Lest we forget

I don't do the whole Remembrance thing these days; the flags and the bugles and stuff, I mean. I prefer an early Holy Communion and away out of it. After said early HC I drove over the hills the long, and pretty, way, avoiding town. I headed west, and as the time reached 10.50am felt compelled to pull over. I stopped in a lay-by and looked and listened; bright winter sunshine, a dog barking, birds, cars passing on the road. I set off again at 11.05am. I stopped at the big store, where a car boot sale was in full swing; lots of people, the shop full, not a poppy in sight. I didn't want the band and the wreaths, and I certainly didn't want the small children marched from their classrooms during the past week and given Union flags to wave and their pictures in the paper. But I didn't want that either.