I went out to water the plants this-morning. There is a big old rosemary bush at the back of the garden, and as I was watering it, I noticed something red peeping out from the leaves. It was a perfect scarlet rose – just one that had grown about 3 feet of stem to reach the light… I was amazed. Maybe there’s a lesson in that – if you just keeping ploughing your way through bark and leaves, you can eventually reach the sun. No sooner had I recovered from that moment of wonder than I discovered that we have a cherry tree, complete with now-ripening plump red cherries. This made me very, very happy.
What a day. ROASTING! So damn hot I could hardly sit outside. Even at 9am, as I drank my morning brew on the sofa in the back garden (yes, there’s a sofa in the back garden), I began to melt. Our flat is “upside down” – the bedrooms are on a half-basement floor – in the winter, as we froze our asses off going downstairs, we used to say (with doubt-filled voices), “Ah, just wait for the summer… it’ll be great then.” Well, the pay-off has arrived. The temperature down here is spot on. Wee L. is asleep with no blankets or even his little sleeping bag… he’s so cute its heartbreaking.
The old acoustic guitar has been wheeled out. I have to learn a John Martyn song for the mighty Steve Vincent who is getting married on Saturday. To tell you the truth, it never really went away. Even in the dark days of no sleep and going slightly crazy when L. was very young, I used to play for some kind of salvation. I used to play “My Song is Love Unknown”, a hymn that Leo (Abrahams) arranged beautifully for guitar, and end up crying my eyes out at some ungodly hour of the night. Partially because I was so gone, so tired, but also because its one of the most beautiful pieces of music I’ve ever heard… playing it is like praying in a strange way. I played for L. – he loves stroking the strings, and played his first chord at the tender age of 3 months with the help of my left hand. I never would have believed I could become such a cooing dad… is that what happens to all blokes when they have a baby? I have become an emotional basket case since L. was born, and its not changing.