Wedding traditions, sheep encounters, and the loss of innocence (10 – 16th August)

The weather this week

Several oppressively hot days then 4 days of mist and still air. The feeling of stagnancy is exacerbated by the continued restrictions of Covid. Even though we can move around now and have resumed some of the ‘normal’ life routines, we still have to be careful with whom and how we interact, for the sake of my mum and dad.

At home

It is only a couple of weeks until our wedding, and this week we started the preparations in earnest. Asides from the practical bits – finding outfits, choosing what to eat and drink – we also tended to the symbolic aspects, buying wedding rings from a fantastically old-fashioned jewellers in Hawick, and a beautiful wooden quaich to be used in our riverside ceremony. According to a friend, there is a Rule Valley wedding tradition that sees the bride and groom share a quaich of good whisky after their vows, sipping some and dedicating the rest to the river. We’re not sure if this rumour isn’t confusing a tradition used in the launch of the salmon fishing season, but we’re not averse to including some good whisky in the nuptials and perhaps just making it our own tradition.

According to Jim, one of the biggest steps towards becoming Mr and Mrs occurred this week when we created our ‘library’ by melding our substantial collection of books. Since moving in, we’ve talked about installing a bookcase big enough to hold them all, and this week it finally arrived. With only an inch to spare, it was squeezed into the living room and now holds the amalgamated literary explorations of us both. Unpacking those books took a while, as titles that evoked moments in each of our histories were unpacked and discussed, photo albums found, memorabilia unearthed. We learned a lot about each other, and I was faced with forgotten elements of my own past via the books I had read and collected, photos and letters I had kept. It was a bittersweet experience that felt like a significant convergence; two middle-aged people sharing these worn, rich and well-loved symbols of their past-selves. I registered a futile, old-fashioned hope that people continue to invest their memories in such tactile things. It is hard to imagine such emotion and joy being elicited from browsing outdated social media posts.

In the garden

Everything is producing and growing faster than I can keep up with, but perhaps I exaggerate the speed because I am a little garden weary. Seeing as this was intended to be a ‘hands off’ year of observation, I am making do with a garden structure that I wouldn’t have chosen myself, and have also not invested the amount of time and energy needed to make the garden space wholly enjoyable. Of course, we DO enjoy it. It’s a privilege to have a garden at all, and when the sun shines even the chaos is beautiful. There are plenty of lovely perennial flowers, mad triffid-like nastursiums, and wildflowers in the paddock - but the persistent grass and weeds are both cause and product of my lack of enthusiasm.

Even the poly tunnel is looking a little neglected, although I have to note my satisfied surprise at the number of ripe tomatoes being produced. What a wonderful thing home-grown tomatoes are. Even despite the lack of sunshine, they are sweet, juicy, and provide that glorious evocative tomato scent.

I also started a number of kale plants a few weeks ago, that are getting to decent size. Half are in a raised bed outdoors, and half in the tunnel. If they can survive the rabbits and mice, I may yet have kale to see us through the winter.

Out and About

People around us are beginning to ease their social restrictions to include garden visits, and we were immensely pleased to be able to enjoy some company this week.

Most notably, a friend of mine who is apprenticing as a hill farmer on Ruberslaw offered to introduce Humphrey to some of his sheep. Living in the rural Borders, it’s important that our dog develops a healthy regard for all livestock, and learns to stay out of their way. Our aim was not to have him be hurt, but to allow him to get close enough to realise sheep are not giant fluffy dogs who want to play. We headed out into a field of ewes with their mature offspring - Robert with his long shepherd’s crook in hand – to set up the encounter. Unfortunately, Humphrey was far more interested in the excrement than the animal itself, and it took quite some time for him to even notice the sheep. Eventually he took a few excited steps towards a ewe who, on seeing him, snorted and stamped her foot in a convincingly threatening manner. We were close by in case intervention was needed, but clearly both parties decided that nothing was to be gained by further interaction. The sheep resumed its rumination, while Humphrey returned to his foul supper. Rather an anti-climax, and I’m not sure Humphrey learned much.

Humph with Great Uncle Charlie on Ruberslaw

Perhaps to compensate for the non-event, Robert offered to take us up the hill to see the heather in bloom. The thrill of the drive up was only paralleled by the view from the top and the heady scent of the heather. I am envious of Robert’s office, but don’t hold any illusion that I could do his work. As we descended the hill, he spotted a sheep in distress and had to zoom off on his quad bike, roaring around in circles until the sheep was isolated. He pinned it to the fence and had to perform a pretty gruesome operation by hand. After a short skirmish, the sheep trotted away quite restored, leaving Robert to clean his hands as best he could on the grass. Not a job for the faint hearted.

Overall, it was rather an exciting week for little Humph. He is almost 7 months old and showing signs of becoming a teenager. At this stage, it’s really important that we continue to socialise him with other dogs to discourage any aggression or anxiety he might have. Having a naturally sociable nature, neither aggression nor anxiety appear apparent. On the contrary, the presence of other dogs makes him unbearably excited and the majority of doggie-dates result in him haring around in circles until his (usually older) playmate barks at him to stop. Even then, he will often continue until he is a ragged, panting mess. We thought it might be helpful for him to meet with a dog more his own age (the eternal hope that he might tire himself out), and fortune provided us with an invitation to drinks with a couple who have an 18 month-old Labrador bitch.

Everything was going well until Humphrey launched himself, without warning, onto our host’s lap, daintily removing a piece of prosciutto from atop a canapé and wolfing it down before we could blink (is it wrong to profess I am a little proud of this sneaky manoeuvre?). Our hosts were incredibly understanding, but for the sake of the remaining canapés, Humph and the bitch pup were confined to the kitchen while we continued our drinks. The pups had been causing a ruckus that embarrassed all owners, so it was a bit of a relief to have them out the room, but an unnerving silence drove Jim to check on them, and found our darling little monster in a rather uncompromising position. All memories of our sweet and innocent little puppy evaporated and we dragged our exhausted, tousled dog away from his first love. Luckily, we established that no permanent damage had been done, and are very unlikely to be receiving weird short-legged, large-headed, terrier/Lab cross puppies in the future.