The summer solstice is upon us. Time to get out the woad, ramp up the chanting and perform some ancient pagan rituals involving fire, water, air and earth. It might be very cheering to get blue and naked in the countryside, and it would certainly take our minds off the current doom and gloom that is our daily news. So why not? ‘Because it’s idiotic,’ was my 19-year-old son’s response. My suggestion that he might like to celebrate the longest night with a bonfire and marshmallows on the wild heathland overlooking the sea in Norfolk was met with a withering look. ‘It’s probably illegal,’ he said. ‘And how old do you think I am anyway?’
London is now my home again after 15 years of living in Norfolk. I have moved to Paddington, to the top floor of a crumbling Regency cake of a house, with tumbling stucco and undesirable water features on the stairwells both inside and out. Apparently the Westbourne river flows merrily under the building, often escaping Thames Water’s boundaries and contributing to a mediaeval dungeon atmosphere in our exterior cellars. Last week I made a trip down the outside steps to look for the gas meter. It wasn’t there, but in the most subterranean cavern was a folded copy of that day’s Financial Times and a mattress. My mind was fixed in pursuit of the gas meter, so I thought for a mere split second, ‘How odd, who would want to come down here to read the paper? It’s the sort of place Fungus the Bogeyman would turn his nose up at,’ and continued on my mission. The next day, though, an email arrived from the residents of the basement flat. ‘A new tenant?’ they queried, and went on to describe a be-suited African gentleman they had seen coming up the steps from the cavern early that morning, and a swinging padlock on the door of the cellar with the mattress and newspaper in it. There was general email ping-pong among the residents about changing the locks, but I wonder if instead we should capitalise? With very little effort we could make the caverns into a sauna and steam room, a more exclusive version of the Porchester Baths, and make the space pay.
My own capacity for earning needs pumping up, but I am always susceptible to distractions. Last week I found a very good new distraction when I was asked to become a writer-in-residence at a school for a scheme called ‘First Story’, a new charity endorsed by the Department of Children, Schools and Families and by the Royal Society for Literature. The charity was born less than a year ago, but is already placing eight writers at schools once a week through the academic year to foster creativity in teenagers, and the self-confidence writing can bring. A similar scheme in America, called 826 National, which was set up by the writer David Eggers, has been very successful. ‘First Story’ focuses on schools where more than 30 per cent of pupils are on free school meals. The scheme has been offered a platform at next year’s Hay on Wye Festival, and a week of residential creative writing at the Arvon Foundation. My own contribution so far has been simply to agree to it, but having been into various schools to teach on a one-off basis already I am excited, and I am sure that it is only a matter of time before there is a literary ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ show spawned by this project.
International talent had my jaw swinging at Gifford’s Circus in the Cotswolds where I was last weekend. In a tiny big top surrounded by a trail of painted wagons, this circus is one of the most picturesque and enchanting shows of the summer, and transported me to an idyll I wish had been my childhood. The theme is ‘Caravan’ and the mood is mysterious, at times mediaeval and utterly magical. Horses, falcons, and incredible feats of human bendiness and also poise are all dressed up in the most beguiling costumes. For an hour and a half I enjoyed the fantasy of what it would be like to be Nell Gifford, the beautiful founder and owner of this circus. Being Nell involves being poured into a fur-edged riding habit, performing advanced dressage on a golden horse and occasionally raising an arm for a falcon to land on her gloved hand. I’m sure she occasionally has to open her post, wash her hair and take her shoes to the menders, but in the sawdust-covered circus ring on a sunny evening in Gloucestershire, her world glows with enchantment. This week the circus is at Tackley, then Cheltenham and it is a blissful way to spend a day.
With my last book finished and the new one just a speck on a page I have a ‘school’s out for summer’ sense that is at odds with more or less everything else in my life. Cycling around London only contributes to this, and as Hyde Park is the hub of my daily existence, I am beginning to believe that no one really goes to work, they just get into their office clothes, pick up their briefcases and head for the park. I usually enter by the Italian Fountain and it is a social nexus, with promenading, flirting, dogs coming and going, roller bladers gliding by and always a herd of runners, beautifully choreographed, charging on and off the set of park life, providing a cattle prod of guilt whenever anyone was thinking of just sitting down with a book for 20 minutes. Speaking of cattle prods, in the 19th century there was a herd of cows in St James’s Park, and I think it’s time to bring them back. Keep the milk local. Fetching it from the cows would be a fine daily ritual and could bring Londoners closer to nature. I shall ask my son if he thinks it is a better idea than wearing woad.
Poppyland by Raffaella Barker is published by Headline Review at £12.99.
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