Sitting here with a glass of red wine and the lights low firmly grasping my imaginary life rewind button I recall a boring, really boring, rainy Sunday. I had been demobbed after serving my two years National Service. I was the first out, my friends were still scattered to the four winds.

After our traditional Sunday high tea the rain had cleared and with a bright evening in prospect I donned my newly acquired sports jacket and headed out for a walk along the river. I walked past the “hosses field” where the Co-op dairy grazed their horses after their stint pulling milk floats. A field which in my pre National Service days had seen many an epic football and cricket match. Down the footpath to the river and then with my Sports jacket hooked over my finger slung over my shoulder I walked along the rain fresh river path singing what I could remember of a song that seemed to fit my mood. 

“Say what you will
The countryside is still
The only place that I could settle down
Troubles there are so much rarer
Out of town.”

If there had been any justice in this world I would have met a beautiful young lassie but there isn’t and I didn’t. Just a swift half of Cobnut Brown in the Wild Man and back home for supper.