Home life
Birthday blues
Alice Thomas Ellis
Imostly forget anniversaries — or I try to. Too many are sorrowful and the others are a nuisance, necessitating awful, ghast- ly, boring frolicking and cries of 'Good health' and 'Many happy returns'. At the absolutely worst — silver wedding anniversaries, for instance — people can- not be prevented from making speeches. Horror. As the housewife, I always find myself catering for these lowering occa- sions, and am therefore more than slightly resentful by the time the cake candles are lit. Also, having access to the cooking sherry, I am seldom in need of further liquid refreshment by the time the toasts are proposed. I'm ready for bed by then. We always sincerely forget our wedding anniversary. Someone says this is the sign of a happy marriage.
It was my birthday on Wednesday and it passed fairly painlessly. We had a friend with us who had spent the night and at 8.30 a.m. he expressed a desire for pints of bitter. He said he was going off to Smith- field on this quest, so I said to myself what the hell and went with him. At the first pub we approached we were refused entry. Our friend couldn't quite remember whether this was one of the establishments he was barred from, so we didn't argue but sped round the corner to a more accommodat- ing hostelry. Here I demanded shandy, because I am not particularly fond of the taste of unadulterated beer, and our friend and the barman both nearly wept since they considered putting lemonade in it as some sort of sacrilege. They rolled their eyes and wrung their hands, and the barman flung in as little as possible, so that as the morning passed I ceased to mind about it being my birthday.
There was a young man leaning on the bar gazing into his glass, and every so often he would remark: 'There she was, gone.' He would then follow this with 'I wandered lonely as a cloud', and I got the impression that he had just been deserted by some faithless female. I asked him with womanly sympathy whether this was indeed the case and he said it was. His hands were sore too because he'd been digging a tunnel for a new underground route and he proved rather difficult to cheer up. Our friend assured him that there'd be another one along in a minute and I reminded him that men had died and worms had eaten them, but not for love; but he wouldn't be consoled. There was a momentary distrac- tion when we noticed an unattended brief- case leaning against a bar stool, and handed it to the barman. 'Don't shake it,' he screamed. I'd forgotten the days when we were constantly adjured not to mess with unexplained suitcases and plastic bags but to alert the station/shop/bar staff, leave the premises quietly and wait for the bomb squad. I suppose fashions in death change as much as everything else.
We bade farewell to our young acquaint- ance with the calloused hands and the broken heart because I had a luncheon engagement and my friend was due in Grantchester. The fellow was reluctant to see us go and if I hadn't had the dashes of lemonade in the lager I daresay I'd have taken him with me. One can get very fond of the people one meets in bars. The trouble is they then appear sort of different in the daylight and you realise that taking them with you is rather like taking a goldfish for a walk: not entirely correct, and surprising for the next people you run into.
I had a delicious lunch and drifted home replete with noisette of lamb. Then I think I had a little sleep, and in the evening some of us went out to our pet Chinese res- taurant for supper. This is, of course, the only way to handle anniversaries. Every- one in the family would prefer to dine at Cheng Du rather than watch Mummy getting red in the face with rage, standing over a hot stove and knocking back the sparkling white — if it's got bubbles in, people think it's festive — and then refus- ing to eat any dinner because she's bored with cooking it. Deirdre has just rung to say she may be in Ireland until December and what are we going to do about Christ- mas. I think I am going to run straight round to Cheng Du and ask them what they're going to do for Christmas. We may be spending it together.
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