To Cameley with Pameli

After an enjoyable evening's poetry at Bradford on Avon the night before, courtsy of Dawn Gorman's Words and Ears, Pameli and I were on the road relatively early for a morning jaunt to the Church of St James of Compostela in Cameley, North Somerset. 

As soon as we entered the churchyard we were met by its resident robin, who seemed quite unbothered by our presence.  

Maybe s/he was trying to draw our attention to various headstones, like this one to Charles Sage, who died in 1808. It has a coal wagon carved on it - a reminder of the North Somerset coalfield. 

Or this to a Quarman, who died on November 17th. His age - 67 - was left out and added with an omission mark. Damage to one side means key details are missing, though t'internet names him as James and gives his year of death as 1783.  


St James is one of those churches that got left behind when its congregation shifted, in this case to Temple Cloud, which developed in Victorian times around what is now the A37, just under a mile to the east. Its gradual decline meant  it escaped the attention of Victorian 'restorers'.  

No worries about getting into it as it is cared for by the Churches Conservation Trust and open daily in the summer. First, though, we admired some remnants of paint on the Norman doorway in the porch. 

Inside, a hotchpotch of ancient and not-so-ancient fixtures and fittings, murals and carvings 

John Betjeman called St James 'Rip Van Winkle's Church', and it's true, a history of the Church can be traced in its fabric and fittings.  Pre-Reformation wall paintings, discovered behind layers of whitewash in the 1960s, line up alongside seats of royal arms and the Puritan-approved Ten Commandments; the vestiges of mediaeval side chapels and the mediaeval door to the rood screen partly obscured by 17th and 18th century box pews and the 18th century and 19th century galleries. 

18th century hat pegs, far left

The last surviving pieces of the Church's mediaeval glass

The pulpit with its magnificent sounding board is dated 1637. This is where the sermon would have been delivered; the rest of the service being conducted from the reading desk. 

The 12th century font with its cover, which was made in 1634 at a cost of £1 12s 4d

An iron peg which could have been designed by C F A Voysey, though I suspect it's a fair bit earlier.  

And then there are the wall paintings: here, all that remains of what would have been a huge early 14th century St Christopher carrying the infant Christ, namely, a foot surrounded by little fishes and a fearsome crab.

The lower part of the royal arms of King James I (1603-25), most of which has been obscured by the gallery above.

A contemporaneous set of the Ten Commandments; above, the traces of a yellow sun or 'Glory'.

A damask pattern of what Pameli and I mistook for candles at first, but are 15th century acorns and oak leaves.

Red dash and scroll patterns from the 1200s on the chancel arch, and early 15th century black and yellow damask patterns in the former side chapel.  

My favourite - a mid-14th century jester with a forked tongue, holding a scroll. Apparently there's a possible St George in armour and on horseback behind him, but I couldn't really make that out. 

At the back of the church, carved into the seat of one of the narrow mediaeval pews, there's a design that looks very like the daisy wheels or hexafoils that protect the tithe barn at Bradford on Avon from the evil eye. While I snapped things in dim corners, Pameli and I swapped hex stories, mine being about the outlines of shoes  I've come across in various churches and churchyards.  

It was only when I uploaded my photos to my laptop that I realised St James has its own sole outlines.  



The guide to the Church describes these as 'three pieces of lead from the roof, where presumably those who laid or repaired it autographed it with their footprints and the dates 1733, 1757 and 1795.'  But like the lead outlines on the roof at Muchelney, and the other examples I've come across, I think they might well be examples of apotropaios. 

Outside, we came across a door that was the perfect size for Pameli ... 

... complete with miniature handle.

The robin was still knocking about too, and gave me quite a shock when I went to sit on the bench for a moment. 

There was just time to admire the poultry belonging to nearby Cameley Lodge (is that cockerel a Buff Orpington?) ... 

... and views so bucolic we seemed to have stumbled into an Eclogue.  All this a bare 11 miles from the centre of Bristol, our final destination. 

Still Sidmouth

As destinations go, Sidmouth is nothing if not a family favourite.  For my aunt and parents, it's the town of Betjeman's poem.  They love the gardens with their prize-winning floral displays, the tea shops, and the esplanade.  My father likes to sit and gaze out to sea.  Auntie Mollie and my mother particularly love the charity shops.

I like the holed stones on the beach and the fact that it's a good place to sit and dream.  Not that it's always easy to relax with the older generation about.  Can't take your eye off that Auntie of mine for one moment.

I also love Sidmouth for its red cliffs crumbling into grey seas, its dangling garden fences, trees and summer houses, and the initials carved by lovers into soft sandstone only to be erased by the attrition of wind and sea.  The elements and the passage of time respect nothing, not even love.  I wrote a poem about the Hanging Gardens of Sidmouth a few years ago.  You can read it here.  It's also in my poetry collection, Communion.

Meanwhile, the hanging gardens continue to slither over the edge onto the shore below.

On a jollier note, Sidmouth is also a grand place to buy a hat.

Plus, it's the home of the folk festival, of course, and whilst I wouldn't normally go gigging with my sons - and my sister and brother-in-law - and my septuagenarian aunt - and my octogenarian mother - and my nonagenarian father - when your nephew and niece-to-be are in the band, it's definitely A Family Thing.

 

By the time I arrived in Devon, Blackbeard's Tea Party had already completed two evening gigs, as well as a fair bit of busking in New Street.  This final afternoon gig was behind the Anchor.  It was, however, anything but sedate.  The oldies turned off their hearing aids and put a brave face on the proceedings while Ted tucked himself out of the way.

The band was very well received, as always, with lots of people dancing and singing along and buying CDs, the third one of which will be recorded in the New Year.

Despite my best efforts, I still got a lecture about safe driving from my father, who didn't believe for one instant that my pint of Cheddar Valley cider was apple juice.  Which isn't as bad, I suppose, as when my grandmother told my Uncle Meric to be careful crossing the road and he retorted 'Mother, I'm 70 years old.'

Blackbeard's Tea Party in Sidmouth, 2011

John Betjeman loved Sidmouth for its 'timeless charm'.  I love it for its annual folk festival, and last Thursday we ventured over the River Exe to see Blackbeard's Tea Party perform at the Anchor.  

It was the first time in some years that the town and surrounding cliffs weren't dressed in shades of grey for my visit.  I love Sidmouth when it's all misty and mysterious, but I have to say, the sunlit view along the coast to Beer Head was just stunning.

The moment we walked into the town centre, I heard the opening bars of a familiar piece of music, and as we rounded the corner, there were Blackbeard's Tea Party busking on the pavement.  My nephew, David, is in the centre on the djembe, and his girlfriend, Laura, is playing the fiddle.  Before the first song had finished, people were dancing in the streets (me included).  

We had a few hours to idle away before the gig proper, so we wandered through the streets and up to the front. There were statues and cats to fraternise with ... 




... and hat stalls to patronise ...  


...plus all the other sights and delights of folk week in Sidmouth.  

The gig when it happened was brilliant fun - so many people of all ages dancing, including a team of female rapper sword dancers with a very sexy, top-hatted Tommy - and I discovered that I can whoooo! after all.  Apart from the member of the folk police who remarked 'Well, that's a social faux pas for a start!' when David walked on stage with his djembe and who didn't stay to hear the band play, I would defy anyone to leave without a smile on their face.




In the end, they ran out of CDs to sell, and had a great festival (apart from Paul having a head-on collision with a drunk driver six miles out of Sidmouth, but that hasn't happened yet in this account, and anyway, he was uninjured, though the car was a write-off). It would be really good to see them somewhere  more official next year, though. The Ham Marquee would do.

There was just time on the way back to the car for a last bit of magic. Writing in fire.  Poetry.