As summer gently shimmys toward the exit door, and fall gets in the queue to get into the club of the passing year, we’re slowly seeing the weather change. Even Auntie Kittie has started wearing a sweater now and then, a matter of considerable relief to Max, who types up her material.
“Max is such a dear,” she said the other day. “I’m so grateful he’s so good at putting it in. He’s so thorough.” and then added as an after thought,”… and so quick.”
The poor 20 year old lamb goes the color of a beetroot when he’s embarrassed, and Auntie Kittie will say such things in front of Sylvester and Mistress Meg. And it was Sylvester and Meg who were sitting at my kitchen table this very morning. Sylvester was telling us how in these troubled times we should all be finding ways to lift our spirits. Instead of worrying about the Corona Virus we should be reaching deeply within ourselves and fostering our creativity. Meg was a little skeptical.
I’ve been doing that very thing myself. I’ve been doing a little embroidery, making some of my jeans look a little more feminine by adding a few little designs. It’s really very simple and gives even the most masculine of trousers a nice feminine touch. If you’d like to change your favorite dungarees from the farm yard, or even the ones you wear when cleaning out the slag from the iron foundry this will do just the trick. Even your most stylish denim pants can be personalised and uplifted – and we could all use a personalised uplifting of our denim clad butts, I’m sure you’ll agree.
I leaned over the kitchen table and turned to Sylvester and said, “What do you think of this?”
Sylvester looked at my jeans as I did so, and said, “That’s really very impressive. I think I should enter you.”
“Sylvester, I…” but before I could speak he went on, as Meg looked on, arms folded and unimpressed.
“I should enter you in the embroidery competition. It’s part of the end of summer cultural fair at the recreation center.”
“Oh, really I don’t think so,” I said. “Most of the people entering are really rather older than I am. They’re quite a conservative lot. I’m really not sure what they’d make of me. I can imagine it would be like that poor South African athlete who they didn’t believe was a woman.”
Sylvester looked a little doubtful. “No, I don’t think it would be like that.”
Anyway that’s what I’m doing. Sylvester tells me he’s working on a book. The Complete Idiot’s Guide To Being A Complete Idiot. A catchy title.
“Are you writing it or reading it?” muttered Meg, ever the acerbic wit.
It turns out that half the people in this competition I’m now entered in are young arts students. I thought they’d all be doddery old buffers like Auntie Kittie’s father, who’s staying with her rather than going into a care home. These days that seems a rather good idea. The old fellow is about 150 years old and sits smiling looking into the far horizon. He seems a kindly old fellow, though the dementia is quite complete and he has little idea of what’s going on. He seems cheerful, though.
I said to Auntie Kittie, the other day when I was round there, “He looks like he’s fondly remembering the things he used to do when he was a young man.”
She frowned and agreed.
“Yes, you’re probably right. He’s remembering flying aeroplanes and bombing Germany. He’s always been a belligerent old bugger.”
I suppose we all have our own journeys.
Have a safe week.
Fiona
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