A Man’s A Man For A’ That

Tags

Burns' Night, Rabbie Burns, Robert Burns, Scotland's National Poet, Scottish Literature, Sydney statue

Rabbie Burns – even celebrated Down Under (Sydney)

Photos by Candia

Pokey hats

Tags

Cadbury 99, chocolate teapot, Grace Darling, ice cream bike, laryngitis, Lindisfarne, Neil Oliver, pokey hats, Robert Burns, St Cuthbert's Church, Stanley Baxter

(strawberry ice cream cone, 2010

TheCulinaryGeek from Chicago, uploaded by Mindmatrix)

 

 

The guys hadn’t returned and so the wedding preparation discussions

continued.

Ice cream bike, or not?

Virginia had suggested the latter, but Diana mixed up the tricycle concept

with a chocolate teapot.

Won’t it melt? she asked.

No, it is a bike with a fridge thingy attached to it and people can have…

Pokey hats! enthused Mrs C.

Neither Virginia nor Diana had heard of these delicacies, but Mrs C

laughed and explained that they were cones, with or without the addition

of a Cadbury’s ‘Flake.’

You mean like a ’99’? asked Virginia.

Aye, they always remind me of a Stanley Baxter joke about a young lad going

up to the ice cream van on his housing estate and hoarsely asking for a pokey

hat.

The vendor smiles and says:  Raspberry sauce, son?

Aye, the wee lad responds enthusiastically, wi’ a voice like sandpaper.

Flake?

Oh, aye!  He sounds really gravelly.

Crushed nuts?

Naw, laryngitis.

Mrs C, do remember that we are trying to be ladylike, reprimanded

Diana, who had noticed that Virginia did not really approve of such

ribaldry.

Changing the subject, Virginia broke in, where did you get married Mrs C?

Oh, St Cuthbert’s,  Lindisfarne, the housekeeper replied.  That was a long,

long time ago.

What made you choose that church?  Diana asked.  Mind you, it must have

lots of history.

Och weel, there was a line fae Burns that Ah learnt at school and it has aye

stuck wi’ me:  ‘Nae man can tether time nor tide.’  Ah didnae want himself

thinkin’ that he could tether me, so Ah suggested a wild, unpredictable place,

beyond the causeway of the normal mainland and subject tae the vagaries o’

the tides, tae tie the nuptial knot.

The causeway? Virginia was puzzled as she was not au fait with the

coastal geography of the region, never having been a fan of Neil Oliver.

She also had difficulty with the idea of a tethered Mrs C. It was not an

image she chose to reflect on for long.

Aye, Ah thought crossing the causeway fae wan world tae anither was kinda

symbolic o’ traversin’ the matrimonial threshold from spinster tae married

wumman, ken?

Tres metaphysical, murmured Virginia.

Weel, better that than onything physical developin’, fur Ah thocht that if

he put a foot wrong in the crossing, he’d be swept aff tae sea and he widnae

hae found me rowin’ aff tae rescue him, like wan o’ they Grace Darlin’-type

wummen.

Mmm, Virginia pondered the fact that Mrs C was definitely a ‘sink or

swim’ kind of female.

And did he ever put a foot wrong- then- or subsequently? Diana dared

to ask.

Nae mair questions the day, Mrs C replied and went off to fill the

teapot, which was very definitely not made of chocolate.

Portrait of Grace Darling by Thos Musgrave Joy)

 

Diary of a Lax Mistress

Tags

Bradford on Avon, Burns Supper, Calais, clairvoyant, cliche, Dalrieda, diaspora, estuary, Heraclitus, Immortal Memory, lacrosse, Mary Tudor, Nemo Me Impune Lacessit, New Year Resolution, parsing, Robert Burns, St Vitus, straightjacket

Not ‘lax‘ in any moral sense, you understand, Dear Diary.  Just an

abbreviation for that energising and energetic sport which I once

taught all those years ago when I was a fresh-faced sports

mistress at St Vitus’ School for the Academically-Gifted Girl, that

educational establishment now served by my one and only

daughter, Drusilla.

Lacrosse, how indebted I am to you for my trim figure in late

middle- no, change that-early middle age.

My New Year Resolution was to record in your pages an unfolding

record of my life as I turn my back on Bradford-on-Avon and return

to Suttonford, or environs thereof.  I could castigate myself by

declining to add a preposition in the final position of a sentence,

but, Dear Inquisitive Reader, I am not allowing such an intrusion

into these highly personal pages. I can assure you that ‘thereof’

is actually an adverb.  So, Parse that! as my primary teacher used

to say to me.

Apparently all that pedantic wrangling and linguistic strait-jacketing is-

new hate word- ‘prescriptive‘, so we can write what the ….we like!

Having spoken to Sonia, my old friend, ex-colleague and godmother to my

child, I was persuaded to come and lodge with her while my cottage is on

the market.  Diana, she urged, Feel free to stay as long as you’d like.

So, here I am in Royalist House, 3 3/4 High Street. Suttonford.

Will this new chapter of my life include Augustus?  I should ask Sonia; she

claims to be a clairvoyant.

Gus has frankly been a bit of a bore recently.  We were all three en famille at

Christmas and our pre-festivities Turkish trip was delightful, but since he

assumed this Acting Head harness, he has shown a distinct lack of

delegation. I don’t know what he expects his School Secretary to do.

Well, maybe I don’t want to know, Dear Diary!

Last night he was moaning on the telephone about the fixtures list having

been published on the Calendar he inherited. Apparently, he has been left

to fill in the subtle logistical details.

The Fundraising Burns’ Supper for the PTA is a current example.

He hasn’t even booked the speaker for The Immortal Memory yet.

Did I know anyone who could deliver it?  I ask you.  I’ve only just arrived

in the community.

Why should I?

It all leads me to question our compatibility.  I am not that burbling stream

that he once paddled in and which scarcely covered the ankles of his

gumboots.  No, the mighty river of my post-menopausal personality would

probably engulf his emotional waders, to continue an aquaeous metaphor,

and would sweep him off his feet, into a tidal estuary.

Maybe his Classical learning has influenced my subconscious and transmitted

some Heraclitean analogy concerning never being able to step in the same

river twice.  We have both moved on, I fear.

We emerged from the house into the street and immediately were almost

knocked over by a child on an aluminium scooter.  Sonia didn’t see that

coming.

Our physical evasion led us to bump-literally-into a neighbour of Sonia’s,

namely an interesting looking woman called Candia Dixon-Stuart.  She was also

on her way to the infamous Costamuchamoulah must-seen cafe, in order to

meet a friend, and so we fell into step.

Her Jacobite surname, albeit hyphenated, led me to the most serendipitous

idea.

I asked her if she knew of anyone who could give some readings of the Bard’s

works at an impending Burns Supper.

She immediately replied, I can, of course.  Although I live in Suttonford, you

may detect a hint of the Caledonian in my genetic code.  Prick me and do I not

exude a few drops of blue blood from the Kingdom of Dalrieda?!

I took this as an affirmative and she drew my attention to a clan badge that

she wore on her lapel.  I did not know if this indicated an invitation to

remove it and plunge its pin into her soft and yielding flesh.  I did not

doubt that, eviscerated, her remains would bear the motto: Nemo Me

Impune Lacessit just as indelibly as that other Mary had the word:

Calais stamped on her heart, or running right through her like a stock

of seaside rock.

Over a couple of cappuccinos, she introduced us to her friend, Carrie,

who turned out to be half Italian and half Scottish.  Gosh, these Scots

certainly had some diaspora and spread their seed around like some

blown thistledown.

Carrie told me that her mother- Morag!- a stereotypical name- would have

come down had she not been performing at various Masonic associations

and venues north of the border.

Very kind, but somehow I think Candia is our woman and she will ‘step up

to the plate‘ to re-circulate a current, over-used metaphor: isn’t that a cliche?

I gave her Gus’ number and am half-inclined to allow him to take me along as

his guest of honour.  There are bound to be some spare tickets and, frankly,

this new acquaintance intrigues me.