Twenty Before Twenty by Vivien Teasdale

 If you look online, there are loads of ‘things you should do before … such as the National Trust’s list for children under eleven and three-quarters. All very laudable, like getting to know a tree, camping, play conkers (with due regard to Health & Safety), play Pooh sticks and skim stones (loved doing that, before and after the above age).

Adults are also given instructions. Lists of twenty things you are expected to do before reaching the old age of twenty, and so on up the decades – thirty items before age thirty, fifty before your half century.

The problem is that the older you get, the more things you have to do and that does not suit my notion of growing old gracefully. I prefer the ‘three score years and ten’ version. Instead of matching the items to years, work backwards:

70 things to do before you’re 10

60 things to do before you’re 20

50 things to do before you’re 30

and so on until you get to

10 things to do before you’re 70

This is much more achievable and more efficient, matching the number of activities to the likely energy levels and keeping the kids quiet by finding them seventy things which will take up their time and stamina, without impinging too much on whatever activities you prefer. Make them learn ice skating, while you sit on the sidelines and knit/read/text as you choose. Transcendental meditation might be a good one: keep them quiet while you both chill out.

For the following decade, well, they have the challenge of GCSE and A levels, but why not add learning to clean the bath properly, standing on one leg while cleaning their teeth and repaying loans on time and in full before taking out another one from the bank of Mum and Dad.

Next come the challenges of the middle years with buying a house, starting a family and promotions at work. But what about that trip in a helicopter you always promised yourself? Have you ever tried donating blood, gone to a music festival, been to live theatre, gone on a retreat, eaten candyfloss or Pontefract cakes? Do something really mad like going down a zip wire, take a llama for a walk, jump in a puddle and/or make mud pies. Finish the year with a Moulin Rouge party – women in tuxedos, men in skimpy dresses doing the can-can.

By the time you’ve got through the years doing all sorts of strange and wonderful things which will, no doubt, have appeared on the decade’s list, (and on social media, if you are not careful), you’ll be so exhausted that the last ten before seventy can cheerfully encompass toasting marshmallows before the fire (if fires have not been banned by then), riding a steam train, admiring the night sky, feeding the ducks and, most importantly, seeing the sun come up.

And after seventy? That list is simple. Wake up. Do whatever you feel like doing, no matter what others tell you is more appropriate.

Headliners by Dave Rigby

 

‘Bonjour,’ says Beret, to a passing stranger,

As he flaneurs along the Seine embankment,

Happy to have no itinerary

Just to follow his nose

And see what turns up.

A bright orange beret, nothing dull, for him,

Worn at such a jaunty angle

You’d swear it would slip off.

But even as the breeze blows off Pont Neuf,

Beret stays in position, defying gravity, cocking a snook.

***

Baseball Cap, worn backwards, the essence of cool,

Or maybe not!

On her way to a gig,

She stares through the tube window into the darkness of the tunnel,

The brightness of the stations,

Counting down the stops,

Her barely moving fingers running through the keyboard riffs

Of their new number.

Jazz funk the music world calls it,

But she dislikes genres and refuses to be pigeonholed.

At Covent Garden, she rises to the surface,

Tall, erect, composed, shades on, Baseball Cap minutely adjusted,

And glides towards the venue,

Knowing her trusty roadies will have everything ready

And her unreliable bandmates will suddenly focus,

When she strides onto stage, snaps finger and thumb,

Hovers over the keyboard

And plays that intro.

***

Bobble Hat, in colourful stripes is pulled down tight over ears,

The easterly cold and cutting,

The sleet undecided as to whether to veer up to snow,

Or down to rain.

Should she raise the hood of her waterproof,

As further protection against the elements?

No, she decides,

As that would hide the evidence of her grandma’s permanently clicking needles.

She climbs further up the steep slope,

Passing hard-bitten sheep who continue to eat, ignoring her presence.

At the top she’s greeted by sudden shafts of sunlight, breaking through black clouds.

For just for an instant, she’s in another world, before the shafts close,

The snowflakes sting her eyes and Bobble Hat begins to turn white.

She gazes out over the valley she can no longer see

And thinks about her mother,

At rest.

***

Flat Cap tries to keep up with greyhound,

As it dashes across the recreation ground after yet another

Imaginary rabbit.

Flat Cap still hasn’t got used to magic-extending-dog-leads and the idea

That dog owner should be the one in control.

A treat does the trick.

Man and dog stand watching the local eleven as they traverse the heavy pitch,

Trying desperately to score their first in weeks.

Their shouts echo across towards the decaying bulk of the Green Dragon,

A dim light in the lounge bar window, a curl of smoke

Emerging from a chimney in need of a rebuild and drifting down towards

A solitary, flickering street light.

Flat Cap is raised, head scratched, Cap lowered. Hands are clapped together,

Not to celebrate anything as unusual as a goal, but simply to keep warm.

Within five minutes and thirty seconds, the greyhound has seen enough of the game

And drags Flat Cap away from the pitch and into the Dragon.

The logs are putting on a red-glow show and in the sudden warmth,

Flat Cap is removed, a pint glass is lifted and a bowl of water is lapped.

***

The soft felt of the Fedora sits comfortably on the retired bank manager’s head.

The brim provides much-needed shade. The retiree instinctively runs his hand

Over the Fedora’s lengthwise crease and gives it the slightest of pinches.

He stretches out in the warm sun, not reading the book placed face-down

On the glass-topped table by his side.

Instead, Fedora reads the dappled light on the slow incoming waves,

Stories from other islands, far out across the bay,

Unoccupied, unsullied, un-touristed,

No inappropriate noise.

Fedora stirs, rises from the sun-lounger

And walks slowly across to the harbour master’s office.

He’s expecting a delivery, a parcel.

Come back in a couple of hours, he’d been told.

The clerk hands him the parcel.

The Fedora is raised slightly in thanks.

Outside, clattering over cobbles in a donkey-cart,

He removes the wrapping and checks the contents.

The drugs are there.

Another month’s medication.

Another month of life.

***

She wonders about the collective noun for Fascinators.

A fascination perhaps?

Her own displays feathers, not real ones, though they do look real,

Dried flowers, dried berries and beads which sparkle as the sun sets.

The whole creation, is attached to her hair with a mother-of-pearl clip,

Which has its own sparkling qualities.

It’s an evening of celebration. Her 60^th birthday.

But she stands by herself on the veranda, at peace,

Unwilling to rejoin the throng inside and the chattering, drinking

And dancing to tunes she’s heard too many times before.

She feels like walking away.

And suddenly she is.

Along the lake shore, pleased with her comfortable, un-fascinating shoes,

Past the beached rowing boats

And the now-closed knick-knack stalls.

She buys herself a hot dog.

The vendor compliments her on the Fascinator.

She spills tomato sauce on her dress,

But is not bothered in the slightest.

Sometime soon she’ll have to turn and amble back to the party.

But not just yet.