Time is a premium luxury!
Naturally we need our health… some money to enjoy some of the finer things balanced with the simple pleasures of life.
But the older I get, I resonate more and more with my father’s words…
“A good bed, leather soled shoes on your feet and good food on the table , is all you really need son”
He was right , I’m not a wealthy man by any stretch of imagination…
Yes I’ve tasted it and it’s lovely, but more and more it becomes less important to me.
One fuels the other, the more toys and trinkets, the more pressure! and gearing up in uncertain times can be stressful.
I remember as a young boy being bored on Sundays, they were better than school admittedly, but you had to walk miles to find a sweet shop that was open, and until I discovered fishing, Sunday’s were pretty quiet, with certain strict rules about what you could and couldn’t do on the hallowed day. Fortunately, fishing was allowed, followed by ‘Sunday tea’ watching The Flaxton Boys. (I missed the wonderful Sunday lunch cooked by my mother, for the sake of fishing) until I managed to persuade her that ‘Sunday dinner, early evening would altogether be more sophisticated.
Now I sort of look back at those days with fondness and melancholy for a time gone by.
Shop’s didn’t open on Sundays (we still don’t) and church bells peeled and their was a quietness, which I now love and hanker for.
Fishing was and still is great, and I should try and make more time for this gentle restful pastime.
I remember one Sunday visiting Bolton Abbey with a school pal and watching an elderly gentleman in a tweed jacket and waders, fly fishing for trout on the river Wharfe.
It’s a crystal clear picture that is etched in my memory. I wanted to swap my course rod and place on the local pond, fishing like my pals, for perch and roach and try my hand at the gentle art I’d witnessed on the Wharfe.
Billowing pipe smoke, a cane wand flicking a pale coloured line so gracefully, peaceful and tranquil… I feel myself calming just thinking of it.
Not to diss the hours and hours of wonderful fun and banter I had with my pals around the local pond….I would never swap those memories!… but I did take up the graceful art and though not as much as I would like, still fish to this day.
I don’t know why I started thinking about fishing as I started to write this blog, maybe because life has been running in ‘10th gear’ this last two months and whilst waiting for a train back from our London office, I found some of that precious time to reflect and maybe its a sign to pick up a rod again and relax a bit.
This last two months, I can’t remember lunch unless I’ve been in London or on a shoot day, as I have been so busy with R-W and all spare time has been claimed by a new project…
My other half is to open a shop in Ripon, near the Cathedral, which I’m informed makes Ripon a City!
A shop not with clothing, or fly fishing equipment, but with another interest of many years, one off pieces of furniture, paintings , prints and beautiful objects…. tempted to call it ‘stuff we like ‘ but settled on Kirkgate House, Eclectic Living… opening early December next door to the excellent Italian restaurant ‘Prima’.
There have been plenty of 5am starts to get to antique fairs and London, and days off and Sundays have formed the normal 7 days working week for the last two months.
We are nearly there and have two full days to break the back of getting ready to open, alongside all, that goes on at Rhodes-Wood, before flying with two of my boys, Charles and Freddie and Charlotte my step daughter to New York for a (well I somehow don’t think it will be a rest!) short holiday.
My eldest son Henry will be gigging with the band he’s in ‘Van Houten’ and playing at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds over the weekend we are away.
They’ve just released their first album, titled the same ‘Van Houten’ and I think it’s great… here is a link to a video on YouTube
Oh, and there’s been a few late evenings too, filming at Rhodes-Wood for our website and a series of instructional ‘how to’ videos. These should be up shortly on our website www.rhodeswood.co.uk and I hope you will find them both entertaining and informative.
I think there might a pizza or two involved with a trip to New York and a couple of suit fittings for clients in The Big Apple thrown in too… if only to maintain the balance of work rest and play.
Until then ….