Two and Thirty Years Ago Today

Thirty-two years ago today I first cast eyes on Sarah as she strolled home northward on a brilliantly sunny October day in London. The spot where we walked toward each other and spoke was just around the corner from the photographic studio I ran in a previous decade. It now no longer existed.

It sometimes happens that a man and a woman meet and instantly recognise the other half of themselves behind the eyes of each other. Such a meeting occurred between Sarah and I. From the first moment we met and gazed upon each other, our spirits rushed together joyfully, ignoring convention and custom, driven by an inner knowing ― too overwhelming to be denied. It is more than coincidence that, out of the whole world, we should be drawn together at the appointed time. Through each other we found wholeness. How empty were our lives until that October day when we met.

On Passion Sunday, April 1987, whilst staying at her parents’ rambling Wiltshire home, I asked Sarah to marry me. She accepted and the following week, on her birthday, I presented her with a solitaire engagement ring. Four months later we were married in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, at 11.15am. Sarah arrived in a vintage 1930s Roche-Talbot. She made a beautiful bride. On the last evening together as single people we had walked in the moonlight at twilight in a wooded area close to her parents’ house. Bats suddenly filled the darkening sky, some swooping to touch us as we stopped to look at them. It was somehow fitting, symbolic of a last brush with a world we had both encountered. Exactly one year later, on 8 August 1988, our dear and good friend, Father Charles Owen, blessed our union at the Marian altar of St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church on Highgate Hill, Highgate, London.

St Joseph's, Highgate, 8.8.1988.

Longleat, Wiltshire.

Longleat, Witshire.

Chalice Well, Glastonbury.

The Abbey, Glastonbury.

Hampstead Heath, London.

Hampstead Heath, London.

South Hertfordshire.

South Hertfordshire.

Christchurch, Dorset.

Sarah with a friend in the sea where we reside.

Sarah in the garden at our Dorsetshire home.

Together where we have lived for a quarter of a century.

27th Anniversary of Elevation to the Episcopate

Holy Guardian Angels

My mother introduced me to St Teresa of Avila and, later on, to St Thérèse of Lisieux. Her death on the day following the feast of the latter was the most difficult moment of my life. Her last breath came at twenty minutes past five o’clock on the feast of the Holy Guardian Angels 1992. All I can remember is my father’s distant voice proclaiming: “She’s gone.” Two little words that were of themselves devastating ― yet I knew in my heart she had not gone at all, but had passed into the Lord’s safekeeping where she would be for eternity. Like her favourite saints, my mother remained as fragrant as flowers in death, resisting decomposition until the last; even when I replaced the lid on her coffin in the stone chapel for the very last time. She became the “first person I would anoint and on whose behalf I would recite the prayers for the newly dead, since receiving the mitre.” [The Grail Church, Holy Grail, 1995, page 102.] My mother’s funeral was also the first I would conduct in my episcopal office. It was held at Islington and St Pancras Cemetery on the feast day of St Teresa of Avila, one of the two saints my mother was most close to; the other being St Thérèse of Lisieux. I also conducted a funeral service in the same cemetery chapel some eight years later for my father.

This year my mother would have celebrated one hundred years had she lived, and I am now the same age when she fell asleep and departed this earthly realm twenty-six years ago. Requiescat in pace †

†

Do not stand at my grave and weep;

I am not there. I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am the diamond glints on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain,

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning’s hush,

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry;

I am not there, I did not die.

(Mary Frye)

Greetings, Gifts & Garlic

One of the more unusual gifts, and no less welcome for that, received was this remarkable vintage French horn that has been converted into a lamp. It now takes pride of place in our front reception room. Sarah was also responsible for the acquisition of two extremely valuable and very rare books.

I was also fortunate to receive a most excellent print of this very early self-portrait by Alan Bennett whose dry wit, humour and observation is legendary. I find this self-portrait curiously appealing.

Upon reflection, it must have been somewhat prior to 1955 when I was in Skegness as a young child.

Arthur went to the trouble of making me a birthday card on which he painted a scene in watercolours.

The Birthday Party

Should there be any puzzlement why invitations did not go out this year for one of my birthday parties over the next few days, I shall venture to lend clarity concisely and without a hint of prevarication.

This month, indeed in a couple of days' time, I will reach the same age as that of my beloved mother when, sadly, she entered the Lord's safekeeping twelve months after my elevation to the episcopate.

The awareness of this has weighed upon my mind for some time, sufficient to persuade me to bring the July party tradition to a close. I shall still be holding a formal birthday dinner on the day itself, but only in the company of ghosts choosing to attend and, of course, my wife. It will remain, as often it was in the past, a white tie occasion. This stipulation on invitations has not always been observed, but I very much appreciate the few who made valiant attempts to be, at least, what they consider to be dressed for dinner. Such things, as most of you realise, matter to me, but I recognise that with the new century came a downside, and that includes the dumbing-down of just about everything, including etiquette. Moreover, I very much appreciate how uncomfortably hot July can be. This year is certainly no exception with temperatures veering in the general direction of 30° and even beyond.

That notwithstanding, the real reason there is no birthday celebration with friends is the one given.

This does not affect other anniversaries. Needless to say, all friends and acquaintances are still welcome during the Christmas period; indeed from Gaudete Sunday in Advent through to Epiphany.

Official Birthday Portrait (taken on the day itself).