44. Overheard in Bridlington charity shop
“You know those funny things you buy?”
“Aye.”
“Well, you like them, don’t you.”
43. With apologies to Larkin
This Whitsun, I’ve been prompt getting away;
I’M ON THE TRAIN.
Ten twenty on a rainy Friday did
My three-quarters full train pull out King’s Cross.
My bag and coat piled up beside me so
To deter any neighbour who might chat;
The prospect of four hours to myself,
Away from school-work; clearing out the loft,
Too precious to be given up to talk
On whether we will ever get a summer.
42. Live Adventurously. (Advices and Queries 27)
Linda stood up next. “Marjatta was a great believer in the power of nature. I remember shortly after I lost Roger, she took me to her allotment. We were planting potatoes and I had my back to her. Then I turned around and she was gone. I called her name and, when she answered, I saw that she was lying on her back between the beds. It turned out that, as she’d dug in her fork, it had somehow sprung back and she’d landed on the ground. ‘I’ve never seen the world from this angle,’ she said to me. ‘It’s very interesting.’ So, I lay down next to her and we both watched the world above us, and laughed and laughed.”
There must have been nearly 120 of us squeezed into the Quaker Meeting House yesterday morning for Marjatta’s funeral, and at Linda’s ministry we all smiled, imagining this elegant, elderly Finnish lady lying among the vegetables.
41. Deep in my heart, I do believe…
“Anyone want to choose the next song? … Anyone?”
YoungLochinvar and I look round the circle of Elfins and are met by slightly bemused stares. We have been asked by FellowKnitter to help out with a session singing campfire songs, leading up to the Whitsun camp in Epping Forest. Elfins are the youngest in our local Woodcraft Folk group – ages up to about 7 – and we are looking at a dozen or so of them. They’re a tough audience to get going, that’s for sure. I’m jolly grateful that YoungL has come along with his guitar, as otherwise you’d only be able to hear FellowKnitter and I laying our burdens down and refusing to study war (whatever Mr Gove may say).
40. Do you promise not to tell…
“You remember this – answer from Never to Always passing through Very Occasionally, Sometimes and Often.”
We’ve done the neurology questionnaire three times now: at the start of the drugs trial, in the middle and now, at the end. Where did that six months go? Dr LaMancha knows me so well that his pencil hovers over my answers before I say them. We whip through the questions. Then there’s that moment when I long for Dr LaMancha to give me a red pen to mark my own paper while he runs through what the answers should have been. It’s a test and I want to know how I’ve done. Perhaps I could be put in a league table with the other Parkie patients.
39. Be it ever so humble
The old chap on the doorstep is called Roger and he’s holding an estate agents’ brochure of our house. We don’t recognise the name of the company but the photo of the front is definitely our street.
“I see you’ve sold,” he says, nodding at the board in the garden. “I’ve come all the way from Dorset hoping to see inside.”
After a bit of a chat, we invite him in and give him the tour. “It says in the brochure that the hall has oak panelled walls,” remarks Roger.
“It did. But we found them a bit gloomy and painted the hall white. We’ve still got the platter-rack though.”
“But no platters?”
“Afraid not. We did for some time have our overspill of paperback books on them but whenever GrannieBorders bashed into the skirting boards, they fell on her head. After she was nearly concussed by a Dorothy L Sayers, we just bought another bookcase.” Continue reading →
38. Ding dong the bells are gonna chime…
Thirty years ago yesterday, I woke with the stone cold certainty that we were doing the wrong thing. It had become crystal clear to me overnight that we had made a mistake.
“We can’t do this,” I told ActorLaddie. “We’ll have to cancel.”
37. Keep on running
“’Jellygirl approaches games lessons with enthusiasm’,” reads ActorLaddie.
I am weeding the file labelled ‘instruction booklets’ and look up to find that he is holding one of my old school reports.
“In other words, ‘Jellygirl is rubbish at games’,” I translate. I am fluent in Report Speak. “We appear to have an instruction booklet for the coffee table.”
36. Listen, do you want to know a secret…?
“Did you know that Parkinson’s Awareness Week is next week?” says InfantPhenomenon. She’s just started work as a trainee journalist and is calling me in her coffee break. I, however, am on Easter holidays and evading doing school-work by skulking in bed with coffee and a Kindle. Lounging around while the children are at work; Earth hath not anything to show more fair.
35. Marmite Maggie
ReadingColleague’s birthday last night and we gathered at her house for a very jolly evening of chilli and chat. Mostly workmates or other teacher friends.
I shared the news that we have accepted an offer on our house! A new estate agent last Tuesday led to a viewing on Wednesday from a young couple who were able to climb the stairs without stopping for a breather. The chap won over ActorLaddie’s heart when he said he could look out into the garden while cooking. AL had to be restrained from giving him soup recipes there and then. They will make lovely neighbours for our lovely neighbours. So that’s all good.
The Jelly Chronicles 