Bartimaeus

It is always a portent of Nye's birthday when the peony flowers. I had got ahead of myself, buying Nye a lamb adoption while at the Moray Fabric Fest. He had to be told about it as they started sending him emails on the first of May. Part of the purchase included an opportunity to visit and meet your lamb. The only issue was the farm was not near us. It was near my sister Mary though, near Fyvie.

He had a busy month and Olaf was growing fast. He chose to go on his birthday weekend at the very end of May and, being a good distance away, we made a long weekend of it.

The summery weather was taking a break too and the forecast was wet for our northern trip. The view en route was not promising for walks.

Still it was dry in Aberdeen where Mary met us. She brought us a scenic route to the car park, down Donald's Way and under a leopard, the surprising mascot of Aberdeen.

The weather was brighter than expected and the forecast for the weekend was rainy so Johnny had decided to bring forward the barbecue plan as this was the best prospect for al fresco dining. He had marinated the chicken and got the BBQ fired up. The wind had other ideas and burnt the coals out super quickly so some inside cooking was needed but the rain stayed off so we were still able to eat in the garden.

It was our first try of 'This is meat' substitute in kebab form. Nye declared it a success. He just needs to find where to buy them local to us. 

We got confirmation of our time to visit the lambs. They were available on his birthday. The next day Nye had another plan. While he was up north visiting family he wanted to revisit childhood haunts from when his grandparents were alive and also visit their grave. He had written a poem about his granny on card impregnated with wild flower seeds. My mum was fond of wild flowers, and poetry. Mary packed a garden fork and drove us there. He buried his poem by the grave, in the hope of flowers growing, while Mary and I spent a good while recognising names of local characters we knew in the graveyard. We had brought some water, for the seeds but also used the tap to add more. We went for lunch at the garden centre at Fochabers. 

Mary and I had a look round the nursery which is no longer called Christie's, as I remember it, nor did it have an aviary, but Mary declared it a good garden centre. Nye went off to continue his heritage visit, going to the museum, the ice cream parlour, his grandparents' house and the nearby "Lake", as it was known locally, though many would called it a pond. He showed us his photos of old school group photos he saw in the museum, where a few of our siblings were labelled as in the picture. Mary and I weren't convinced they had all been correctly labelled!

The evening also held subterfuge as Mary was trying to bake a cake for Nye surreptitiously and asking me to distract him to keep him out of the kitchen. It was made trickier by the delicious smell emanating from the kitchen. Also the promised rain had arrived, so the garden wasn't an acceptable distraction. He didn't seem to clock what was happening - he thought I was behaving strangely but probably thought I was being my usual annoying self.

We had the lamb expedition set up for the next morning and though it wasn't that easy to find the place, Mary did an expert job and we didn't get lost. Poor little Olaf, the tallest of their lambs, was limping and causing the vet to scratch their head a bit. He's getting painkillers. He has a friend Sven in his pen to keep him company. He came over to Nye for feeding. 

We saw some other lambs out in the field. People can even come and do pilates there with lambs running around them! Then Mary had some other animal surprises lined up for Nye. She drove us to a field where another farmer was diversifying!

After lunch Johnny joined us and we all went to the extraordinary village of Crovie. The road to it is quite scary. There, rather like our waterside life, the houses are not on a road.  The car is parked a little away. People have to take a trolley or barrow. or backpack down a single straight path along by the the water's edge to bring their shopping home. On the way along we saw eider ducks and close inspection of rock pools yielded several other little creatures. The birthday boy enjoyed the tickling tentacles of sea anemones and finding a sea creature he hadn't seen before.

As a lover of animals and nature, Nye had been thoroughly indulged  and Mary bought us ice cream too. Another treat was in store as he hadn't worked out that Mary was baking a cake and was surprised by his granny's recipe lemon drizzle sponge with candles after dinner. In 2020, Mary had made me the same cake, a firm family favourite, and had utilised the COVID safe method of blowing out candles, a hairdryer on the cool setting, and Nye got to try this out too.

The next day we headed back on the bus. The cloudy day and drizzle didn't bother Nye. He has never been a sun seeker or rain avoider. 

He was home in time to get the train to Glasgow with a friend to go to a concert, so his celebrations continued.

Meanwhile the birthday trip away with one sister had distracted me from another - my sister Anne's birthday is three days after Nye's and I hadn't sent her so much as a card! What's more it was a special birthday! She had gone to Spain on holiday though so would not have received anything any earlier, or on the day. However a friend and author advertised her book launch the day after Anne's birthday - a slightly behind  time solution for me. She said copies of her prose / poetry book, Leaves Of Absence, a joint project with a photographer, were available at a bookshop in West Port. I hot footed down there the next morning, only to find there were more bookshops nearby than I had expected. I waited outside Armchair Books till it opened. The young assistant found it on line but had no knowledge of a stock there. Another shop nearby only opened by appointment. I tried Edinburgh Books but it didn't have it but thought Main Point Books would be most likely to stock it but was unlikely to be open. They were right. My quick solution wasn't so quick. Still I filled time buying a book from each of the second hand shops I had been in, that had been helpful. While I hung around Main Point Books, I noticed it was round the corner from West Port, on Bread Street, but that Main Point was also the name of the place it was situated, a junction of several other Streets. Despite its important name, and clear labels, the Main Point had passed me by all these years.

But the main point for me was, that I had tracked down a present for Anne and got it sent the same-day, even if it was a bit late. 

The week held yet another birthday. Our friend Gandolf was having his annual gathering on his birthday, on the Meadows. He had a bring and share table full of food of all kinds. Last year we missed the gathering, being on board, near Burton on Trent. That might have been a bigger celebration, but it was lower key this year for his 81st. No cake candles this time, but always ready to improvise, Gandolf tried a wooden fork, provided for eating salads and cakes. The handle didn't catch well, nor icing covered prongs but fork prints dipped in olive oil did catch and the assembled throng sang him happy birthday and he blew out the fork candle... neither a fork handle nor four candles.