The Slighted Wife

An uncommon joy for a writer is to be handed a story on a plate. So:

Once upon a time on the 678 bus from Gloucester to Newent via Taynton. It’s 1:20pm and the day threatens rain.

“He’s fifty-one next month. I saw him at my father-in-law’s funeral four months ago. I certainly wouldn’t fancy him NOW.”

This isn’t the beginning of the story, of course it isn’t, but it sets the scene, giving us a taste of what is to come, a detail, and an intimation that not all is well. Stories must have a touch of this. Too happy, and who cares? Other people’s happiness is of little consequence, though we wish them well. Too sad – and we are left bereft. Come on people! Life can’t be all bad!

Our chief protagonist holds centre-stage – the front left-hand seat on the Community Bus, that can take fourteen, according to the sign, but holds just eight of us, including me and Brian.

She is looking good for sixty- seven. “He was,” She says, “Sixteen years younger than me.” I did the maths. White hair neatly styled and shoulder length, casually but smartly dressed.

I am going to call him John, and that might even have been his name. His father owned the pub in the tiny Severn-side village of Apperly where our lady, whose name I do not know, served behind the bar.

“He was twenty-one. I told him to get lost at first, but after a year we got together. He was drunk all the time. A right clown.”

A divorcee with her own home and the attributes of a good barmaid. Not a total idiot then …

Why, we wonder, not unreasonably, would she take up with a drunk? We get the feeling that our friend is not going to make good decisions. It turns out that we are right.

So they married, and he was good to her boys, and then one day he crashed the car drunk, and he never drank again. At this point we had high hopes of a swift and happy ending, but it was not to be.

“I left him, and it was MY house. Never got a penny, I was too upset to get a lawyer.” The empathymonitor is now in the red, and we all cluck in horror, except Brian. Who, has, I think, an entirely different take take on the story. The bus driver concentrates on the winding road.

“How long were you married?” Asks Dot, anxious to get some closure before she has to alight in Tibberton.

“Twenty-three years.” Gasps. My calculating mind puts the hapless rogue in his forties and things begin to fall into place.

“His new wife is only twenty-three, the daughter of one of his father’s customers. She’s been after him since she was fourteen!”

We had all been fourteen once, and know the score.

“His sister won’t have anything to do with him because of the way he treated me!” Justice, it seems, has been served.

“I had his youth though! And I wouldn’t have him now. You should see how fat he is.”

We won’t, of course, but can imagine him. Balding, overweight, with builder’s bum and shirt agape over a tight belly. We are all consoled by the fact that she had his youth, and sigh with relief.

Not the happiest of endings, perhaps, but it’ll do.

The Pendulum Swings

God knows how. It’s a mystery.

I expect you think I’m being metaphorical on the pendulum question. Poets have the write. But no. This post is not a plea for politicians to behave themselves, or family values to go this way, or that. It’s about a remarkable timepiece.

Three years ago I bought a rather kitschy clock in Aberystwyth. It’s a glass-fronted pretty little thing with flowers and songbirds etched around its face. I gave it to Kate as a house-warming present, but somehow in her going from here to there, and back again, the clock, still boxed, ended up in the spare room with a rich collection of my daughters’ left overs.

Well, I like it. So I deboxed it, and hung it on the wall in my bedroom.

It’s a stupid clock in some ways. It has birds and flowers, but no numerals, so timing is never quite exact, and the pendulum is purely decorative. Or has been. For three years the pendulum has hung stubbornly and uselessly down. In the beginning, I tapped, pulled, adjusted, swore, tinkered and, in desperation, bashed, but to no avail. The pendulum moved not a twitch. I gave up.

This is hard for me. I don’t usually give up, and, believe me, this is not always a good thing. Eventually I allowed the pendulum BE a metaphor:

There are some fights you can’t win.
Some things you just can’t fix.
There’s room in my life for the purely decorative

I reconciled myself to a clock with a pendulum that wasn’t going to work.

Then a window opened, the sun shone in, and the pendulum began to swing.

Early morning sunshine struck the silver disc and reflected a shiny penny of light, which oscillated gently, left-right, left-right, on the wall over there > >>>. It was this movement that first caught my eye. It took me less than a second to look up that way < <<< to discover the clock proudly presenting me with a fully functioning pendulum. Left-right, left- right. Tick-tock, tick-tick.

That was twenty minutes ago. It's still going. I am thinking perhaps the slight breeze coming in through the open window is the cause. I don't know, I'm afraid to touch it in case it stops. Instead, I shall revisit my metaphors:

Never write anything off.
Sometimes broken things fix themselves.
There's still room in my life for the purely decorative.

Time to get up.

Oh! By the way, Kate – if you read this – you're not getting your clock back.