Today would have been my mum’s 95th birthday. She died on April 5th 2007 at the age of 80. I was just about to start a European tour with the ex-band making it a difficult time. I remember I’d sent her a postcard to the hospital in Aberystwyth that she never received. I’d spoken to her before, not sure exactly when, it’s all a bit of a blur. She died of pulmonary fibrosis which can be caused by Covid. The hospital had told us to go away as she was in a chemical coma just hanging on, unable to breathe and they would call us if there was any change. They called around midnight to say she had died. The family got in the car and drove to the hospital. It was very difficult, my parents had been together for nearly sixty years. I held her hand, it was still warm but she was gone from that body, I could just feel that she was no longer there, her spirit, her soul, her essence, whatever you want to call it, had fled, her earthly body empty of the woman. Rest in Peace Mamma, miss you, love you.

On the subject of Covid, we took the lateral flow tests today at home and both were negative so after two weeks we are banking on getting out of the house tomorrow, although we are still waiting for the doctor to call to give us the green light. I am so going to bask in the glory of the psychedelic psupermarket or swan into the bakery, I may even go into town for a coffee, although I have a sesh with Craig in Atlanta at 5.30 PM, the glory of the aisles and the fluorescent lighting may be exciting enough after two weeks inside. Also, tomorrow is the first day of the post lockdown easing, so good timing, except I can’t really see much of a difference between this week and last week. But it’s slowly getting lighter, last year is well and truly gone, negative test, positive vibes.

As I promised myself, we watched episode one of David Attenborough’s The Green Planet. Fascinating, unbelievable time-lapse photography with his legendary presentation and narration and looking amazing, still alive and going strong at the age my mum would have been. I had a sesh earlier with Tony in Sydney and recap with old friend Dan Charleston with whom I stayed in Escondido for extended amounts of time in the past. Time flies and you’d better get in touch with everyone you knew in your life who meant something to you, all this hanging out on Earth isn’t going to be forever.

Both Abby and Nick in Philadelphia and John in Brooklyn had to postpone today because of getting or getting over Covid. I still didn’t manage to catch up on emails and I didn’t even watch Liverpool beat Shrewsbury 4-1 to get to the fourth round of the FA Cup. I watched the first half of one of the African Cup Of Nations games but there was no analysis or proper presentation, just the game and one commentator. The network doesn’t take it as seriously, but if they presented it better perhaps the people (like me) would watch it with more interest. So little effort beyond broadcasting the pictures. Cape Verde beat Ethiopia 1-0.

Music today was in honour of Cape Verde’s victory, I listened to Cape Verde native Cesária Évora’s Mar Azul (1991). I discovered her many years ago and she is the perfect soundtrack to living in Portugal. She sings music called Morna of which she was the queen and is so famous in Cape Verde that she is on the money, literally on the money. Earlier she featured on a Cape Verdean stamp. She died aged 70 in 2011. Seductive, beautiful, yearning, wonderful.

Morna is widely considered the national music of Cape Verde as is the fado for Portugal, the tango for Argentina, the merengue for Dominican Republic, the rumba for Cuba, and so on.

Music Of The Daze