Yesterday, I do recall implying that we were ready for visitors, everything having been tidied and cleaned to within an inch of its life.
Apparently, when I said that I was mistaken.
Happy with the way things were, and with an hour or two to kill before Marty and Ness arrived with their tiny troupe, I had just surrounded myself with a collection of dismantled stove parts and was happily readying them for reassembly, when from somewhere behind me I heard the distinctive clunk, clunk, thud of someone ineptly manoeuvring her crutches and plaster cast through a doorway barely designed for half a person to fit through.
Apparently, (and she knows a lot about this stuff), a new layer of dust and crumbs and non-shininess had appeared while we slept and needed to be dealt with. Worse, I have been informed that an even newer layer will have arrived tomorrow and we will have to repeat the process again.
This second dusting had barely been completed when our guests, no doubt wary of the menial offerings of sustenance aboard, had arrived with what seemed like a delivery van full special treats to share. Marty settled himself into the galley, with Louie’s expert help, while Leo was content to bounce from lap to lap or to climb steps and windows and generally be unsuccessful at finding one speck of dust to wipe on his Sunday best. All the while the others played a kind of musical chairs albeit with one of us permanently seated in the same spot, propped into place and anchored by her cast. All of this mayhem and the wonderful meal that followed, played to the accompaniment of that sort of frantic conversation conducted by people who have been apart too long and have too little time to catch up on everything, but they do their best anyway.
As soon as they had arrived, it seemed they were gone, leaving the boat not feeling hollow and empty as sometimes happens after a crowd departs, but filled with happy memories and unfinished conversation, glowing in the way the ashes of a fire do when they are poked one more time before bed.
Enough of this, there’s dusting to do.
1 comment
Tell Jo to take her glasses off. It’s much more relaxing that way. Dust and even cobwebs remain blissfully out of sight. Apart from that, I’m so pleased you all had a glorious time!
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