Talking Heads by Alan Bennett

Author:Alan Bennett [Alan Bennett]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780571365395
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Published: 2020-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Crack of dawn this morning I routed out my trusty green cossy and spent a happy half-hour breasting the billows. The old cossy’s seen better days and the moth has got into the bust but as the only people about were one or two brave souls walking the dog I didn’t frighten the troops.

Came back hungry as a hunter so boiled myself an egg on the ring and had it with a slice of Ryvita, sitting in the window. Sun just catches it for an hour then, lovely. I tidied the room, did one or two jobs, and then toddled along to the library and had a walk round Boots by which time it was getting on for lunchtime, it’s surprising how time does go. When I think of the things I used to get through in the old days I wonder how I did it.

Been here about a month now. Got onto it via an advert in The Lady. Sledmere it’s called, ‘Holiday flatlets’. Off season, of course, and quite reasonable. I haven’t quite got the town sorted out yet. I feel sure there must be a community here if only I can put my finger on it. I had a word with a young woman at the Town Hall. Blue fingernails but civil enough otherwise. Said was I interested in Meals On Wheels. I said, ‘Rather. I was 2 i/c Meals on Wheels for the whole of Sudbury,’ a fund of experience. Brawn not too good but brains available to be picked at any time. She looked a bit blank. Turns out she meant did I want to be on the receiving end. I said, ‘Not on your life.’ But message received and understood. The old girl’s past it. Hence the swim, I suppose.

Still, I soldier on and it’s not quite orphans of the storm time. I look round the shops quite a bit and if I’m lucky I run into Angela Gillespie who’s got her mother in a home here and comes over from time to time. We have coffee and a natter about the old days. Though I can’t do that too often. Morning coffee these days seems to cost a king’s ransom. And with me there doesn’t have to be coffee. I can talk to anybody. The other morning I got chatting to one of these young men in orange who bang their tambourines in the precinct. Came up to me rattling his bowl, shaven head but otherwise quite sensible. His view is that life is some kind of prep. Trial run. Thinks we’re being buffed up for a better role next time. As sensible as anything else I suppose. I said, ‘Well, I just hope it’s not in Hunstanton.’ (She laughs.)

The big bright spot on the horizon is Margaret. Heaps better, lost a lot of weight, got rid of that terrible cardigan and now is quite a good-looking young woman. In a hostel up to pres. but planning on getting a small flat. Came

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