Hoping for a sunny day ...

A photograph and a few words ...

The great thing about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages you've been

Madeleine L'Engle

Today is my birthday - I'm getting ever closer to the three score years and ten mark.

I've had some wonderful birthday celebrations over the years. Leaving aside family and friends' get-togethers for picnics, BBQs and celebratory meals, there have been such treats from my wife Sarah of a magical mystery tour of London, a food tour in Rome, opera in Verona and nights in the Titanic Hotel in Belfast (the once design offices of Harland and Wolf - my photograph above is of the welcome treat left in our room).

This year, the celebration will be a little more downbeat. I'm spending it on my own. It was my choice; my friends and family have not forgotten and abandoned me. I have cards and gifts to open; I've already had a facetime call with Sarah and no doubt there'll be other calls and messages. It's just that this weekend saw something more boring but essential happening, and that is I'm having the roof of my house replaced. A sort of present to myself. Well, the house. Also, it's not as if this birthday is a significant milestone. Although as I'm now in my late sixties, I suppose it becomes a little more critical that each birthday keeps happening….

In any event, I went to a huge street party last Saturday with a trip to 'Durham Big Meeting', a vibrant celebration of community and working-class culture with more than 200,000 people packing the streets of the tiny city of Durham to enjoy the festival of banners and bands. I wrote about last year's meeting in The Big Meeting. And as can occur at such events, while in a pub sheltering from the rain that fell most of the day I happened into conversation with a couple of other visitors, Tam and Kevin. A conversation that flowed so easily that we’ve agreed we’ll meet again in the same pub at the Big Meeting next year. As the poet Edgar Guest wrote in his 1915 poem ‘Faith’, “That strangers are friends that we someday may meet” - a phrase later tweaked and misattributed to W B Yeats and many others.

And even though I'm alone today, I'll still celebrate. There will be cake, of course. Chocolate cake. My favourite. To be eaten as a treat after some home-cooked party food of grilled chicken drumsticks that I currently have marinating in lemon juice, onion, garlic, paprika, celery salt, ground cumin, thyme, sage and cayenne pepper. And I'll wash them down by raising a glass or two in celebration. But otherwise, I'm looking forward to a lazy day and, weather permitting, a long stroll in the nearby countryside.

And with the weather in mind, here's something on the chap, St Swithin, with whom I share my day and because of whom today's weather takes on extra importance. You see, legend has it, if it rains today, it will rain for forty days and forty nights. So, who was this Saint Swithin who had such an effect on the weather?

Well, in 836, King Ethelwulf of Wessex, King Alfred the Great's dad, rewarded his old teacher, Swithin, for his earlier academic tutelage by appointing him in 852 Lord Bishop of Winchester, a very influential and rewarding post in those days. However, on his death on July 2, 863, humble Swithin instructed that his fellow monks bury him outside "in a vile and unworthy place" where water from the cathedral's eaves might fall upon his grave. Following his wishes, the monks buried Swithin outside the Old Minster in Winchester. 

There Swithin lay for more than one hundred years. However, many people remembered Swithin's good works, and his reputation for holiness grew. As more reports emerged of miracles in his name it led to his canonisation as a saint. Thinking that Swithin's resting place was not in keeping with his sainthood, Bishop Æthelwold, the then Lord Bishop of Winchester, decided to move Swithin to an opulent shrine inside the cathedral. The day appointed for that was July 15, 971.

One story goes that a tempest raged that day, postponing the removal. Heavy rain continued without remission for the next forty days and forty nights until the monks interpreted this as Swithin's displeasure at the disturbance of his resting place and decided to leave the humble bishop where he was. 

Even though no record or report supports a cataclysmic fall of rain for such a prolonged period, the legend became popular in medieval England and entered English folklore.

But of course, as tends to be the case with legends, another story emerged: of the successful transfer of Swithin on July 15, albeit during a severe storm. More than that, the poor saint endured several more, to use that nice phrase, ‘translations’. In 974, the monks separated his bones, consigning half to a side chapel of the Minster for the benefit of pilgrims and the rest to a shrine behind the high altar for ceremonial occasions. Then, in 1006, Alphege, another Bishop of Winchester, became Archbishop of Canterbury, and wishing to bring a worthy gift to his new flock, he took the skull of Swithin with him. In this legend, Swithin even travelled outside of England. It's said that in 1125, Reinald, one of the monks of Winchester, crossed the North Sea to find a Christian settlement at Stavanger and allegedly took one of Swithin's arms to Norway. Finally, a scattering of Swithin's remaining bones far and wide happened during desecrations of his shrine in 1252 and again in 1538 as part of Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries.

Whatever the truth behind the legends and whether there was a scattering to the four winds of the bones of Saint Swithin, there is still this rhyme,

"St Swithin's day if thou dost rain,

For forty days it will remain.

St Swithin's day if thou be fair,

For forty days 'twill rain nae mair."

And before I go off to begin my birthday celebrations, I leave you with one last thing. In polite company after dinner, you never ask your neighbour at the table to "Pass the port". The proper question is, "Do you know the Bishop of Winchester?" which, for those aware, invariably starts a move of the decanter in the desired direction. And if you are in a company where that phrase will mean nothing, you can at least now recount to them the tale of poor Saint Swithin while you hope that the Port may find its way to you. Of course, that movement will be by each guest passing the Port around the table hand-to-hand to the left from the naval tradition of the left-hand side being the 'port-side'. 

There's nothing like a good legend and an old custom to set you up for the day, whether it's your birthday or not …. now, let me see what the weather is doing...