The Umbrellas of Hamelin - the Book Itself

The copies of my book arrived on Friday afternoon!   I have added one of Col's photos of a parasol fungus. It seems vaguely appropriate. 

Wonderful to see the book at last, and check out the dedication and acknowledgements.  

I dedicated Umbrellas to my siblings and to our childhood friends.  Disraeli Crescent  (one of the short stories in the book) is the street of my childhood, fixed forever in the 1950/60s in my mind. The early years make such an impression, and last so much longer than the later years - especially the years of retirement, which hurtle past.

And it was my chance to acknowledge the Thursday Night Writers Group that Penny set up so many years ago.   We, its three members, are all now published writers.

I also mentioned Peter Hiley's book in progress, in a small postscript to the story Klook and Plukey, as it turns out we have both been busy writing about our schooldays.  The little story is about my schooldays plus the strange shallowness of the Dollybird world of the 1960s.  Pete is an old schoolfriend of Captain Butterfly - and in fact he is the reason Col and I met in the first place, as I shared a room at Uni with Pete's then girlfriend, later wife, Diane.  

Col says he has forgiven him though.   Wait a minute...!!

I would have loved to have shared this book with Diane, but sadly she died some years ago.   But I am so glad I am able to share it with Pete.  One of the Janets and the Mary Jane in my dedication are also no more.  Janet's last rescue cats live on though, happily bonded to Nute and the bungalow. I only wish she could know that. She was so anxious about them, when she knew she was dying.  

I hope they all sleep safe in "the everlasting arms", safe in Jehovah's memory, and have a wonderful awakening ahead of them when the time comes.

We had no idea back then how short life was, how quickly our threescore years and ten would rush by.  There were old people in the world, sure, but we were young people, of a different breed altogether.

Or so we thought.   And of course getting old in the way we do - which is to say getting old, withering and dying - is so hard to comprehend and to cope with because Genesis tells us that our first parents were made to live forever.  We were not designed to cope with this, and, as Ecclesiastes tells us, of Jehovah:

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has even put eternity in their hearts; yet mankind will never find out the work that the true God has made from start to finish." - Ecclesiastes 3:11

Our Creator has put eternity into our hearts.  We want to live, not die.