Still, it’s nice to think that I can depend on him, and his tool belt and hot glue gun. And he’s not the only person the gingerbread grotto has fighting its corner. There’s all the toddlers and schoolkids (who’ll adore the display, as always). You can depend on the grotto bringing in the few locals who remember it from their childhoods. Only, with all the second homes and the house prices shooting up there are fewer of them every year, plus they’re not the ones with the deep pockets and the sponsorship money.
Things being tight like they are, big donations dried up a while back, and now… well, now we’re keeping going on our last reserves of Christmas spirits and, frankly, actual spirits. It’s amazing the boost an own-brand Baileys can give you in the face of adversity.
I try not to wince at the sight of the bank cards being swiped down under that fancy awning and instead shake my tin at a gaggle of teenage girls sliding by on their way to the bus stop, each one carrying a big red coffee cup and all looking glacial in school skirts and blazers. Where on earth are their coats… is, uh, something my mother might say.
One girl gives my tin a side-eye glance, and there’s a definite look of distaste on her face like I’m asking her to sniff a litter tray. There’s a few shared smirks, and I hear a pitying, ‘Eww, cringe!’ before they’re gone.
Me? Cringe?I’m the same age as Madonna!I want to shout after them. But they might point out that’s clearly where the similarity ends and I’d wind up swearing at schoolchildren in public.
As I’m left questioning whether they’d actually know who Madonna even is, I look down my body at my silver-grey cords (with added stretch – I’m not tackling the high street at Christmas in anything belted; I’m not a masochist), pull-on Doc Martens (Mum’s called them my ‘clodhoppers’ since I got my first pair at nineteen), and my multiple layers of cotton and M&S merino wool. Greys and classic black, of course. Cosy and practical, and a little bit bobbly with age.
They’re not seeing the real me, though. The old me, wherever she’s buggered off to. I guess this is what’s left of me now. They see a post-menopausal, twice-divorced, retired Home Ec teacher with an unhealthy obsession with spiced cookies, and yes, I’ve let my shoulder-length waves go their natural soft grey, unassaulted by the bleach bottle I was practically bonded to in my youth. These days, I’m not exactly someone those schoolgirls would want to emulate.
They should think themselves lucky they don’t have an increasingly out-of-reach fundraising target, a painful bunion in spite of a lifetime of Doc-wearing, rollercoaster mood swings, or a bashed-about heart to contend with. They’ll know soon enough how quickly time passes, and how broken hearts, like broken bones, are harder to heal the older you get. Not that I’d wish the way I’ve been feeling this year on anyone.
I suppose I do feel a bit ‘cringe’ after all.
I’ve just about had enough of this. Standing outside the school, at risk of losing digits to frostbite, not to mention limbs to parallel parkers, and has it been worth it? My tin’s disappointingly light.
The school bell’s ringing now. I reckon it’s time to crack open the thermos of coffee Izz made for me.
I notice the bin by the school gate is stuffed to overflowing with Starbucks cups from that new branch out on the bypass where, according to Izz, they charge nearly five quid a pop for a soy maple latte with light whip and a dusting of cocoa powder.
If she’s right, then literally everyone who’s passed by me this morning clutching a green paper bag and a red cup like it’s full of life-giving elixir has already blown an hour’s pay in there. No wonder there’s nothing left to spare for us and our little gingerbread venture.
Ugh!Grumbling about Starbucks! As if they give a monkey’s. I’m turning into a sour old bat, and I hate that feeling. Only, it’s hard not to indulge my grumpiness on days like this.
I don’t like admitting it, but lately, I’ve lost that vital, burning, alive feeling I’d always had at my core, the part that made me get up in the morning and meet the day bravely. The best way to describe my emotions nowadays would be ‘flat’. Steamrollered flat.
I’ll pour myself a cup of Izz’s coffee, turn up my collar and tell myself I’ll give it another hour. The shops are opening now, and by shops, I mean Scrimengor’s bakery, Jill’s hair salon, Ted Olsen’s bike repair place, the art gallery, and the newsagents. That’s the entire retail and business offering of Wheaton village these days, not including the pub, and Bizzy Izz’s Cafe, of course, which Izz will be opening up in a few minutes now she’s on the move, waving as she goes to swap her lollipop stick for her oven gloves. I raise my steaming cup to her with a stoic smile.
I’ll hang around long enough to catch the morning dog walkers and the newspaper-and-a-loaf shoppers, then I’m sacking it all off for a hot bath and a depressed scroll through Instagram reels of strangers’ Christmas party charcuterie boards.
Gilet’s crowds have died down too, I notice. He catches me staring and waves a gloved hand while his stall’s sound system blasts out ‘Frosty the Snowman’. A passing car pulls up beside him and he sells yet more tickets through the passenger window. Give me strength!
Half an hour more passes. I’ve begun to lose feeling in my calves, and I’m done. I pack up my home-made sign with my tin under my arm and trudge past the Dunham Gravey guy in shamefaced defeat. He’s busy organising banknotes in a cash box chained to the stall like the ghost of Jacob Marley. The sight of all that money sends me spiralling, wondering why I ever thought this was a good idea in the first place. Nobody outside our committee cares about the future of our gingerbread grotto or the village’s Christmas traditions, and why should they, really?
I’ll have to tell Izz and Patrick that their fundraising faith in me was completely misplaced and there doesn’t seem to be any way of breaking even on our baking ingredients this winter.
Maybe this is the year we accept the inevitable and let Wheaton dwindle away to become just another commuter-belt village with only its pretty scenery going for it. Maybe it’s time to ring in some serious life changes all round.
If I was more like Mum was, back in the day, would things be easier? If I’d managed to hold on to my enthusiasm and tenacity? If I hadn’t lost my community spirit? If I wasn’t secretly planning on getting out of Wheaton?
How can you fundraise with a whole heart when you’ve already got one foot out the door – or one foot on the other side of Wheaton’s thirty-limit signs, in my case. Still, that’s my secret for now. No point telling the gang before there’s something concrete to tell.
I plod on to the edge of the village where the double yellows end and the long road to Cirencester begins. That’s where I take my familiar turning down the lane to my cottage. The mud is solid and ridged underfoot after last night’s frost, the first of many to come this December.
A robin flits across the path in front of me, warbling in warning: a tiny, delicate thing shouting birdy obscenities at me, the giant, disturbing its morning’s singing.
‘Good on you,’ I tell the plucky ball of rage eyeing me furiously from the holly hedge. ‘Give it hell, little guy.’
I used to be like him. Bold, loud, fearless, loved. I mean, everyone loves a robin, don’t they? These days, I’m more like one of those silly pigeons which has flown smack bang into sheet glass and sits, shocked, on the patio, feathers fluffed for protection, wondering why its head hurts.
I reach my gate in the stone wall that hugs my little garden. Here, all summer long, Dad’s roses bloom in the sunshine. In December, the skeleton shrubs and looming evergreens do their best to look jolly, but I can’t help thinking the cottage – with its threadbare thatch and its stone walls the colour of gingerbread – has the look of the house where Hansel and Gretel came a greedy cropper at the hands of the witch, who, incidentally, I am seriously coming to identify with: crotchety, sweet-obsessed, and increasingly isolated. The robin keeps his eyes on me as my phone receives a noisy barrage of notifications just as I’m slipping the key in the lock.
A quick glance at the screen tells me:We have four Birmingham properties matching your search criteria.
I shut the door on my little garden, frosted a sparkling white as though the sugarplum fairy has dusted every leaf with icing sugar. I’m too absorbed in my phone to revel in the beauty of it, scrolling through the properties. A mid-terrace and three little semis, all with nice, manageable-sized gardens, and all in my price range. All situated minutes away from Lucy, my darling niece’s place, as well as being a snowball’s throw from all the exciting stuff a big, bustling city has to offer.
