The Joys of Running a Rest Home
The roses get the green fly, the taters get the blight,
The cabbage get the caterpillars, what a blooming sight,
Apples there are plenty, grub hole in every one,
Birds have pecked the plums, the rot it has begun.
About twenty years ago, my misses was keen to earn a bit of money running her own business. She was very good, nay I must say excellent with old people, and there seemed to be a niche for country people wanting accommodation in rest homes but not wanting to go into a built up areas of the town.
So without any formal training we set about converting three rooms of our house into an "old people's rest home".
With no advertising we had our first old lady Anne, who had suffered a stroke and was not safe to live on her own. As it turned out Anne lasted the whole time that we run this rest home, (fifteen years) she was the first and was also the last, and received he letter from the QUEEN and went on to be one hundred and one. Really it was a sad end for her as she slipped off her chair one evening and broke the main bone in her leg half way up her shin, from which she did not last long in hospital, we think it was this MRSA business, the flesh eating bug that got her. In the fifteen years we have had three gentle men and eight ladies who had enjoyed their last years of their lives with us.
One of the exceptional character we had was John Ecclestone, John had farmed all his life and was in his element tutoring me on how to run the farm. He had been a resident at a big nursing home in town and kept "running away" just to be able to see some fields. They had to send staff out in their cars looking for him almost every day. He was a man who milked cows and got up early all his life, and was up and away and off outside before breakfast, often lunch time before he was found.
John's daughter was at her whit's end with worry, as they had started to ring her to come looking for her dad. Then she heard of what we were doing at Yews Farm, and came to suss us out, but of course with only three residents, we were full. So we were asked if she could send her dad John when we had a vacancy.
Eventually John came as a resident on the farm, he liked to count and keep an eye on the cattle just down the road, they were suckler cows getting close to calving. He would tidy up the troughs along the bull beef sheds. And every morning he loaded up a wheel barrow with timber so full I could only just push it, this was for my log / straw burning boiler that heated the house.
However this wore him out by lunch time and he rested all afternoon, but he was as happy as a dog with two tails. At Mid morning at ten thirty we always have a coffee break, but John was always too dam busy to stop work, so his coffee was taken out to him. The ruck of timber that he worked at was by the end of an old cowshed, and in the end of this shed we put an old arm chair, this tempted him to sit down to have his coffee, after all he was in his eighties, sometimes he fell asleep then had to rouse him for lunch much to his embarrassment of sleeping on the job.
John took his jobs seriously and would start promptly at nine am, but this one day he realised there were some rats lodging in his wood ruck, so came across the yard to fetch Matt, my son, with his ferrets, Matt and john put the most reliable ferret down to find its way through the wood pile, and they could see a some rats moving about so they got a stick apiece and started prodding into the pile, shouting with excitement every time one was spotted , but I think John must have prodded the ferret by mistake as the ferret jumped out of the wood and bit John on the ankle, this did not deter old John as he was well used to bumps and bangs through his farming life.
But what he had not bargained for was the he was on tablets that thinned his blood, and when he bled it would not clot as normal. So half an hour later, when they came in for lunch John's boot was literally full of blood. Of coarse my misses who is responsible for him thought he had lost his foot, then pulled the blood soaked boot and sock off and washed his foot, then could then see it was just a small bite, then applied some antiseptic and a plaster, but John had lost a lot of blood and was pale, Matt and I and John was told off about recklessly hunting rats with ferrets, particularly with a very elderly gentle man who was very unsteady on his feet. It must have brought back happy memories for John as after that we laughed many times about his ratting escapade, and it was only later that his daughter found out, but by then even she could see the funny side.
On another occasion the local hunt was to meet on the village green right outside our front wicket, John in his lifetime had always been a keen follower of the hunt so was keen to go onto the green to see the meet. There were many folk he new and all came talking to him, we took him a seat and his morning coffee out, then after a short while the hunt moved off to draw the first covert. When the girls helping went out to fetch him in again, John was missing, we thought at first he must have gone with the other hunt followers who were on foot up into St Chads church yard, where they always went where there was a grand stand view of the hounds in full cry when they drew the first wood.
Matt and I went to look in the church yard when all the spectators were getting into their cars, but no one had seen John, we went all round the grave stones thinking he may have fell down, because we knew he could not get up again without help.
An hour had gone by and his lunch was ready and the misses was getting extremely worried for his safety, and after another half hour she rang his daughter. There were three of us searching all round the farm and the village, and even further afield in a cars but still he could not be found. Much later in the afternoon a car drew into our yard, and out stepped John, it was only his old mate Tom (in his eighties) from years ago, had seen him, and John had got into his car without telling anyone, they had had a good three hours of following the hunt. When ask was he hungry, he said he had some of Tom's and a drink from his flask. It was a relief that he was okay and not hurt in any way, try to explain that to the council care people, and about the rat bite.
Now being so active in his mind John hankered for a four wheel scooter battery powered so he could get out and about under his own steam, this was all right but when we realised where he wanted to go, some of it was along a main road with no pavements, the thought of him in his buggy going at five miles per hour, and traffic passing him at over fifty miles per hour that was not on. His intention was to visit his daughter some seven miles away, this was what he had done when he drove his car every week but they had to stop him from driving for his own safety, so John did not get his scooter.
In the garden we had a couple of rows of strawberries, and John I remember from years ago on his farm had a very tidy and productive garden, so John decided he would weed among the strawberries for us with a hoe. He was watched carefully from the kitchen window to see he was okay, and then at the next moment he was in the rows on his hands and knees. This went on for nearly the next hour, then it was realised that he had fell down, and while he was down he just kept on weeding.
He was very independent, and did not like asking for help from a woman, even to be helped back onto his feet, so he just kept busy.
John told us tales of his first small farm called Spurly Brook, where he and his wife milked cows by hand with the cowshed directly connected to the house, He was able to step out of his kitchen into the cowshed, but unfortunately the cowshed was at the top side of the house, so the urine dropped by the cows drained in an open gully through the house kitchen. This must have been very basic living and in the 1920's . Bet he kept that gully well washed out.
It was a very sad day when John had to go for an operation on his throat, it got that he could not swallow solid food. It was arranged that his daughter would pick him up at 11am, so John went out do his normal chores - fill the wheel barrow full of timber for me to take to the boiler house, then in again to get changed ready for his hospital appointment.
We weren't to know that that was the last time we should see John, as the operation was a very risky one that he never recovered from. He was a hard working and cheerful man all his life and for him to load that wheel barrow before he went into hospital meant he had work every day of his life, right to his last day at our home. It was an absolute privilege for us to have had such a gentleman, who would talk all about his life and be our adviser in many ways other than farming as well.
Hears to the memory of John Ecclestone he would have loved to have read this one about gardening.
Gardening as a Pastime
The lawns are mowed the grass removed, starve it if you can,
Start in March or sooner, cut it twice a week's the plan,
Grows like mad till the summer, then brown and crusty goes,
Precious water sprinkled on, the time and cost who knows.
Had the mower sharpened, through mole hills it has cut,
They're only after earth worms, to fill their little gut,
Got to have a blow hole, to push the soil out,
Maize of tunnels under the lawn, so tough and black and stout.
The roses get the green fly, the taters get the blight,
The cabbage get the caterpillars, what a blooming sight,
Apples there are plenty, grub hole in every one,
Birds have pecked the plums, the rot it has begun.
The wasps are round the jam pot, flies around the meat,
Its summertime enjoy it, try getting out the heat,
Cooler in the evenings, sit in the garden to relax,
Midges bite your arms and legs, round ya head attacks.
Cut the hedge about three times, clearing up the leaves,
Hawthorne holly and brambles, full of thorns it heaves,
Fingers sore and bleeding, enjoy the job they say,
Out in fresh air and sunshine, all this work no pay.
Nettles in the corners, tackle then if you dare,
Just the lightest touch from one, it'll make you swear,
Cut they come again times ten, fresh and green as ever,
Save them for the butterflies, neglect'll mek ya look clever.
Green fingers what a laugh, muck builds up under nails,
It keeps you fit and healthy, keeps ya weight off the scales,
Organically grown is good for you, but pests they are a pest,
Work with nature is what they say; you can only do your best.
Countryman
Those who bring sunshine into the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.
James M Barrie (1860- 1937 )