"Our Friends In The North"

* See end of post re above snap.

I DO SO love November! But I seem to be the only person I know who does.

I love huddling in scarf hat gloves coat while air nibbles my cheeks, brightens my eyes, makes me walk fast(er), hands snug in pockets, comfy-socked feet twinkling in muddy shoes.....Hmm, slight exagerration: I've got muddy shoes, but as for twinkling feet...

BUT November in rural northern England really stuns me. It must be instinctive, primitive stuff... (!): I was supposed to be born on Christmas Eve but couldn't wait, appearing far too early and in the wrong month. Legend says my pregnant mother fell off her bike, therefore hastening my arrival but I like to think it was just November calling. And so for always, I've loved gunmetal skies, bare sculptured trees, the sheer crazy blueness of November mornings....and I love her dark pink-laced skies, when white clouds lilt in blackness. I could go on but you'll be glad I won't!

We've just had 2 w/ends with 2 lots of Friends in the North.

The 1st w/end was with ex neighbours/old friends known donkeys yrs. They've left our little city and now have a friendly cottage in a grey stoned Cumbrian village. It's not a manicured, glossy village; it has its own rather worn face, etched with lines...and sometimes it's smiling, other times a bit weary....And a storybook stream trickles through this village, ducks quack in the lane, and there's a dusty church ( with yews and plane trees guarding its people) echoing the dignity of centuries with its history, its churchyard.... and each time we visit our friends, a friendly pleasantly-scruffy pub welcomes us with tasty beef baps, excellent beers. This place is the home of genuine country people and it's got " no sides" ( as my mother would say) and we love it....

While there, we visited Larch Cottage Nurseries nr Melkinthorpe( see http://www.larchcottage.co.uk/ and you'll see why we liked it. )

We also made a return trip to The Theatre By The Lake at Keswick ( see http://www.theatrebythelake.com/) where we enjoyed Alan Bennett's " The Lady in the van". This is a super theatre, worth a visit ( or several) if you're in/nr the Lakes. It opened in 1999 and in 2007, broke all previous box office records playing to over 55000 people. It operates without deficit, has a far smaller proportion of public funding than comparable theatres, but it's sensible in recognising that nobody in the crazy Arts world can afford to sit back nowadays and snooooze...

Our 2nd w/end was to more old friends, this time in Coniston. They've featured before in m'blog coz like our other friends, we all go back a long way. Last w/end included a trip across the lake from our friends' place, to a craft fair at Brantwood (home of Victorian artist writer social reformer John Ruskin, see http://www.brantwood.org.uk/) and also a Sunday morning trek to Cestrian folk now living in a centuries old watermill several miles from Conistion.

The Lakes were at her loveliest. But that's November for you...

** The snap is Coniston Lake (late pm/early eve) taken last Saturday from the gardens of Brantwood.

Thanks to G.C. once again..