Senseless

After the morning dog walk in the cool of the forest, passed through the neighbouring village of Frechenrieden and for some reason the Maypole seemed very prominent and I thought now that the Whitsun parliamentary recess was over, it might be appropriate to bring some joy to its namesake who will be facing PMQs again this afternoon.

To try an get the whole tree in the photo had to cross the bridge over the stream and stand almost in the entrance to the village kindergarten trying to avoid falling over all the little trikes parked outside. I still didn't manage to get the very top of the tree in the photo.

Walked to the base of the tree to look at the wonderful carving in the bark. They don't paint their tree in this 500 soul village but someone is very talented at cutting the "lozenge" shape forms. I learnt later that the village erects a new tree every year. Many villages replace theirs every other year.

Then the war memorial behind the tree caught my eye and given that it had so many names carved on the four panels I took a look to see which period of history it covered. See extra photo. To my amazement and horror, it is only for the two world wars. I thought it may cover the 1866 Inner German war which led to the 1870/1 Franco-German war. But no.

Reading the names of over 80 (20+ WWI, 60+ WWII) almost all very young men who fell mainly in Russia in WWII, with surnames that are so common in this area, I felt very moved. How could this massive loss of young lives in the then no doubt much smaller village be allowed to happen?

Greed in I and populism in II.

And where are we heading today with the like of Trump & May (Boris, Davies et al), Putin and Erdogan?

Had a long chat with the lady of my age who lives in the house to the left and happened to come out to hang out clothes. We had similar views but her immediate concern or rather one she lives with 24/7/365 is being so close to the Maypole. She tells me that in a storm, the proximity of the tree is very worrying.