Family Life

"Felicity in family matters is as rare as hen's teeth,"

I once read.

I tend to think of myself as the keeper

 of the family happiness,

but is that a thankless task,

or even possible?

I am like the self-appointed shepherd

of a small, ornery flock

who only want

 to be left alone

to go their own way.

My idea of a blissful family day is a pub lunch,

all of us together, 

followed by a long walk afterwards.

Only rarely is this wish indulged,

because one person doesn't like to eat out

and the other doesn't like to walk

and the third wants to listen to a radio programme

instead.

Let's go to Combe Gibbet, I said.

High upon Combe Down

is a long chalk pathway

with incredible views

of Berkshire and Hampshire,

and maybe even Oxfordshire.

I remember reading about Combe

in  A Genius in the Family.

In her memoir about

the intense love and rivalry between sisters

Hilary du Pré says

that her famous sister, Jacqueline

described Combe as "the top of the world."

Jacqueline du Pré took her husband

Daniel Barenboim

up to the Combe Gibbet.

She loved it; he loathed it.

It is a wild, beautiful place

but a little haunted.

This is a two-person gibbet, apparently.

George Broomham and Dorothy Newman

were hung in this place in 1676.

For crimes against family: adultery, which led to murder.

I wonder if the sky looked as ominous

on that day.

The day was full of clouds and intense, muted sunlight.

Against this backdrop,

even the haystacks look a bit menacing,

and lonely, too.

And yet, unexpectedly,

the sun will sweep across

the landscape.

Family life is like that, too.

 Here we go

over the stiles,

one after another.

Sometimes with a helping hand,

sometimes entirely alone.

These oak trees have endured

who knows what.

They seem to have grown together.

I think that can happen in marriage, too

if you are fortunate.

If there is anything that makes me happier

than seeing my children happy, together

I can't think what it might be.