropped and that ended the war completely.

The programmes made me think a lot about the war, and the suffering that went on then, compared to which our current suffering is nothing. Tomorrow would have been my mother's 98th birthday. She died in 2012 and I'll always miss her.

But I'm also missing the family and the little ones. They're changing - we see it in photos but I'm longing to see them in person.