READING FRIENDS RECOMMEND

Issue 1

Written by Dementia Support volunteers to share

withreading friends

Poemby Teresa Harrison-Best

A Cat’s approach to the Corona Virus.

My cat’s in isolation as he’s taken good advice,no frivolous exertion or chasing after mice.Just rest and relaxation and hearty meals on tap,a comfy place to lie on perhaps an ample lap!

Forget the stress of living he’s avoiding all of that,he’s looking for the quiet life, a peaceful habitat.Where tranquillity, the byword and life is most serene,my cat has expectations of no break in his routine.

He washes like an expert by grooming all his coat,no need of any ‘paw gel’ to keep his boat afloat.Contamination is unlikely as avoidance is the wordso now in hibernation he thinks the world’s absurd.

My cat has got the answer, no need to panic buy,just relax and take it easy so simple to apply.He thinks we’ve all gone crazy as we run around the stores,I suspect he’s fast asleep now, the clue is in the snores.

Perhaps he has the answer ‘keep calm and carry on’don’t flap around in panic, think cat you can’t go wrong.So my cat’s in isolation and I think he’s pretty shrewd,sleep well for sixteen hours just wake if there’s some food!

MESSAGE from Lynne Morgan:

Welcome to the first edition of Dementia Support 'Reading Friends Recommends'.

1

We hope that this will become an interactive, virtual version of the sort of activities we have been enjoying over the last year during our Reading Friends sessions at Sage House. 

We very much want to hear from YOU about anything you have been reading, or listening to, or playing which is helping to keep you going through these strange and unsettling times. 

I have been listening to Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard for the Trekkies among you!) reading a Shakespeare sonnet a day on Twitter.  His voice is very soothing, and I like the way that, when he comes to a sonnet he dislikes, he says he's not going to read it 'and no-one can make me!' 

Another favourite actor of mine, Samuel West, is reading 'Pandemic Poems' each day; the poems are suggested by his Twitter followers and are usually really inspiring and sometimes funny, such as 'The Jumblies' by Edward Lear, which made me laugh out loud.

Personally, I have been dipping into Daniel Defoe's 'Journal of the Plague Year (1665)' - mainly because it's free on Kindle - and it's almost comforting to realise that human nature hasn't changed in 355 years.  In those days, under strict lockdown, householders would resort to tunnelling through cellars to escape, or even blowing up the watchmen with gunpowder (I am not advocating this strategy by the way).  There were also many unscrupulous people who profited from the tragedy, including a 'quack' doctor promising free advice for the poor.  The advice consisted of him telling them to pay him a lot of money for a 'guaranteed' potion to cure the plague.  When challenged he insisted that his advertising was not misleading - the 'advice' was indeed free!

Poem by Paula Puleston

2

A FEW TITBITS from Jan ReesAlthough there were outbreaks of Bubonic Plague in the times of the Tudors, the disease much feared in England was called Sweating Sickness or The Sweat. Just after the Battle of Bosworth it killed 15,000 people in 6 weeks. It went on to claim many more, the infection mysteriously disappearing in 1551. At its worst, death could happen only hours after onset.

"so sharp and deadly that the lyke was never

hearde of to any manne’s remembrance

before that tyme."

It is still a mystery with lots of theories…influenza, anthrax, hantavirus. Mr. Rat and possibly his friend Mr. Mole are thought to be the

culprit spreaders!

3

4

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SAThis Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SAThis Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA