Today I am on a day off the day job.
That's good. We should all be thinking about working less. We all work far too hard and have no time to be doing any creative stuff. The sun is shining outside and I have already been for a walk on St Cyrus Beach. I've just had to turn down a fiddle playing job for tonight on the grounds that I already have one.
A bit short notice for sure but what the hell. It has reminded me to text Charlie (tonight's Band leader) to get the details for the job I actually have. Hopefully it will be a straightforward wedding job.
Weddings are good for bands usually. One does get the odd "Bridezilla" who is difficult to please but by and large weddings are pleasant experiences to play. Particularly if there is a Disco as well. That way if the band is not what they're looking for we can take an early bath and hand over to the disco.
I have a few plans for today to take forward. Chase up a Fiddle Bow in for re-hairing. Do a washing, hang it out. Enjoy the sunshine. Make a start to a few books.
I'm currently reading Peter Preston's "The Spanish Holocaust" and Misha Glenny's "The Balkans". They are both eminently readable histories albeit fairly blood-soaked.
I have been reading a lot of non-fiction lately. I am unsure why. Right on the button though the postman delivers a book I bought on Amazon. One of Sven Hassel's world war two novels. "Liquidate Paris" is the name of it. One of the few in the series I have not yet read. My late Father was a big fan of these books and I often read them afterwards.
They are all written from the viewpoint of a Dane who volunteered in the pre-World War Two German Wehrmacht as a response to economic privation. Sven Hassel claimed to have been such a volunteer. There is some dubiety about this and at any rate, controversy in Denmark as to the circumstances (or otherwise) of the author's service in the Wehrmacht.
These are clearly novels where the author is inhabiting the life of one of the characters as well as the other way about. The controversy in Denmark ( and one can read this on Wikipedia) seems to be whether "Sven Hassel" was a pre-war volunteer conscripted by poverty or was he rather a treacherous Dane who willingly enlisted in the German forces after Denmark was occupied by the Nazis?
It is clear that there is a blurring of the line of the truth here. It seems certain that the author used much poetic license. And so he should. Whatever the "truth" or accuracy of recollection of real events, they are fine books to read.
These are anti-war books. They do not glorify the conflict or the actors. That is the centre of their appeal to me, and I think to my Father.
Looking forward to reading it whatever. Not everyone's taste for sure but I will read it and think of my Father.
His wartime experiences were very different of course. He served in the Fleet Air Arm and his ships accompanied many convoys in the Arctic and elsewhere. During a convoy to relieve the island of Malta, his ship, the aircraft carrier "Eagle" was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine. Fortunately he survived unlike many of his shipmates.
My sister has contacted the Ministry of Defence to see about our Father being posthumously granted an "Arctic Star" Medal. These are now belatedly being awarded to veterans of Arctic convoys around the North Cape of Norway to Murmansk in the (then) Soviet Union. It seems clear that this is an embarrassed response by the Ministry to medals already issued to veterans by the grateful City of Murmansk.
My Father served on the Arctic Convoy PQ15 in the Aircraft Carrier "Victorious". It was not a pleasant experience for him. The ship's company spent most of their time at "Action Stations". For my Father "Action Stations" meant being on the hanger deck of the carrier out of the way of hands fighting the ship. It also meant being stuck in the bowels of the ship if it was attacked or sunk and having to struggle up companionways in the event of having to abandon the vessel.
Like many men of his generation he was uncomfortable speaking about his experiences which clearly moved him. I recall the troubled recollections which distressed him at the time of the sinking of the Argentine Cruiser General Belgrano during the Malvinas War.
He could see through the jingoism of the tabloid press with their "Gotcha" headlines. He knew what being torpedoed meant. He knew what abandoning ship and struggling to survive meant. He knew many who did not survive that struggle.
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