The Kid gained her Fédération International de Tir à l'Arc (FITA) Red and Gold Feather awards before her twelfth birthday but since then has taken a break from archery and is having horse-riding lessons instead. Oddly enough, this arose easily out of the archery because the archery club we joined is run on land owned by a riding stables.
The Dad has been in several archery tournaments and does well – he has medals and badges already.
I decided after a few weeks to 'go barebow' rather than go for the more technical approach favoured by Olympic recurve archers. A few weeks ago I shot a Portsmouth Round (60 arrows, 60cm target, from 60 feet away) in the garden and got a score that would have given me third place among the novices shooting recurve at a recent tournament (the only one I've entered so far). Since shooting barebow is generally acknowledged to be harder than shooting with sights and balancing rods and all the other paraphernalia, I was chuffed with that result. All I have to do now is keep repeating it. Aye right! ;-)
One of the best things about archery is that it does not have a detrimental effect on my health. I've finally had to accept my GP's diagnosis of ME as the only thing that comes anywhere near 'explaining' my long-term weird and wonderful symptoms. Accepting the diagnosis doesn't change anything physically as there doesn't seem to be any treatment other than rest and learning to pace oneself, but I think it has changed my attitude: before it was very hard to explain to anyone why I didn't feel up to something or why I got tired so easily, especially as I look fit and healthy and am, in fact, pretty active, though less so than I'd like, having been forced to give up cycling, swimming and dancing which I enjoyed but which caused distressing 'payback'. I didn't want to 'explain' anyway because I feared it would seem like moaning; now I have a convenient label! It was a label I resisted for years but actually accepting it does make things simpler as far as other people are concerned.
We had a lovely family get-together in Anglesey back in late July/early August – four generations of siblings, cousins, aunties, uncles, grans and grandads. The oldest person there was my mum and the youngest my grandson, who is now three. Another grandchild is due in a few weeks.
The Kid has settled well into her secondary school. Having walked to school all her life until this August, I think one of the biggest adjustments was getting used to the twelve-mile bus ride there and back. She adjusted well and now enjoys the rowdy homeward ride very much! The driver deserves a medal! Her favourite subject is Art, at which she is brilliant, according to her Art teacher at a recent parents' evening. We were not surprised by this assessment as she has spent a large portion of her life drawing on anything she could possibly draw on, including some things we'd rather she hadn't drawn on.
My garden ambitions for the Boggy Brae have had to become a little more realistic to fit within my energy limitations, so I'm now encouraging wild growth wherever appropriate. Since the overhead electricity cables up the hill have now been removed, I can allow a couple of self-seeded oaks to do their utmost with a clear conscience. Given the number of ash seedlings we have to remove each year, I should think that when the current fungal disease that is affecting ashes passes over, and if ours escape infection, we'll be able to restock the UK with naturally resistant saplings. As for sycamores.... :-/ Anyway, it's quite encouraging, really, to see that if we just left things alone here, Nature would soon generate a forest. Even now, we cannot be seen from the far side of the loch in summer because we are hidden by tree foliage. In winter we can be seen in daylight but at night, in the darkness of no street lights (since we aren't on a street), we are invisible again. We like that.
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