Terrible

As Yeats said, "All changed, changed utterly". One minute I was writing my blog, waxing lyrical about the Aldeburgh Festival and its unique atmosphere, not just a rival for Glyndebourne and the many other country house music festivals that strut their stuff all summer but an outright winner thanks to its incredible location and unpretentious air. I was preparing to take Hugo out for a walk, happy that his leg had nearly healed and he'd be able to run free in the open spaces again. His dew pad protectors have arrived and I think they will work. But I hesitated to put them on until the last scab had dropped off, fearful that any friction would prematurely dislodge it and work it into a sore again. I took him out in the fields on his lead, and the pair of us sauntered through sun-baked barley, the scent of newly-mown hay from the edges filling our nostrils. I'm no Yeats, that's the best I can do. Suddenly the lead was jerked out of my hand and Hugo was off after a hare, leaving me with a painful abrasion. It happened so quickly I had no chance to react. Off he zoomed, straight down the track, and then he'd turned right and was racing up the other edge of the field. And then I lost sight of him. Feeling sick, thinking of all the terrible things that could happen to him with that trailing lead, in addition to the normal dangers, I went home to get the car. Same old same old, up and down the lanes, scanning the fields with my binoculars, desperate for a sighting of a little black chap, dreading the sound of screeching brakes. I came home, I went out again, I looked up and down, I went upstairs for a better look. And there was a car travelling down the hill at normal speed and then slowing, crawling along, creeping forwards. It didn't stop but I decided to investigate. And there at the bottom of the hill, dragging himself and his trailing lead upwards was Hugo. No sign of the car. They'd just left him there. Oh well. At least they didn't run him over.

I'd like to say no harm done, but of course there was. The vulnerable dew pad, the one on the right, was lacerated again. And there were cuts to his two hind legs. We got so close to this never happening again, but not quite close enough. So it's back to square one, dressings, Elizabethan collar, walks on a short lead, no running. It's enough to make you weep.

So back to the festival. It was my first chance to be a punter this year, and I sat on the terrace with my glass of chilled white wine while people spread themselves out all around me. Against the backdrop of the the reeds in the wetlands and a clear blue sky on this lovely evening, the summer crowd milled about, taking the boardwalk path with its names of sponsors carved into each plank, crowding around the Hepworth sculptor, all jolly and laughing and chatty. It's such a special place, and never so much as during June when this annual event takes place. It feels so extraordinary to not only live a few miles away but to be a part of the operation.

Yeats' poem was about a terrible episode in Ireland's history, but it lead eventually to a good thing. And so will Hugo's misfortune today. I trust.