Ever Had A Bad Day?

Photos Copyright: Maggie May

Ever had a bad day from beginning to end?

I woke up with excruciating sciatica. Well, that is an understatement because I've been battling with it for weeks but this particular day I felt I just wanted to sit and cry with the pain. It is a problem that keeps recurring and has done since I was in my late forties.

Harry is just starting chemo 3 and isn't very well right now, though he has been doing fine since the strength of the treatment was reduced last time.

The area I chose to do my shopping in that day seemed to have a great problem. I realised that the roads were blocked off and buses had ground to a halt. Passengers had to get off and walk and eventually the vehicles had to go a different way through some really tricky side roads and narrow streets full of parked cars.

There was a terrible smell of acrid smoke and fire engines all over this (usually) very busy road. Pedestrians were eventually stopped and I turned into a little lane, up a hill and suddenly saw the shop....... or rather what was left of it. People witnessing everything, told me there had been several explosions, as the shop had been a nail bar and had chemicals stored there. Luckily no one got hurt but the flat above was gutted as well as the shop.

I felt a bit of an unsavoury character taking photos but lots of other people were doing so too. I do carry my camera at all times and am always ready to snap unusual things but of course this was tragic for the people involved, losing property and possessions. However, when it comes down to it, no lives were lost and it could have been so much worse.

Some hours later, I went back a second time and the fire engines were still there but this time pedestrians were allowed to walk to the other side of the road. Still there were no other vehicles allowed....... only Police and fire engines and crew. There was a car next to the nail bar that had partly melted with the heat.

When I eventually got home....... a phone call that I answered made things so much worse. My friend, who had been in hospital for several weeks had died that morning. She wasn't expected to die as she'd got over the worst. She'd even talked about coming home in a few weeks last time I phoned her. I'm so glad that I did phone her when I did a few weeks ago, little realising it would be the last time I would ever hear her voice.

The New Pier

Photos Copyright: Maggie May

I expect many people from South West of England/Wales, remember the terrible news of the Weston Super Mare Pier burning down in July 2008.

I went there shortly after the event and managed to get close enough to take this photo.

It was a terrible thing to see.

Not that I could say that piers are that important in my life but I think it was an asset to this seaside town and I had known it since I was a small child when I used to go there on Sunday School outings.

Over the next couple of years, the old pier was dismantled, strengthened and widened.

Progress seemed to be very slow and whenever we visited Weston, we took the occasional photo but thought that it would never get finished.

However, when we revisited a few weeks ago after a very long time without going there, I was able to snap the photo below and think it is a definite improvement.

Strange Haunting Beauty?

Is there a strange, haunting beauty in the burnt out tangled mass of metal, that is all that remains of Weston Super Mare's Pavillion? The remnants of a white building, packed with rides and all the usual things that attracted thousands of people to walk down the pier and spend their money?

We recently visited Weston and walked down the pier until we got to the barriers that stopped us from walking any further, where the twisted metal stands and the big hole in the pier planks look straight down into the murky sea below.

It was a sad sight when we first got there. No one knows quite what happened or how the fire started during the early hours of one Monday morning. At least I think it was a Monday. The whole of England must have seen it on the news. Flames and black smoke shooting up into the sky and seen for miles around.

The town seems as busy as it has ever been, despite the gloomy forecast that Weston would be finished after the fire, as no one would come if the pavillion was not there. Well I don't believe that for a minute!

Here we were, seeing it for our selves. A strange, sad feeling wafting over all who had come to pay their respects.

One day it will rise again. No doubt looking even better than it was before.