Healthy minds and bodies

6th July
"It's a mad world , my masters" I cannot remember where that comes from but it certainly applies to what I read in this morning's paper. Did you see where a Surrey Burough Council had forbidden the local WI from tending the War Memorial in its home town? In order to save £14,000 per year in maintenance costs, the Council decided to replace flower displays with grass. The WI in typical fashion said its members would perform the task for free, only to be told that it was too dangerous for the women to cross the road in case they got knocked down by the traffic. Did you ever? I presume it is OK to send their sons and daughters off to war but not to allow the mothers to walk across a road which they have to do countless times a year in the course of their normal lives.

Our WI meeting tonight involved exercises done on our chairs and gentle stretching upright from the floor---the sort of thing one could do in queues, I suppose. Everyone took part and the result was lots of smiling faces. We heard the report from the AGM in Liverpool and were given information on what follow-up work should be done on the mandate about the closure of libraries. Plans for future events were made and volunteers sought for a catering job which the WI has undertaken. The cushions made at the patchwork course were on display and these were admired. A large party is off to the Bank of England this month on an outing arranged within our group of neighbouring WIs. There are lots of activities advertised in the Bucks Newsletter for September so it was a case of working out dates for the diaries.

5th July
The Book Group met today. We started off with a reprise on "The Swimmer" by Roma Tearne which had been well received the month before. Then we talked about the Literary Lunch which several members of the group had attended. We all agreed that Katharine McMahon had been an excellent speaker and someone had bought each of the titles on sale that day so some swapping was arranged. The book we had all been reading or attempting to read was "Now is the Time to Open your Heart" by Alice Walker. Actually a lot of the readers had given up because it was very deep and meaningful with a storyline that was unimportant to the message of the book. One can only be interested in a limited amount of experiences in a person's soul induced by drugs taken to purge the mind and body. The novel was beautifully written but very different from "The Colour Purple" which had prompted this selection. We were encouraged to enjoy the companionship of women who were all better guardians of the planet than the males, to preserve the Earth and ourselves by making conscious decisions about our relationships with others and our food.At least I think that was what we all thought it was about! Our next book is a biography of someone who had lived in Northern Rhodesia in the days of the British Empire which I hope will be more manageable.