Patching up

Through some weird alignment of the planets my home village comes to my now village, across the Channel and several hundred kilometers south.

Chris arrived with a parcel of old photos, Sarah arrived with her mother's laugh and her dad's accent. 

Lizzie came to the moulin this morning.  We opened the windows onto an embryonic spring day, laid the photos out on the table, poured a couple of glasses of wine and went through them. 

Me at three with my thumb in my mouth standing awkwardly between two tall ladies, parties for Papa's birthday when everyone ended up in A and E, mama looking severe, then looking young and pretty in one of the little alcoves on the bridge across the moor.

Nico made a parmentier de canard aux pommes which could have fed an army but our family is an army so it all went.  Bobby looked like Father Jack so I took him upstairs and gave him a shave.  

It feels at times that we're putting a plaster on an open wound of our parent's suffering.  

I used to play with the word 'Parents' with the French slang Verlan which inverts words.  Parents becomes Remparts which always seemed apt; a fortress, a strong wall protecting you against attack.

I walked home via the potagers and down to the river.  Shacks made of bits and bobs of old doors and windows.

These things I've shored against my ruin


Ta Mr Elliot xxx