Remembrance Day

In 1915, Major John McCrae, brigade-surgeon, First Brigade Canadian Forces Artillery, was working in a dressing station on the front line to the north of Ieper, Belgium, when he wrote In Flanders Fields:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved,

and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe;

To you, from failing hands, we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

In 1918 Moira Michael, an American, wrote a poem in reply, We shall keep the faith, in which she promised to wear a poppy 'in honour of our dead' and so began the tradition of wearing a poppy in remembrance.

.....
.......


It isn't even half way through November and the headers are rolling into paddocks! This is early but it will be well and truely over before chirstmas, so that is great!

Jack is like the local spare at harvest time... when ever someone needs an extra pair of hands Jack is called upon! So, hense, he has spent his weekend in a header for friends of ours. Hughie spent a couple of hours in there with him yesterday afternoon after swimming then we had tea (the kids and I ) with the wife of the farmer Jack was helping out.



This is quite usual over harvest, the wives get together and feed the kids and have a few drinks while their husbands work.. sort of breaks it up a little for the harvest widows!

The header will pull into our crops tomorrow sometime, so will post photos.

I started the day with a nice walk, before Jack left. Well, it was nice until my neighbour scared the shit out of me.. curse the MP3 player...

OK... time to clean!