Birthday in flames

A unusual birthday in that I felt completely happy all day. After last night's liveliness, happy to be in bed open a few cards and presents and spend time with Lorraine. I also felt physically better and more energetic than I have felt for weeks, a feeling that I had turned a corner somehow.  In the evening, we went for curry at Spice Village, and then sleepy Seaford burst into life, with gangs of stripy shirted people dressed like pirates or perhaps smugglers, walking through the streets with flaming torches. It is part of the Sussex tradition of fireworks which culminate on Guy Fawkes night in Lewes. It is to celebrate the foiling of the gunpowder plot of 1605, and also the burning of protestant martyrs who were burned at the stake between 1555-57 on Lewes High Street. Nothing like a bit of grudge bearing. 

We followed the crowds down to the seafront towards Seaford Head and after a bit of sitting about in the wind, there was an enormous bonfire. The bonfire itself seemed to have a world war one theme, with a tank and the iron silhouette of a soldier who could be seen as the fire raged. A bit like a scene from one of the Lord of the Rings films, with massed people looking at a fiery castle. Then a noisy and spectacular display of fireworks all to celebrate my 65 year on earth. Sweet of them.