My Past and Future Life

The front and the back of our house represented different worlds. To the front, a busy road, noise and bustle. To the back, a quiet garden leading out to a small lane. The lane in turn lead to a river. A bend in the river harboured a strange quirk in an otherwise fairly flat landscape. A little hill had been partly eaten as a quarry. The quarry had long ago been abandoned, was flooded by the river, and formed a deep pool of languid water. This was the world into which I was born in 1965 – an only child. Ours was a little house in a row of similar cottages. Our house though had the distinction of being flanked by the old prison building. Its cold stone walls enclosed part of the rear garden. They were damp even after weeks without rain. In winter, water would dribble down them and freeze before reaching the ground – even when the weather was relatively mild. I was still very young when I became aware of something else relating to the prison house. There were ghosts there. My bedroom window looked out onto the rear garden and the old prison, and it was through my bedroom window that the ghosts found their way into the house. I was frightened of the ghosts at first. It was not that they did anything really, just that one could sense their presence in my bedroom and sometimes there was something that felt like a gentle breeze on my cheek. In time though I grew used to the ghosts and welcomed their presence. My father was a quiet man. He left the house late each morning through the door to the front. He returned each evening through the same door. A swirl of traffic noise, cold harsh air and dust would announce his return. Often he sat sobbing on his return. As a child I did not know what the sobbing meant. My mother would comfort him as best she could. After we’d eaten they would sit together in front of the stove in the little lounge. My mother would lean her head into my father’s shoulder and they would both doze. Later I became aware that my father had been a supply teacher of English in some of the worst schools in the region. He had a remarkable ability for knowing just exactly the right thing to say to people in order to elicit a good response. As such, his teaching skills were exceptional. He had not been sobbing therefore as a result of struggling with unruly classes. He had sobbed because most, if not all, of his pupils had no hope. My father was very often the only figure in those kids’ lives that gave them any kind of self-belief. My mother cried less often, though when she did I never knew the reason. My father would hug her and place a gentle finger over her lips to stop her from articulating her concerns. Perhaps he should have let her speak, but even so this cure seemed to work. Before long her shy smile returned to her rounded face. The radio played softly. After my mother had gone to bed my father would sit at his desk writing long into the night. This was why he was so often late setting off in the morning. My mother sat at the same desk and wrote during the day. We seldom left the house as a family. I had a little seat by the fire, but from a young age I took up residence behind the sofa. Squares of paper, cut neatly to the same size, were somehow always there. I did not leave home to go to school. I do not remember really how I learnt anything. I just remember my mother, on her hands and knees, crawling into my little world behind the sofa. In her hand were some squares of paper inscribed with letters and little drawings she had prepared herself with a broad calligraphy pen and a bottle of ink. Even the simplest of these would somehow be vibrant and life-affirming – I kept many of them for decades. She would be a little red in the face from entering the world behind the sofa and a little strand of hair would dangle down in counterpoint to her round face. At first there were letters, then simple words, then little explanations about the world and questions and songs. So, little by little, I suppose my knowledge grew without any kind of formal schooling. Behind me in my place behind the sofa, was an enormous set of shelves, stocked with numerous books. Many of the books seemed to arrive via the funny little man. The funny little man must have been a friend of my mothers – he would often visit during the day. He waved his hands when he spoke and made lots of funny faces and silly accents. My mother would listen intently, her head tilted slightly to one side. Sometimes she would laugh out loud at something the funny little man had said. If I should venture out from behind the sofa, the funny little man would first stand up, then kneel down and just wait to see if I would approach as he crouched down at my eye level. I sometimes walked over to him to pat him on the head. This seemed to please the funny little man and he would smile his clown smile at me until I giggled. Sometimes the funny little man would still be there when my father returned home from work. The funny little man would rise to his feet and shake my father’s hand very seriously. Often he would present my father with a book. His voice would change when my father was there and he would be hesitant when he spoke. My parents would invite him to stay and eat with us and we would all huddle around the same little desk used by both my father and my mother, or we would just give up and balance plates on our laps. Sometimes the funny little man would stay late. He and my father would sit outside drinking wine and talking long into the night. I could hear them speaking outside my bedroom window. The ghosts seemed happy with them. I don’t know what happened to the funny little man but at some stage he stopped visiting. I think he may have travelled to Brazil in search of the ayahuaska plant, a natural hallucinogenic – I’m not sure. As I grew older though I started to dip into the many books that the funny little man had brought over the years and which stocked the shelves behind the sofa. I owe a great debt of gratitude to the funny little man, whose life still seems so unexplained. Children swam naked in the old quarry when I was very young. Then, after a few years, they were swimming in swimsuits. A girl drowned in the quarry when I was 12. She was the first ghost there. She was not sad though – as one might expect from her life being cut short – she was a happy ghost. Sometimes I thought I saw her, swimming effortlessly beneath the still waters of the quarry. From that time on the quarry took on an even more magical feel. There were other drownings to follow and after a time, no-one swam there any more. Wire fences and warning signs went up. But I went on swimming there, always nude, and knowing that I swam with ghosts. Eventually though the quarry was sold off and its magical pool filled in. Another person who visited the house was Stephanie. Stephanie was an architect – I was later to learn. She often brought drawings of houses beautifully drawn by hand and hold them up for my parents to inspect. My parents seemed to be very fond of Stephanie and her designs. Stephanie herself was the most charming person one is ever likely to meet. She always smiled from her happy face framed in long blonde hair and it seemed she was unrelentingly positive. I think it was Stephanie who made me decide to pursue a career in architecture myself. Another person who visited was Francesca. She had a shock of unruly black hair and dark skin. Francesca played guitar with a great deal of passion. She would stand as she played and her hips would be swaying and thrusting in time to the music. My parents would both applaud her enthusiastically. Another musician visited – her name was Crystal. She played guitar more quietly. Her voice had a faraway hypnotic feel to it, as if it came from another world. Her songs seemed to speak of a world that could only be dreamt, but when she sang you could believe for a time that those worlds were possible. When it came time to choose a future for myself I simply sent off a set of drawings and a letter to the nearest school of architecture. I had no formal qualifications so no idea of my chances of success. I was accepted onto the course without condition. From there on though it was a struggle. I had settled on neo-classical architecture right from the start. But the school, like all schools of the time, was hoping for modernism, then latterly for post-modernism. I just scraped through. I worked for others for a while but soon set up on my own. When computers became the norm I resisted. I continued to draw everything by hand right up to my retirement. My parents died young, in quick succession – both just passing away quietly in their sleep. I had by that time moved into a place of my own. But when they died I inherited the house and moved back in. It was only after my father’s death that it was revealed what he had been doing all those nights writing at his desk. Hidden away in the house was a folder full of numerous letters – all written to politicians on a variety of issues and all filed away with various replies, notes and press cuttings. A lifetime of quiet and courteous diplomacy that he had remained silent about all his life. And then there were illustrated books, written by my mother, and which I had never seen. Each book was dedicated to Stephanie, Francesca, Crystal and Crispin. Crispin of course was the funny little man. Back in the house I left everything exactly as it was. For several months my parents’ ghosts seemed to be present in a more definite way than the ghosts from the jail. Then, within the space of a few days, their presence faded, as if they had joined the other ghosts. The years pass and I become an old man. I sit each day at the little desk my parents had used. I make ink drawings, with old-fashioned ink and dip pens. Figures, always figures, and always trying to express the wonder and ecstasy of being alive. The mystery of it all – a puzzle that never needs to be solved. Houses gradually encroached to the back of my parents’ house and the traffic to the front grew ever busier. The world had changed. Storms were frequent and crops were now raised under endless plastic greenhouses that stretched across the surrounding countryside. A new neighbour decided to demolish the remains of the old prison house that backed onto the rear garden. One day all the old stones were dumped into a skip out in the lane. I was too old by then, but I managed to go out and rescue a few stones and bring them to my garden before the skip was taken away – as much as my tired hands could carry. The ghosts stayed, thank goodness and the ghost of the dead girl from the quarry, plus some others, have come to join them. Well, of course, I am dead now myself and have joined the ghosts. We sheltered for a time rather miserably amidst the little pile of stones in the garden. It is difficult to speak of time passing, but eventually we decided it was time to move on. A new house was being built, just where the old quarry had been filled in, beside the bend in the river and next to the little hill. The couple building the house gathered up stone from all around. It was the perfect move for us, and we shelter within the walls of a new home, built with love and care. The folk who built the house were surprised at first, to find us living with them. But they have learnt to love us and we bless them in any way we can. I rest in peace.