Talking Trees
What a weird bloomin song: course they don’t listen to you and the stars most definitely never hear you. The trees i’m talking about! My Mum loved that song, she was always singing it. You probably have absolutely no clue what i’m talking about. It was a song that went ‘I talk to the trees, but they don’t listen to me, i talk to the stars but, they never hear me’ Weird!
My Mum loved music. Only recently i sold a whole box of eight tracks at a car boot sale. I always remember them snuggly fitting in the huge mahogany telly cupboard, right next to the big wooden globe that held all the alcohol. This included the Cherry Brandy i once managed to demolish at around 10 years old. Wouldn’t have been so bad but, i’m pretty sure it dated back to Prohibition. Years my parents dined out on that story, years! Make’s me a little green thinking of it now.
We had a Volvo. Don’t knock it, ruddy safe it was, that’s what my Dad always said. Bit ironic really when you think how proud he was about it’s safety. Did i really just say that?
Anyway, the Volvo had a cassette player (i know, all mod cons) and every Sunday when my Mum took me to the Riding stables we would listen to one or sometimes a mixture of the following: The Carpenters, Manhattan Transfer, Curiosity Killed the Cat, Lionel Ritchie or that song about some bloke that could have died in your arms tonight. I have a Deezer playlist of those songs now. They take me to a happy place. Funny really, as i never wanted to go riding much.It was always cold and if you wore more than one pair of socks, you could never feel your toes. Plus, if it was hot, never a more sweaty gusset you would get than in a pair of jodhpurs.
My Mum wanted me to love horses though, because of her history. I liked riding i guess, i was just never really that good at it. They always made me nervous and i think it was because i’m not good at taking direction.Controlling a horse is quite a responsibility I never really wanted to accept. I loved cleaning the tack and getting big stones out of hooves though.
Ballet i loved. I loved it but, i decided to give that up after several years because i was missing Knightmare and Fun House. A valid reason I stand by today. If only i knew that at the age of 34, there would be a specific channel that i could watch them all on now. Bugger!
My Dad never really listened to music, he just worked. He worked a lot. When he was dying he would like to borrow my CD player to try and pause some of the monotony of, well, dying (and the shame of luminous green wee). We knew it was luminous green because it was in a bag by his bed. When i asked him what he wanted to listen to he would always say ‘I love that band Erasure’ Shocking that was! Even when you’re dying: No excuse Dad!
I remember when he went to The Royal Albert Hall to see The Who. My brother took him (yes, we will get to him too: he requires his very own Terrabyte however) and he was so excited by the fact, that because he was in a wheelchair, he went to the very front and he got upgraded to first class on the train there, that he should have done the wheeled thing years ago. I gently pointed out that he would have been unlikely to obtain a wheelchair from the NHS when, even considering that he was paralysed from the waist down due to Prostate Cancer, that they still hadn’t managed to deliver two ramps in order for him to get out the house. One ramp they gave him, one! We just made our own in the end. The second ramp never came. Probably be delivered soon.
There was one good thing that came of riding and not just the hot orange squash in the winter as that was really a revelation. It was my friend Ruth. She was crazy good with the horses, especially the naughty ones: she just jumped on them and off she went, like something from a Thelwell painting . Her Mum owned the stables though so she had a head start.I loved her, I loved her a lot. I still do.She was my confident and she was the one person that when i was being an arse would say, ‘Shu, you’re being an arse’
The only problem i had with her was that when we were together, we were like the Abba of Devon. She was the beautiful blonde one that everyone wanted to talk to and i was the frumpy dark haired one that noone ever looked at. She was Agnetha and i was……see! Exactly! OK, i wasn’t exactly frumpy but in comparison to her i was.I still miss her, i miss her all the time. She was taken from me in a blink. Not like it was with my Mum and Dad. I never had the chance to say goodbye to her properly because she went out in her car and then she hit a tree. But you know what the last thing i said to her was and what she said to me? I love You.
That’s the God’s honest truth and that’s because we said this to each other every day. That’s the thing about losing someone so important so early, you always tell the people you love how you feel about them. This is one of the biggest lessons i have ever learnt and I’m happy that this is one of the most honest traits I have. I don’t care if it’s not reciprocated and neither should you. If you feel something, say it. You may not get another chance. Hindsight is a wonderful thing but, don’t let it be.
This is the main reason that i was so angry about my Mum’s death. She had ample opportunity and time that she knew was ebbing and yet,she didn’t make the most of it. I felt she didn’t. She never even left me a letter. This blog is my letter to her. And my apology.My apology for thinking that way.
When my parents went out I listened to (on Mum’s steeeeriogram)
1) 1812 Overture
2) Dream of Olwen
3) Carpenters – Goodbye to Love
I possibly wore that Carpenters track out, it has one of the finest guitar solos ever.
For my Mum it was Masquerede! If that’s how you spell it! I have a dream of singing my own version at a jazz club. As you know though, my heads a little in the clouds xxx
Another step on your journey Shu! I remember the trip to the Royal Albert Hall! Your dad,told me all about and so excited about it too! As for your Mum, how hard to know you are loosing the battle, I suppose you cling on to hope , and pray the day never comes that you have to say goodbye to such a young family. I find it hard when I think back, as we never said the things we should have and I don’t think we even saw how poorly she was until it was too late. She never wanted to leave and I know she fought a hard battle. She loved you all so very much. X
Thank you for saying that! It was lovely. I know it to be true but after going through it a second time and in such a positive way, it makes it all the more frustrating. Hopefully the lessons we learn will improve our future for our children xxx
Frumpy – you – never. And oh the lovely Ruth we all still miss her and it was thanks to Ruth that you came to work for us. She was indeed quite a girl, naughty but nice, every man that came into the office fell for her charms. So many wonderful memories, thanks for sharing some of them with us.
There are more to come believe me hee hee. She was very naughty indeed but that’s probably why we all got on so well 🙂 xxx
The Who! Dad sitting in The Good Mixer with Menswe@r and Blur and all the mods in the Albert Hall bar talking to him, he made friends so easily, was so brilliant. 🙂 xxxxxxx