Balance

If there is a beginning, then there has to be an end,

that’s logic says the learned man, with a slight nod of his head;

yet that annoying statement leaves too much to be desired

and so throughout the age of man more speculation’s been applied

to the penetrating question of what life is all about.

*

“We’re here today and gone tomorrow,” says the easy-going chap

“My granddad reckons that is so, ’cause he’d been told it when a lad.”

“There ain’t no more to life, so might just as well live it up!”

“No! No!” cries the local vicar, in a pulpit higher than the pews.

“From where I stand I’ll have you know there’s a very different view

there’s the theological question of what life is all about!”

*

Now if I’d had the patience, and been assured by what he’d said,

I’d most likely have agreed with him, as I lay back thinking on my bed;

fact is, I couldn’t stand the way he reckoned he knew best:

confess and get things off my chest, and follow what he said on

the religious set of questions on what life is all about.

*

The world is getting smaller, day by day I know it’s so

for mass communication presents so much more for me to know;

there’s religions, creeds and churches, some good and some that stink

and most that tell me what to do, and just a few that make me think

about the spiritual question of what life is all about.

*

I dreamed last night I’d floated to the space high above the earth

where my view was clear, unimpeded by the happenings below;

there was balance, there was beauty, a harmony of colour and of form

no sign of any discord from the hostilities I’d known, caused by

the all-embracing question of what life is all about.

*

Awaking the next morning, feeling fresh and full of life

I resolved that I’d tell no-one of the things I’d dreamed about;

that I’d simply get on with my life, while life was mine to hold

believing that eventually these things would all work out.

That’s what I think, anyway….is what life is all about.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1995

My lone search

It was a cold December day when I walked from the bus stop towards the church where my mother and father were married. St. Nicholas’s church was about five minutes’ walk from the bus stop and I had to walk briskly to keep warm. I’d made the journey from New Zealand back to England in search of my family history, particularly about my mother who had died when I was a baby, and who I had never known.

It took me some time to find the vicar who was on his way out of the vicarage to visit a parishioner. He was very helpful however, as he opened up two safes and left me to it. The Banns, Marriages and Death Registers kept me busy for some time as I was really keen to find my mother’s signature in the Marriage register. Seeing it, I thought, would help to give me a clearer image of the mother I never knew.

I found it, and I treasured the opportunity to see it. It was more than enough to see that, and to have walked up the path and into the church, down the aisle to the front, where I imagined my Mum and Dad holding hands, and gazing into each other’s eyes. They would have been hearing the words I heard then in my head:

“Whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder”

…and no man did. Instead, death came and took her away, and separated them forever.

It was years later before I quietly asked my father when were alone one day: ‘Dad, what was my mother really like?’

I’d asked him a couple of times before but he could get no further than saying wistfully, and with emotion, ‘She was a lovely, warm-hearted woman, Den; we were soul-mates…’ and he could get no further as his eyes filled up…

I stopped asking after that, as I could see that it distressed him so. But it distressed me too for I longed to know more of the mother who had loved me; the mother I never knew. That day in December though I’d gained a little more for my mind’s picture. I’d been in that church, seen their signatures together, stood where they stood, and some years later I was able to get a copy of their Marriage Certificate.

As I left the church, the vicarage was closed and I had nowhere to leave the keys entrusted me by the vicar. I would loved for him to have been there to chat with me about the history that linked me to his church. I walked back across the main road to a school, which was probably the church school and found two or three people in the staffroom. After introducing myself, I gave them the keys and then because I was so very cold I requested a cup of coffee. They were very happy to oblige, offered me a seat and some biscuits too, and were keen to ask me about New Zealand and hear about the reason for my journey.

It was almost 1.30 p.m. as I left to walk back to the bus stop. The grey skies and the penetrating cold, combined with the fact that I was on my own made it easier to leave. St Nicholas Church records, otherwise I may have stayed there forever, connected slightly to my mother.

And I offer my thanks to the vicar for the willingness to assist me and to entrust his valuable records and keys to me. He had helped me in the search for my own identity, for which I am most grateful.

Dennis Crompton © 1998
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Ben Nuttall was dead

Ben Nuttall was dead. The evidence was there on the headstone—born 7 April 1949, died 24 August 1997. That was all. No mention of kith or kin. No chiselled verse of Scripture and no display of even imitation flowers. Ben Nuttall, had apparently been born, lived the kind of existence that registered as nothing and then died. Can you believe that? I can’t. Everyone makes an imprint; leaves something of themselves behind. Don’t they?

It was the tune on the radio that got me thinking about him again. Tunes can do that, trigger something that’s happened in the past when you’re least expecting it. I reckon it’s because we humans live on several planes. I trip along the emotional, intellectual and physical, and several between, quite a bit; it makes life interesting, as when the tune somehow brought the name Ben Nuttall to the surface for me to ponder again. I especially like that when it does, as if the on the first time I’d not really experienced all that was possible back then.

Now there’s no way I’d consider myself an intellectual and I know I’m easily bowled over when it comes to the emotional. I can weep when an animal dies during a TV programme, even though often it’s not really dead, only acting a part. I’d told my daughters many times during their formative years that the ‘soppy stuff’ on TV was not real. I stopped doing that when they made faces and pretended to snore. Nor do I consider myself religious, though I’ve often sung in a church choir; played snooker with the vicar regularly on Friday nights, ending with pie and peas from his wife, who I believe enjoyed the time I spent at the snooker table with her hubby as it gave him a break from his normal churchy activity. Our relaxed and happy evenings ended when their daughter became ill for many weeks, the gap wearing off my churchiness as I began to rub shoulders on a broader field during my growing teenage years.

Yet some might say that I was at that evening service by divine prompting, an evening that arrived with a cold misty rain which almost changed my mind about going; but I made the effort and was pleasantly surprised to find the interior of the church warmer and more welcoming than I’d expected. I have an inbuilt aversion to welcomes from some religious folks, especially those whose smile is over-sweet or indicate their strong desire to hug. Maybe my aversion showed, as no one approached me thus as I entered and took my seat.

Before the student from a theological college gave the address I examined him closely, and a touch of prejudice made me dislike him before he even started. Amongst other things he looked too serious to my jaundiced eye, but he didn’t lack conviction. You can tell when someone’s convinced of what they are saying; you listen because they make you want to, and this student had conviction. He told us that after morning lectures some months back he and another friend had gone over to help a chap (yes, Ben Nuttall) who was struggling to get to his feet outside the college. He was drunk, his clothes were filthy and he smelt repulsive as they picked him up and took him to where he lived just around the corner. As they opened his door nothing could have prepared them for the nauseating stench that met them and forced them back in disgust…

After talking with his social worker, they learned that he’d joined a tramping club as a young man and things were going well until one member of the club became too friendly, despite his engagement to his sweetheart Susan. Ben was advised to ignore the other woman, but she persisted and placed him in compromising situations. Despite his explanations, it became more difficult for the woman to accept what was happening. The last time she’d seen Susan and Ben together she’d rushed off angry and very upset and Ben had followed her on his push-bike, and that’s when the accident happened. It was in the days before wearing bicycle helmets became compulsory. Someone opened a car door as he was passing, he fell heavily to the ground resulting in severe injuries to his head and back, which left him with amnesia robbing him of most of his memory for over two years.

He never did fully recover, the social worker explained, and on the advice of the medical people who cared for him, they got rid of the pullover he was wearing at the time, and his bicycle, which triggered the worst of his relapses. But he couldn’t forget Susan. He became a vagrant wandering from place to place…and at that point, the young preacher then launched into the religious part of his sermon, while my thoughts took off down a side track.

I’ll say this about the student’s address; I’ve never forgotten his description of Ben’s room, nor the sadness registered on his face as he said, ‘Ben belonged to a family; was somebody’s son, brother, friend and was engaged to his lover, Susan.’ And whenever I hear that tune that was on the radio it triggers my memory of the sad story of Ben Nuttall, and I imagine how I’d feel if Ben had belonged in my family.

Dennis Crompton © 1998
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)