Endings

This year I have missed my cavorting peonies for the first time ever. They went ahead and partied without me and are now so much the worse for wear they are incapable of recognising me. Except this one. Since I moved this plant from the front to the back garden I have nurtured it through five years of not flowering. This year it produced one bloom which hung on and on for me to get back. I am stupidly pleased.

***

The memorial for Maja is tomorrow. Her daughter asked whether those of us in the choir who knew her would sing, and seven of us agreed. The only time that all seven of us were able to get together to rehearse was between 5 and 5.30 this evening. 

Normally I would have cycled the twelve minutes to the rehearsal but instead I allowed 40 minutes for a bus ride and a short walk. 15 minutes after the bus was due I started trying to flag down taxis. 25 minutes after it was due I started to hitch. A vanful of railway engineers from the Rhondda Valley took me to the junction with the road over the Thames and I have MariainWales to thank for having been able to astonish them with 'Diolch' as I got out. (I didn't need the other four words I know in Welsh, which mean 'Slow', 'Police', 'Woollen' and 'Mill'.) 

I started limping towards the bridge, thumb out, and very soon a car stopped for me. When the driver heard what had happened and why I needed to get to my friend's house, he went out of his way and took me to the door and I was only two minutes late.

The kindnesses continue.