November, November

November is a time for remembering, and this year more than most. 2018 has seen the commemoration of the end of World War 1, the 100^th anniversary of armistice day when, on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, peace was declared. Schoolchildren from the UK (including my 13 year old nephew from Somerset) have been visiting the Flanders fields where according to poets 'the poppies grow, row on row' (McCrae), to see where millions of young men from many nations lost their lives. 

It was a tragic loss, as modern weapons technology met old-fashioned tactical thinking and created a bloodbath. They called it 'the Great War', not with the modern meaning, great = good, but with an older meaning, great…