Monday, March 31

Jamie arrived early to drop Archie off.  Apparently he has a busy day and doesn't like to leave Archie at home on his own.  Of course, we enjoy having him..  We're waiting for the Coles man to arrive with our order but, otherwise, we have nothing else planned.  The weather is staring to become colder and I think Summer is fading fast into the background.

I had an email this morning reminding me that there is a probus meeting next week so need to sort out the financial statement.  It's the time of year when we pay our annal subs and these can come by cash or cheque, or deposited directly into our bank account.  I tried to resign from the Treasurer's job at the last meeting but without success.  You'd think it would just be a matter of throwing the books on the table and saying Goodbye but I'm a mug and tried to be accommodating.  Of course, the club took advantage of my good nature and I'm stuck with the job, probably until I kick the bucket. That'll show them!

MRS MINIVER                                                         JULY 9, 2021

Old Tom was in his ninetieth year.  He couldn’t remember when people started to attach the ‘Old’ to his name but it was probably a good while ago.  He felt as if he had been old for most of his life and now he wondered whether great slabs of his memory were disappearing.  He could still remember days of his childhood in great detail and could even recall the smells of rotting seaweed on Blackpool Beach or the reek of stale fat in the bins outside the chippie on Scorton Avenue. But when it came to remembering what he had for lunch yesterday, his mind was a blank.

Funny, that he could remember so clearly  the smell of Blackpool Beach but not something as important as what he had for lunch – even though he didn’t eat much these days and all the food tasted the same.

His mind wandered back to the days when food tasted better and he thought of the newspaper-wrapped fish and chips his mother would allow him to have on special occasions.  The fish was always cooked in crisp batter and the steam that came out when he stuck in the knife would tickle his nose.  The chips were fat and soaked in vinegar. 

Tom’s mum sometimes helped out in the chip shop when it was busy and, on those days, there would be nobody in the flat when Tom came home from school.  That was OK.  Tom’s mum would leave him a glass of milk and two ginger biscuits and he would read a book or get on with his homework until his Mum or Dad came home.  One day, when he came home, he discovered that his mother had forgotten to leave him the door key under the mat.   Settling himself down for an uncomfortable wait, he heard someone come up behind him.

“Hello, Tom,” the person said. “Are you locked out?”    It was Mrs Miniver from upstairs.  Well, it was the lady who called herself Mrs Miniver.  Mum said it was a made-up name and the real Mrs Miniver was in a film starring a famous film star whose name started with G.

“Yes,” said Tom, “and Mum won’t be back for another hour.”

“Oh, that’s a shame.  Would you like to come up to my flat and have some hot cocoa and maybe a biscuit?”

Tom didn’t know what to say.  He knew his mother didn’t like Mrs Miniver and he had overheard her telling his father that “she was no better that she should be.”  He thought that his mother wouldn’t like him to go but it was cold on the landing and he didn’t want to be rude so he said Thank you and went upstairs.

His mother was upset that Tom had gone with Mrs Miniver but, because she had forgotten to leave the key, she couldn’t say very much. Tom visited the flat upstairs more and more as time went on.  He liked Mrs Miniver’s flat.  It was always a bit untidy, unlike his place.  His mother was always angry with him if he made a mess and he was frightened to even leave a book lying about.  One day, Mrs Miniver had left the door of her bedroom open and Tom saw her unmade bed.  It had black sheets!  Tom thought all sheets were white and these ones were much shinier than the ones on his bed downstairs.

Occasionally, Mrs Miniver would ask him to leave a little early as she had a friend coming around to see her.  Sometimes, Tom would pass the friends on the stairs.  They didn’t look like the sort of people Mrs Miniver would know: sad little men in shabby coats, big men in fishermen’s jumpers, frightened men looking at him furtively.  Tom wondered what was going on and then realised that Mrs Miniver might be something like a fortune-teller and that would explain why she had so many visitors. Tom’s mum had been to a fortune-teller once and she was told that, when Tom grew up, he would wear a white coat.

“That means you’ll be a doctor,” she said excitedly. 

“More likely he’ll be selling ice-cream on Blackpool Pier,” his father had replied, grumpily.

When you’re a child, you grow up very quickly and Tom soon realised what was really taking place in the bedroom upstairs.  Like all boys he was fascinated by the frequency of the visits and struggled to reconcile his impression of Mrs Miniver as a kindly woman much like his Mum with the femme fatale image conjured up by the lurid language of his mates.

Of course, that was a long time ago and Mrs Miniver must be well and truly dead and buried.  Tom has always hoped that she passed away peacefully and is mourned by someone who loved her.  He can’t forget her, like he has forgotten so many people from his past.  One of the young women in the nursing home, by chance, wears the same perfume as Mrs Miniver wore and, like the smell of stale fat or rotting seaweed, the faint aroma of her perfume in the air takes his mind straight back to his home in Blackpool and the warm memories of Mrs Miniver, the lady upstairs.