Now that the dust is beginning to settle on our lives - and in the corners of our home - (to which a brand new feather duster is being put to good use - occasionally, anyway!!) we seem to be bumbling along quite nicely in Bunbury...
Take an average Sunday morning ... Rick just about has it under his skirt the 'where he should be and when' matter of things in hand, but this morning the early morning time is getting on and suspicion fails that Rick may have overslept ... I wake him with a tentative "Rick, have you overslept?" question in my sweetest voice, just in case he has a cunning plan afoot to wake at the very last minute possible and fear I'm messing it all up. As soon as the expletive (or several of them) were uttered, I knew there was no plan afoot, nor ahead (as so often there isn't!!) and he dived into his frock and up to church like a bat out of heaven. I had that knot in my stomach that hoped he would stay up-right and not snore, nor dribble through any of the services ... that's the Vicar and me bumbling along in Bunbury ... !
And as the dust keeps settling, we of course, don't stop at just learning names, the next step is to get to know where people live. We've been invited for drinks, and suppers and coffees to various homes described as 'it's the little cottage just down the lane'...but doesn't everybody live in a 'little cottage just down the lane?' And nobody warns us of the humps in the road as Rick lurches over them in the dark (not once, but several of the things) and lands crippled on the doorstep with a grimace on his face which is fortunately interpreted as a smile of greeting! A simple bumble - could have happened to anyone...
And a farm house, "which we can't miss if we head in that direction". Rick heads in the wrong direction saying, "trust me, I'm a Vicar". I've heard that so many times before I've learned not to trust him (not even with a map) and I always allow an extra 20 minutes of 'getting lost time' and true to form we get lost. Quite badly actually. We're in Haughton ... but should be in Alpraham ... Racing up and down dark country lanes, and in several circles I believe, in the Mini Cooper behaving just like a 'townie' would behave driving in the country. And we arrive ... just in time to say 'Good-bye' and leave ... or he'll be late forthe 6.30 p.m. service. He was driving, so he bumbles - I mumble. Quite loudly. Not sweetly!
And it's Christmas time and the School Fair is on so we drop by and thought we mistook the place for a craft shop. There was home-made this - things to hang - home-made that things to stand - home-made this - things were grown - home-made that - things were sewn. We didn't stay long - we crept out feeling soooo INADEQUATE (capital letters!). We bought a pot of jam.
And I meet a lady who has a mother who sits by her window much of the day and I could wave to her as I walk by if I liked - she would like that. So I wave and she waves back. And here is a place I can be real, where I don't have to try hard just to be me ... Yet, I'm told the little old lady likes me ... she says I look so young and pretty (she obviously sees through the middle age and baggy eyes) (I love her already!!)
And I meet an 'older than myself lady' who tells her, 'hers was a name that I would remember...'and several intense feelings run inside me all at the same time and I determine not to remember her name 'cause I don't like being told what to do ... but damn it, next time we meet I find of course I have remembered her name and I use it!! And I melt to myself I 'cause I like her. No bumble there, just natural, just human, just warm and warming. So, here was another place for people to be people and for me to be free...
And I keep forgetting to take my Bible to the Bible Study Group...'cause we're new boys and girls and we don't quite know the rules. And still everybody bakes home-made this and home-made that which makes me want to rush out to my nearest Sayers and buy a massproduced apple pie. But I won't, 'cause I'm sure I'm not quite brave enough and I'm sure that would be bumbling big-time. And Rick 'forgot' to turn up at the school service and had to eat humble pie in apology ... (home-made, of course).
We were invited to the nativity play 'back home' and we went 'cause of times past and I experienced those memories of when my own children took part as 'Joseph' and came that old familiar knot that starts in the stomach and gets stuck in the throat 'cause it has nowhere to go when "one is grown up and one mustn't cry"...but still those feelings have life as they flood from times past of what was ... and what was good...
And we went to another ... performed by our local school, by children we hardly knew ... but that story was the same ... and that's the thing with the story of Christ at Christmas - you can't change its nature - 'it' can only change you...