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My old history teacher, Mr. Fulcher, used to say that learning the events and the chronological order in which they happened is only a small part of discovering the past. For a thirteen year old, that seemed quite enough to me, but he insisted that one has to feel that period of time in question; capture the essence of the spirit of the age to really understand it. There's a German word for this 'spirit', that Mr.Fulcher used..."Zeitgeist". Odd that, as Mr Fulcher himself was an Austrian!
But the area I'm in today, North Essex and Southern Suffolk, does resonate to a 'soul' from the past, and it's not hard to imagine yourself back in the halcyon days of the Wool Trade, from which this part of Britain still glorifies in, earning this Country it's fortune. Draw a circle on any map 40 miles from, say Lavenham, and look at the architecture thereabouts. Many of the great timber framed dwellings, constructed over five hundred years ago still embellish the towns and villages there to this day.
Via Motorways 2 and 25 and A road 12, and some splendid GBG pubs - the Bell at Castle Hedingham is redolent of stepping back into a hostelry unchanged during the past 50 years, eventually I arrive at the quintessentially English hamlet of Hundon. That aforementioned architecture, is here too.
The football ground is easily found, just beyond the Rose and Crown on Upper North Street, and is the sort of arena I've now come to love. Park in the small car park, which also houses the village hall and store, and enter the playing field to pay your £2 for admission and 28 page programme (colour cover leads into everything you need in a matchday magazine) to the young man sitting on the 'admissions table'. The ground is fully roped off and the changing rooms and tea bar are found in the green portakabins as you enter. Dugouts are situated to the far side. The field is totally walled-in and this gives it a real football ground feel. Stand at the far end of the pitch and look down the gentle slope toward the church beyond, resplendent with it's odd bell tower. It's a marvellous vista.
On a personal note, I'm really sorry to be getting back to 3pm kick-offs as Winter yields to Spring, as I liked my early homecomings, but at the allotted hour the match commences. By half time, table-topping Hundon are five up and the game as a contest is well and truly over. The second half is a frustrating affair as Hundon can't add more goals, but that angst amongst the 40 or so assembled is assuaged when the homsters add a deserved sixth goal to their tally, in the very last minute.
The title race in this league is now hotting up, and it looks like Easter Saturday, the 22nd March, when Hundon visit 2nd placed Waterbeach, could be the watershed as far as the championship goes.
Not quite in the right context, I know, but what do you think the "Zeitgeist" in the Hundon camp might be, after this consummate drubbing of the team from Northern Cambridgeshire. Jubilant, I'd say.
And finally, what reminded me of that odd German word? The home side's No.10 is listed in the matchday programme as a certain Mr. Fulcher!
An historical day, in every sense. FGIF Rating: 5* |