It’s a beautiful morning in Hadleigh. I’d like to say I’ve been up since the crack of dawn but it would be a porkie. I’ve allowed myself the luxury of a lie-in today. Because I’m worth it.
It has been a very busy time since I got back from Antigua on Monday. In fact, I was going to call this post ‘Am I on my Arse or my Elbow?’ but thought that might be rude and inappropriate. But I’ve felt as if I’ve been gradually sucked into the vortex of the whirlwind that has been my life over the last few days.
Monday was spent half comatose as I recovered from jet-lag. Actually, it wasn’t so much jet-lag as just tiredness as I’d had my usual jet-lag-coping-strategy of a couple of hours sleep on arrival home and went to bed fairly early that night. I’d got home later than expected as my phone decided to stop working on arrival at LGW so I had to get someone to look at it and then trying to get out of Tesco’s car park was like being stuck on M25 at the Queen Elizabeth Bridge on a Friday night. It seemed as if the whole of Essex was trying to get out.
Anyway – Tuesday was………… THE MOVE!! Now, you have to bear in mind that I’m still full of resentment at not being able to buy Mum’s flat, added to which I’m going to be paying more than £100 more in rent than I would have been paying mortgage that the bloody banks said I couldn’t afford. (George Osborne, are you reading this???) So I’m not exactly skipping ahead with glee at this prospect, and I’m emotionally all over the place. As I’ve said before, selling her flat and seeing someone else living there is as if she’s died all over again. And what with the loss of Jean, I’ve been continually teetering on the brink of tears. Driving along I heard part of MLK’s ‘I have a Dream’ speech and started to well up. Although I accept that it’s grown-up time now and I have to live somewhere else and that I have to ‘move on’, to use current jargon.
The removal company were great, although not the cheapest in the world! Still, good ain’t cheap and cheap ain’t good as a wise man once told me. And by lunchtime I was installed in the flat and £2000 poorer. Once in I realised that the curtains I had weren’t compatible with the poles and hooks installed so on my way to Ladykillers (I was in Tuesday night’s performance) I went to Lakeside and bought new curtains and poles. Only to find at midnight, when I got back from the show and was trying to hang the blessed curtains up (the flat has enormous windows in the living-room and bedroom which overlook the A13, so I was having to creep around in the dark, tripping over bags and banging into boxes to avoid exposing myself to the whole of Hadleigh) that the pole I’d bought was too weak to hold the curtains. And, the curtain rail in the living room was broken and so I couldn’t hang the curtains on it anyway, even if they had been long enough, which they weren’t!
So, on Wednesday, having been awake since first light as there are no curtains in the bedroom and then having to crawl on my hands and knees from bed to bathroom (I sleep with very little on – sorry! Too much information, I know!!) I decided to go back to Lakeside to change the curtains and poles before going onto Ladykillers for a matinee and evening performance. So on Wednesday night at midnight I was yet again, hanging curtains, only for the bedroom ones to fall down with a huge clang in the middle of the night.
Fortunately, yesterday, David, who’s a skilled handyman, came round with his B & D and now I have curtains in both living-room and bedroom. Hooray!
And then came yesterday. What a bittersweet day it was; Jean Hewitt’s funeral. It was, of course, an incredibly sad day. I know that nowadays the trend is to celebrate the person’s life, but I must admit I find that hard to do when engulfed in grief for the loss of someone you love and that you’re never going to see again. I think there’s a lot to be said for funerals in the Middle East when everyone wails. But as sad as it was to say goodbye to Jean, it was such a nostalgic day, too. Very handsome young men and stunningly beautiful young women kept coming up and hugging me and then I’d realise they were the boys and girls I’d taught for years in my drama classes. Some have gone on to do very well in the world of entertainment, and others have become extremely successful in a number of professions from teaching, through banking to the police force. Many of them are now parents, or parents-to-be, themselves. But they’ve all turned into lovely, decent people who it was a pleasure to meet up with and talk to. I was soon swept up on a tide of memories; of all the shows we’d put on; of things that had happened in class. Kylie reminded me how I made her come along (with her hair in rollers!) to dress-rehearsal for the Little Mermaid on the morning of her mum’s wedding! I hadn’t realised I was such a hard task-master! And Kirstie said how she’d loved being a horse that drew Joseph’s chariot. Ah bless! And we talked about Grease and Oliver and Midsummer Night’s Dream and many. Many more as the memories came flooding back.
On the train up to London (I was in last night’s show and the Daughter was going back home to Surrey) we talked about what a special time it had been for her growing up and ‘Dancing at Jean’s’ and she said that she and her friends had agreed yesterday that husbands and boyfriends couldn’t understand what a tight bond it was that united them all because they had grown up at Hewitt’s. Another big THANK YOU to Jean for that.
So, having got home late again last night, I allowed myself the luxury of said lie-in this morning, with a coffee and a teacake and a read in bed. Heaven! Then I finally surfaced after ten and have now got the kitchen straight. All the boxes are empty and plates, dishes, pans etc in their new home. I should now make a start on bedroom or living-room, but as you all know, I’m the Queen of Procrastination, so I’m writing this instead!!
A trip to the bank is on the cards and to a hardware or pound store to buy a bathroom mat and then a visit to the Sister to pick up the final couple of things. I know how to have a good time! Oh and a TV aerial lead. I can’t find the other one anywhere. I think I might have left it behind. Never mind. All I want to do tonight is sit with my feet up watching rubbish. And if it takes me another week to empty all the boxes and put everything in its place – who cares? There’s nobody here but me!
And tomorrow – drama classes at Stages Studios and two performances of Ladykillers followed by Spanish teaching on Sunday morning, haircut and production meeting for Singles’ Holiday, the Stage-play.
Is it any wonder I don’t know if I’m on my arse or my elbow?
