Anna Rashbrook's Blog, page 16

A new hobby

No, not his one!

One of the results of lockdown and travelling restrictions is we can’t actually get to the UK to view places. But there is a new online hobby for us. House seeking. We got onto the sales websites and gloriously troll through houses in the areas we like.

We did find one we loved recently, but with only twenty years leasehold on it and it being on the small side it’s gone on the reserve list. We’re looking at Wales as it has it all and it’s cheaper than the UK. Off for another look!

The contract

After a long. long winter, things are moving along on the sales front. We had agreed a price in the autumn and after sorting some things out, the buyers have got the contract organised! They will sign it in Vienna, then send it to us, then back to Vienna. Once it is entered in the ‘Ground Book’, we will be paid, Whoop, whoop!

It’s certainly less complicated than the UK, and there’s no Estate Agent as it’s a private sale. No capital gains as we have been here over ten years as our main residency. Then, Covid permitting, we will pack up, maybe truck all our belongings with us and rent somewhere in the UK till we find our forever home. Or we may hang on until the summer when maybe the vaccination passport gets going for Europe, we have an agreement with the buyers that we can stay until October. Or we may store the furniture and come back later for it. Or if we find we dont like England anymore, we can come back here as we wont give up our residency!

It’s been such a long time, I’m a bit numb. The desperate longing rises now and then, but we’ve sort of switched off over the winter. I can’t face another winter here, all that trucking through the snow with the dig, despite my shoe nails. I want grass and snow drops in February! I want a life with more people in it, family. We’re now starting to pack things up as I’m haunted by the last move when we had to clear out sixteen years of family life.

We’ve been watching the market and it’s sad, but there are suddenly a lot of nearly affordable retirement homes for sale, but we don’t feel ready for that yet. A little terrace house in a small town in Wales would be good, where there are lots of churches to find a new spiritual home, and all that coastline, hills and castles to explore. Our home town of New Milton, being on the south coast and near a National Park is now way beyond our budget, although I would love to return to New Life Church.

We’ve looked at park homes, but you have to pay Ground rent, fees etc plus Council tax and we worry that that they wouldn’t actually be that secure.

A moment of peace

Yesterday morning, I was loitering at home, and actually sat down in the sitting room. Barry White was burbling away on the radio. The sun had just come over the hill behind us and was tipping bright yellow light into the room, making fluttering movements on the floor. The dog was lying in the sun on our bed through the door. Dave was chomping away at his trough of muesli.

This is OK. A wash of peace and contentment, rare at this time washed over me. It was a Goudgian*moment of the spiritual tripping into the daily. I sat and surfed in it for a while until time moved on. Rare and wonderful.

 

*Elizabeth Goudge is my favourite author and her words can fill me with this sense of a sudden bursting in of the other side, and it can happen around me, or even in a picture.

Snow Muse!

This year, I’ve been mostly photographing this view from the kitchen window!

The death of a neighbour

He was a dear old man and lived across the lane from us. We only really got to know him after his wife died and he would take regular walks up the farm track. He would have snacks for Swingle in his pocket and she would hurtle off if she caught scent of him and sit barking until she was fed. I was always worried that she would knock him over as he was a bit wobbly. At the foot of this post are some of the blog posts I wrote about him.

But as time went by, he got a bit better on his feet and over the years, I would stop and chat with him. When the fence fell down, he giggled and said, ‘Schlaganfall’ or stoke. He met up with some of the older ladies who lived nearby who also took and afternoon stroll and I said they were the Pensioners running club.

He stopped feeding Swingle when he ran out of his biscuits, and he was a bit more wobbly. I would give him a bottle of wine and a mince pie or Christmas cake, and he would invite me in for a tea. He had built the house himself, and although its by the road, it has a spectacular view down the Mur.

Then he had a fall and because of his blood pressure went into an old people’s home while he got better, where his family said he was happy, with the photo of his wife he used to chat to.

Then  a few weeks ago, we got the deathogram. He had passed away at 92 from Corona.

To all of you who wont shield, have a vaccination and believe the lies on the internet, feeding a spurious paranoia about the bug. This man didn’t have to die, he had a few precious years left with his family. If not for the bug, he would be pottering up the lane even now.  You are convicted of a selfishness that is beyond belief.

Last Christmas, I took little gifts of cake and my homemade wine around to the neighbours. One result was Mr B, who we had been on hello terms with before, suddenly thawed and now stops and chats to us all the time. Widowed a couple of years ago (his wife was on the garage roof picking cherries a few months before she went), he’s on his own but takes a daily constitutional along the lane.  When it was icy I had constant fear that I’d find him fallen, as he’s a bit wobbly, but I think he goes so slowly he’s OK! Sometimes I see him dozing in the sun. He now carries a pocketful of treats for Swingle and if she sees him or I say his name, she’s off like a bullet – the tart! And I treasure this little friendship. Paggy used to slag him off all the time, but I find him a simple, honest man. I noticed the other day as the lane was  thawing someone had built little canals for the water to flow away- Mr B gleefully told me he’d been playing with his walking stick!

Swingle has now trained Mr B to carry biccies for her. If we’re along the lane, she can scent he is there and rushes off barking as loud as she can. She stops and sits by him, and he drops the titbits in her mouth. Presently I catch up and we chat, and sometimes he gives me a sweet!!!!!!  I took this photo secretly so I can make it into a Christmas card for him!!!

On the way back from walkies the other day, Swingle and I met Mr B by the Isopan factory, and after she had finished mugging him for biscuits, he turned to the tower and said – did you know I built that?  He had apprentices under him , so he  must have been a boss! What is now a brick factory, before the war was a paper factory that made special ‘Hirsch’ (deer logo) wrapping paper that was sold all over Europe, but by the nature of it, very few examples survive. The factory was ahead of its time, creating accommodation for its workers in the 1930s, and folk from all Europe worked here. Our house was the women’s house with a Kindergarten and by the Jagglerhof, another identical block housed the men (so not  far ahead), and the railway station is still so named.

The factory from the other side of the river Mur

Mr B went on to say there is a tunnel that runs under the road  from one side to the other side of the road- I wonder if that is still there? Mr B was born in the Mur house,which was close to the factory which has since been demolished, I thought because the road was widened, but he said that no one wanted to live in it as the work decreased in the factory. He remembers it flooding and his Dad having to go out in swimming trunks!

You can see the chimneys in the photo, which My B said were dynamited, as either they weren’t safe or the factory was closing. One went down right across the road, the other towards the Mur. On the edge of the factory was the Madlingwirt that is now gone. he said when he worked at the factory lunchtimes were great with a beer (unsaid) they would have chess, chat, harmonica playing. I mentioned the old Fire station that was on the corner of the Thomatal road  (see picture at top, brown building) and he said he’s been in the voluntary fire brigade that was stationed there. All of the things he told me took place in the 1940s, so I guess he was too young for service in the war, but you don’t like to ask an old man his age….

He said that there was wood stored all over the place, but the first fire he remembered was when the Herrenhaus burnt – he said they all had to dash over and they only had stirrup pumps and had to rush to and from the Mur, but they must have got it out, although the building was later demolished.

The burnt Herren house, identical to our block

I asked about when the factory burnt down. He said it happened in the winter, and they were woken in the night in the Mur house by someone banging the door and yelling Alarm! On the river side of the factory, there was a lot of larch planks stored and these had caught alight. He said there were French people working there at the time. So the fire brigade rushed over and by now they has electric pumps for the water. But it was -35c! As they pumped the water, it was freezing, and they had to fight all night, with brigades from all over the Lungau coming to help. The did manage to put the fire out by the morning and save the machinery.  But Mr B said that it was so cold, their uniforms froze! He said the highlight was being brought coffee by the French to keep them going. But I think the damage done meant the factory closed. We have heard rumours that it was an accidentally on purpose fire, meaning it and the various houses could be sold off….

He bought his house and we have always wondered why it had such a big cellar floor although at the side of the road, it turns out it was the village Smithy! He rebuilt it from the cellar up in the 1960s.

I do find local oral history so fascinating and its all stuff that could disappear, Swingle and I will chat with him some more!

Groundhog Day/week/month/year

Anyone else living here? Same thing everyday, except maybe the excitement of shopping?

It wouldn’t be so bad if it was like the film. I could learn to play an instrument. Help out neighbours. Do good. Maybe finally get to understand my husband. But no.

Lockdown ends here February 8th. Then I hope the library can re-open, I can have a coffee with a friend, and maybe have a vaccination. Here’s hoping…

 

Burg Finstergruen in the snow

 

The favourite view from my kitchen window, now has new lighting. Think its cute in the snow!

Ice, ice, baby!

On a quiet, cold walk by the Mur in Tamsweg, we suddenly noticed the river filling with ice and the level rising. We guessed a dam of ice had burst upstream, it was spectacular. The photos don’t really do justice to the nose and flow. I rushed home to see what it was all like by the bend in the river by our house. It must have broken up by then as it wasn’t anything like. Any of you got some ice photos?

New Book!

Just before Christmas, I published the first volume of my memoirs, doesn’t that sound grand? But this is the book that has me most scared. Revealing myself, rather than playing with the people of my imagination.

However, as a Christian, I have prayed about this and am certain, that it the present situation, this is the main way I can witness to people. The whole of my life leads to God, despite fighting him for years. Maybe someone might learn from my mistakes and trials and find him too.

Blurb

Brought up by a warring Mother and Grandmother, Anna Rashbrook had to make choices that no child should have to.

In this first memoir, she begins the quest to understand the threads of faith, horses, and love, which weave and intertwine throughout her life.

Years of diarying help Anna in this frank and honest chronicle of her childhood and teenage, as she explores the scars and the disfunction that was all around her. Not to forget pony mania, the Tremeloes, David Bowie, some terrible teenage behaviour, travel, first love, and heartbreak.

What now?

New Year, new starts, blah,blah,blah. We got through Christmas with peace, and had lovely chats with family. Now, maybe it’s the lack of direction, nothing on the horizon, that’s bringing me down. Nothing to look forward to. Lockdown here until 17th January. No holiday houses to do, so not even frantic February to dread/ look forward to. I don’t even want to get back to writing, I’m struggling with the second part of my autobiography as it is.

It’s not often that I get down or lose hope. This afternoon, Dave and I had a look on the net at properties on Wales to see if the prices have gone down; there still seems to be properties about. I felt so low and wanted to cry. I love this place, but want to go. No sale in sight, its just a lost dream. Or is it safer to stay here, as this stupid bug is still storming around?

I know God has a plan, we are in his hands, I know I’m impatient. God, couldn’t we have just a little hint of the way forward? Many years ago, when we were waiting to be re-housed after the eviction, I went to look at a house to rent. On the way home, I cried to him, could you please do something so clear, that we know what to do? I was in a real dilemma. An hour later, we had a call offering us a brand new council house that became our family home. I could do with a bit of that now Lord.