The Times They Are A ‘Changing

Being a teenager in the 1980s was fun, but a bit scary too. On the one hand, there was lots of great music to listen to in your bedroom while experimenting with luridly coloured eyeshadow. On the other, a B-movie actor was in the White House and the threat of nuclear war permeated our waking dreams. Back then, the satire practically wrote itself. “Spitting Image” was a must-see for all self-respecting teenagers, and Ronald Reagan made frequent appearances. “Gaddafi? Gaddafi Duck?” was one of his sayings, and “The President’s Brain Is Missing” was a regular feature on the show. Mrs Thatcher and her cabinet of cowering yes-men, the Royal Family as we’d never seen them before and the Davids (Owen and Steel) kept me chortling week after week. No surprise then that the show is back, with a whole new cast of characters, including the POTUS.

In the interests of full disclosure, I need to warn you that this week, my blog is political. I could have written about anything, I suppose, but the events across the pond have been so jaw-dropping that I feel I can’t leave them alone. Fortunately, we live in a democracy, so if any of you, valued readers, disagree with me, that is your right.

I’ve tried to understand the American political system several times over the years, but I have now given up and that’s official. Swing states, electoral college vote, primaries, caucuses – you what? Over here, you go to your local polling station and put a cross in the box of your choice. That’s it. Four years ago, when the American people spoke and elected the 45th President of the United States, I was a little surprised, to put it mildly. His term of office has been marked by divisive, revisionist, racist, misogynistic, protectionist and isolationist policies. Plus, tweets. Oh, so, so many tweets.

And yet, in spite of four years of frankly unbelievable behaviour, still we didn’t know who was going to win the election. Last week, driving across Mid Suffolk in the dark to pick up my son and listening to Radio 4, the reactions to the news that Biden might be in and Trump out were remarkable.

Let’s pause there for a second. When I was thinking about this blog (and as you can see from the time of posting, I’ve done a lot of thinking), the book which popped into my mind and wouldn’t go away was, “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.” Why? Because of the scenes where the winter with no Christmas imposed upon Narnia by the White Witch starts to come to an end. The children, accompanied by Mr and Mrs Beaver, are walking through Narnia when they start to notice the thaw.

“They walked on in silence drinking it all in, passing through patches of warm sunlight into cool, green thickets and out again into wide, mossy glades where tall elms raised the leafy roof far overhead, and then into dense masses of flowering currant and among hawthorn bushes where the sweet smell was almost overpowering.”

Lewis’s writing takes some beating, and the scenes where the Narnians start to realise that their long winter is over and dare to express their joy at freedom are powerful indeed. I’m aware that it was a close thing. Slightly over half of the American people voted for Mr Biden, and slightly under half for Mr Trump. Listening to the news, I heard the BBC reporter speaking about the impromptu celebrations all over New York. In the background, I could hear car horns beeping and people cheering. A few of them were interviewed. They sounded like Narnians to me, freed from a long winter.

Of course, they were all Democrats or at least not Trump supporters. There were plenty of people who weren’t nearly so happy, the major one being the President himself. As I write, he still hasn’t conceded defeat or congratulated the President Elect. This is a first in American history. The satirists must be rubbing their hands in glee.

My favourite tweet from the President read thus. “We won. By a lot.”

Just five words which summed up the last four years for me pretty successfully.

We don’t know what the future holds. But I have hope, for the first time in a while, that divisions will decrease, agreements will be reached and walls will come tumbling down.

I’ll finish with a little more CS Lewis. This is Giant Rumblebuffin knocking down the gates of the White Witch’s castle with his club.

“The gates creaked at the first blow, cracked at the second, and shivered at the third. Then he tackled the towers on each side of them and after a few minutes of crashing and thudding both the towers and a good bit of the wall on each side went thundering down in a mass of hopeless rubble; and when the dust cleared it was odd, standing in that dry, grim, stony yard, to see through the gap all the grass and waving trees and sparkling streams of the forest, and the blue hills beyond that and beyond them the sky.”

That’s how it feels to me. The dust needs to settle and there’s a lot of rubble to clear away. But for the first time in four years, I can see beyond to the blue hills and the sky.

Images from the original imprint of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in February 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.

 

It's a numbers game

Welcome back, devoted readers. Some weeks, this blog is serious, others not. Usually, though, there’s an underlying theme, perhaps something I’ve learned and want to share with you, some inspiration or encouragement.

Not this week. It’s all about the giggles, I fear. No philosophising or musing.

A little while ago, I drove up to the pretty village of Gislingham, near the Suffolk/Norfolk border to visit my dear friend Di and her husband who have recently moved there from Essex (hooray!) We had a fabulous time, as we always do. One of the highlights for me, oddly, was the very lovely liquid soap and hand cream Di had recently purchased from a well-known chain of supermarkets with German origins. I am a bit funny about smells. Fruit’s generally a no (grapefruit being the exception), anything heavy or syrupy gets the old heave-ho and in fact, it’s quite hard to please me on the fragrance front. However, this particular product had me washing and moisturising my hands not once, but twice, and sniffing them appreciatively afterwards.

The label on the side of the bottle was fairly uncompromising. “No. 1. Lime, Basil & Mandarin” it read, in bold black letters. Making a mental note to snap some up from my own local branch as soon as humanly possible, reluctantly I bade farewell to my friends and drove home, smelling my hands every time I stopped at a traffic light or T-junction. A bit weird, I know. But then, as I think we’ve all worked out by now, I am. 

On the way back from gymnastics in Ipswich on a Thursday night, it has become my practice to nip into the said German supermarket with my daughter to pick up a few bits. Pots of custard and jelly for lunch boxes, oddly flavoured crisps, stuff from that weird middle aisle they have there. On this occasion, I was on the hunt for some Number.1. I looked in the obvious places, but naturally it wasn’t there. Eventually, nestled between two strange bedfellows (toilet cleaner and scuba diving equipment, let’s say), I discovered the range. I let out a cry of excitement, but then discovered that my particular branch of the well-known supermarket had decided to dispense with liquid soap and moisturiser in favour of candles and those fancy-schmancy scented reeds you put in the loo when people are coming round. 

I’m a philosophical kind of girl, so I contented myself with sniffing the candles and making appreciative, “mmm” noises. I filled my basket with candles and reeds (because at these prices, who wouldn’t?) As I did so, I noticed a second fragrance, calling itself No.3. Pomegranate. I checked it out but rejected it as being unsuitable. And that was that. 

My life was made immeasurably better by having the candles dotted around the house. They look really posh and expensive, but in fact come in at under £4. In half term, I met up with my lovely cousin for a muddy walk around a field and a picnic in the back of the van. As the children were chatting, I shared the exciting news about my candle find. She too is a devoted fan of this particular German supermarket. We amused ourselves by imagining how funny it would be if the manufacturers filled in the gap between No.1 and No.3 with – well, a No.2. What fragrance would that be, we mused, between loud and unladylike snorts of laughter. We agreed that no-one in their right mind would market a range of scented homeware with No.2 written on the side in big black letters. It would be like poor old Robert Wagner in Austen Powers 2. No-one wants to be Number Two.

Imagine my surprise, therefore, dear readers, when I paid a visit on Tuesday and found that they had indeed marketed a No.2 range of fragrances. Once I’d finished laughing, I took pictures to prove my point. I sniffed the No.2 (as it very much were) and it wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting. I didn’t buy it though. Can you imagine the hilarious misunderstandings that would ensue?

“Has anyone seen my No.2?”

“Who left that No.2 on the floor?”

“What is that lovely fragrance in the loo? Oh, hang on …..” 

And that’s it for this week. I’m writing this on the last day before lockdown in England. We don’t know how long it will last or how we’ll cope. I suppose the reason I wrote this today is to make you laugh. I hope it did. We need to read silly things sometimes, and today of all days, with all the goings-on over the pond and the spectre of Covid-19 dogging our footsteps, a jolly good chortle about a shelf covered in No.2s is just what the doctor ordered.

Stay safe.

Images by Pixabay and me

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in March 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.

Creaky joints and naughty dogs

Should you be wandering past the Station House in Campsea Ashe on a Tuesday morning (non-Suffolk readers, unless you’re making a pilgrimage, this is unlikely to be you), you’ll see four or five ladies of mature years lying on mats finding their neutral pelvises and drawing chalk circles in the air. One of those ladies is me. Now you know.

Back in my early thirties, living in Essex and working in London, I attended a twice-weekly Pilates class run by an amazing woman called Melissa. She was full of beans, mixing up standard Pilates technique with lots of pair work, stretching and floor exercises. When I joined, I wasn’t particularly limber, but by the time I’d been with her for a few months, I could touch my toes without bending my knees (still can, in fact) and do all kinds of stretchy things. I even taught the class once or twice when she was ill. Dear me, the elasticity of youth!

Melissa’s class had almost mystical powers. I was employed at the Department of Psychology at UCL back then, and worked closely with all the Masters and PhD students. One day, one of them sank into the chair in my office, eyes closed and sighed, heavily. “I don’t know how I’m going to get through the day,” she complained. “I overdid it a bit last night.” I recommended the class – sure enough, after an hour of stretching, extending and bending she was as good as new.

I left the Department in 1998 and did another Pilates class somewhere else, taught by a woman called Melissa. A pattern was emerging. Fast forward to 2020 and I noticed a post on Facebook from a lady advertising her Pilates classes. This particular form of exercise had always worked for me and I got in touch and joined up. Sure enough, the instructor’s name was Melissa. I don’t know if there is some kind of rule that Pilates classes can only be taught by people bearing this name, or if Melissas naturally gravitate to this kind of work. We may never know.

 Anyway, back to Campsea Ashe on a Tuesday morning. Melissa Three is fantastic. This week, she had us doing something called the Mermaid. I could do it on one side, but not the other. Last week, we lay on our backs rolling our heads around on a semi-deflated ball. Gosh, it felt good. There was much sighing and creaking. For some reason, the right side of my body is not nearly as agile as the left. I have no idea why this might be.

Last week, we celebrated my father’s 95^th birthday on the Monday. We had a large Indian takeaway, including a particularly delectable dish of tarka dhal. One of Melissa’s exercises, about three quarters through the class, involves assuming the four-point position then alternating the naughty dog and the cat. I was a little concerned about the lentils. I won’t lie to you. I confided my worry to my friend Barbara at the beginning of the lesson and there were explosions. But only of laughter. As we pushed our navels up towards our spines then went down into the aforesaid naughty dog, I kept my eyes firmly fixed on my mat. Barbara and I are notorious for outbursts of helpless laughter at inappropriate moments. 

Fortunately, all was well. I managed to end on a series of shoulder rolls and spine stretching without anything untoward shattering the calm.

I’m not the greatest at self-care, but I’ve got a lot better since lock down. My weekly Pilates class is an oasis of calm in a busy week, with a bit of creaking and grunting but lots of laughing too. I love doing it in a building which has been refurbished and restored by a community group and is now being run by them too. It doesn’t hurt that they do the best hot chocolate for miles around – a delightful end to all those naughty dogs, mermaids, neutral pelvises and shoulder rolls.

Note to self – don’t have curry on a Monday night.

Images by Unsplash and Pixabay

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in March 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.

 

Frolicking with the gardener

I don’t want to shock you, but I feel we know each other well enough for me to be  honest with you.

Since lock down began, I’ve been seeing other men.

It all started in April. Things were weird, the sun was out and I was facing a year of many challenges. So, when a rather handsome gardener appeared and started building a polytunnel on our veg patch, I found myself spending a lot of time with him. I took him over cups of coffee as he dug the foundations, offered him lunch as he hammered the base together and then invited him home for dinner once he had it all done. One thing led to another, as it will do.

This fine young man then turned his attentions to our back garden and started doing lots of little jobs we’d been meaning to get around to for years. He fixed the old pew and turned it into a herb garden. He built a pond out of an old boat. There seemed to be no end to his talents. Thanks to him, the family were enjoying a bumper crop of fruit and veg and a weed-free and well-ordered veg patch. Two manky old beds at the back of the house filled with aggressive and pointless spiky plants were transformed into beautiful flower borders.

Next, a handyman appeared. He too got going on any number of little jobs around the house and garden which my husband and I had had on the to do list for years. I offered him cups of tea and lunch and we even went out together a few times.

As autumn approached, the gardener cut down on his days and we got in a plumber, and a painter and decorator. They repainted the kitchen and changed everything around so that it made sense (it never has). Shamefaced, I showed them our downstairs bathroom, which has been in dire need of a jolly good makeover for many years. Nothing daunted, they ripped the whole lot out, repainted, put in a new loo and basin and even bought new towels and little candles to make it look really posh. Going to the toilet now is an absolute delight. Every time I exit the bathroom, I think of our plumber and it gives me a warm glow.

This is not my bathroom. It is an image I found on Pixabay. 

You’re probably wondering how my husband felt about all this. Fine, is the answer. Absolutely fine.

Since March, we’ve all started taking on new roles. My husband and I were planning to spend most of the year being caterers, but that is over for the foreseeable future. A friend of mine was running a thriving beauty business, but stymied by restrictions, she began her own little gardening company which is going very well. I started the year as a freelance writer and will end it as a novelist with a publishing deal.

One of our favourite films is, “The Madness of King George.” In it, there’s a great scene where the Duke of York (Julian Rhind-Tutt) tells his brother (Rupert Everett) that he’s just found out he’s the Bishop of Osnabruck. “Remarkable what one is, really,” he muses.

And so it is. Quite remarkable. We all have hidden talents, unplumbed depths, unconscious abilities. Sometimes, it takes a life-changing situation to bring them all to the surface.

This year has brought fear, uncertainty, apprehension and worry into all our lives. Some of us have had to make sweeping changes and most of us are living a new normal. Life has given us lemons, but we can use them to make a new and exciting kind of lemonade (if you’ll excuse the torturous metaphor). 

Tonight, I’ve invited the gardener, the handyman, the plumber and the painter and decorator over for dinner. But it’s OK. We’re not breaking the Rule of Six. There will be five of us, as there are every evening. Six, if you count the kitten.

What’s your new normal?

Images by Pixabay. I know I already said that, but it probably bears repeating.

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in March 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.

I Never Thought I'd See the Day

 

This week, I’ve found myself doing things that surprised me. Aged 54, living a relatively comfortable life, it would be easy to get into a rut. Get up, make packed lunches, herd children into car, drop off at school, buy bananas and stuff from Melton Produce on the way home (I don’t know what my parents do with them, but I can’t keep up with demand), load the dishwasher, put on a wash, get down to work. That’s pretty much how every day looks and that’s fine. Work these days involves all kinds of thrilling things. This week, I conducted one interview with a 22-year old Christian mission worker in Manchester, drafted my Christmas blog for More Than Writers, wrote up a piece on writer and stand-up Paul Kerensa, conducted a lifestyle interview on a beautiful Cambridge house and started editing my novel, The Diary of Isabella M Smugge.

Interesting stuff.

But it is not that of which I speak. Anyone who knows me knows I am not really an animal person. My philosophy has always been to keep animals who benefit the household in some way. Our chickens and quail lay eggs for us and in return enjoy a happy life being fed, watered and given plenty of space in which to amble. Dogs are a no-no due to all the time and attention they need. I just haven’t got that time and it wouldn’t be fair to have one. Mr Leigh is mildly allergic to cats and I am terrified of them, so we’ve always set our faces against the suggestions from the children that a cute little kitten might be a nice addition to the family.

As I told you back in June (https://bigwordsandmadeupstories.blogspot.com/2020/06/its-been-quiet-week-in-lake-wobegon.html), we adopted a kitten aged three weeks very much to our surprise (and, presumably, hers). Now a cheerful little thing aged around five months, she has somehow managed to get us all wrapped around her velvety little paws. She has not one but two beds, bought by my besotted husband and daughter to keep her warm at night. “You put the base in the microwave and it heats up,” they told me, returning from a trip to a well-known pet store not a million miles from here. “She’ll love it.” She doesn’t. It’s been completely ignored until we discovered the other day that if we put it in front of the Rayburn when it’s lit, she’ll curl up in it and go to sleep.

A kitten scratching post set provided entertainment until she got too big to squeeze through the furry tube. A crackly mat is also largely ignored. What she does love, more than anything, is Nerf gun bullets. She will play with them for hours and the house is littered with them. Also scraps of paper and random pieces of fluff. Just like young children, if you buy her a toy, she’ll play with the box. There’s a life lesson for us all there.

A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I were in the kitchen having a conversation that I would never have thought possible.

Him: “Have you thought about what we should get Misty for Christmas?”

Me: “We should get her a little stocking, don’t you think? How about some antlers?”

Him: “Definitely a stocking and maybe some cat treats. I’ll have a look in that well-known pet store not a million miles from here.”

Me: “How about we get her one of those big scratching posts for her main present?” 

At this point, we broke off and uttered the phrase that has become a daily occurrence.

“I never thought I’d see the day…..”

There will be some people reading this who are spluttering into their coffee at this point. Lynette, Cathy, Steph, you have known me long enough to find this kind of kitten-based chat hilarious. It gets worse.

 Yesterday, Misty paid a visit to the vet to be spayed. She returned home in good spirits with the instruction that we should put a protective cone over her head so she didn’t scratch herself. We all tried. We did. In ones, in twos, in threes. We ended up scratched and traumatised. When we did manage to get it on to her, she wrenched it off. I found myself ringing the vet and asking if they could suggest anything else. “We can give you a kitten vest if you like. It’s a bit like a Babygro.”

And so, we returned from the vet with a kitten clad in a rather natty navy-blue suit. Which she ripped off after an hour and refuses to wear.

At some point in the next few weeks, I will be looking at a kitten Christmas stocking bought by the aforesaid husband and daughter, and instead of screeching, “Have you lost your MINDS?” I will be smiling benevolently and working out what to put in it. And whether to wrap it.

Ah yes, life. It has a habit of sneaking up on you in the most unlikely ways. I never thought I’d see the day.

Images by Pixabay and Unsplash.

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in March 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.

23.06 and all's well

For the first time since I started Big Words and Made Up Stories, I gave myself a day off last week. Sorry about that. I’ve been inundated with phone calls, texts, WhatsApps and hand-written notes shoved through the door pleading with me to fill in that missing week.[1]

I did have a very good reason. My first ever novel, the Diary of Isabella M Smugge, is being published by Instant Apostle next March. I started writing it just after 10.30 in the morning on 7^th May and my deadline was 30^th September. I took a fairly relaxed attitude throughout the sunny months of lock down. Some days, I’d write nearly a whole chapter, others, I’d allow my ideas to marinate before the next burst of activity. It was fun, making someone up. My heroine is a snob, quite selfish, looks down her nose at people and has little if no self-awareness. She and her family (banker husband, three children, Latvian au pair) have just moved from London to Suffolk, and she thinks that everyone will be delighted to see her. However, her perfect life is about to unravel.

Writing her story, I found that she’d had a pretty grim childhood, lots of abandonment issues and was a child of divorce. One of my favourite sayings is, “Everyone’s got a story” and Isabella certainly does. It was fun to write it, albeit a bit weird. Who was this woman? How come I was suddenly making up hashtags and writing authoritatively about Instagram? I found myself trawling through Pinterest for annoying quotes (I found plenty).

Along the way, I made up a whole cast of supporting characters. For some reason, I really enjoyed writing the horrible ones. I suppose because my entire writing career has been about interviewing people who are good, generous, philanthropic and compassionate, I never get to talk to the villains. Ex-cons, yes. Unreconstructed bad folk, no. So, it was fun to create a hideous agent called Mimi Stanhope, married four times, smokes like a chimney and is rumoured to sleep in a banana leaf coffin. She drinks coffee constantly, has blood-red nails and her third husband ran off with a traffic warden. She’s a great agent but not a very nice person.

Isabella’s mother is also a bit of a moo. We don’t find out about her background until the end of the novel and it goes some way towards explaining why she’s been such a hands-off mother. I wrote a fight scene which erupted over some value sausage rolls. Someone microwaved a Girls’ World head. I made up some imaginary bloggers.

As I may have mentioned on a number of occasions, all I’ve ever wanted to do is write. And now I am and it feels amazing. Writing fiction is a new departure for me, however, and I’m surprised how exhausting it can be. You wouldn’t think that tapping away on a laptop while sipping tea and gazing out of the window would be that onerous. But you’re going to have to take my word for it. It is.

Last Wednesday I should have written my blog. I spent the entire day writing the final chapter and sent it off to the publisher at 23.06 pm. I was drained, a limp rag, worn to a frazzle. I thought to myself, “Ruth, will the world stop spinning if you don’t write your blog tonight?” I decided it wouldn’t and fell into an exhausted slumber.

So, now, we’re at the editing stage. This is about as much fun as cutting your own toenails with a blunt pair of shears, but it must be done. I suspect that chocolate will help a lot. Also tea. The fun bits, like talking to the publisher about the cover design and writing the blurb are yet to come. 

Isabella and her world have become very real to me. I don’t want to leave her, so I have already written the first page of the sequel. The last four and a half months have been wonderful, a chance to do what I always dreamed of doing, creating a world and peopling it with characters. You could say I’ve come full circle since I created this blog. The novel has quite a few big words and it’s one giant made up story. I like it and I hope you will.

If you want to pre-order a signed copy, please let me know via Instagram or Twitter (ruththewriter1), in the comments on this blog or in any other way you can think of. Only another six months and my self-centred aspirational blogger will be launched upon the world. #livingmybestlife.

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[1] I haven’t. This is all made up.

We've Got Crabs

 

One of the cardinal rules of blogging is to get and keep your readers’ attention with an attention-grabbing headline. Hence my title this week. Welcome.

 

Autumn is the busy season for the jelly, chutney and preserve makers amongst us. Out comes the River Cottage Book of Preserves by Pam the Jam and a strange and arcane selection of equipment. Maslin pans. Ladles. Spouts and funnels. Muslin. Any jelly maker worth their salt will be off foraging for free hedgerow ingredients.

My favourite jelly is crab apple. It's incredibly easy to make. You pick crab apples and give them a bit of a wash under the tap. You put them in a pan with some water and stew them for a bit. Then you strain the pulp through muslin. In the morning, you’ve got a pan full of syrup which you boil vigorously with sugar. The resulting jelly is a charming pale pink and goes incredibly well with cheese.  

Wild apple trees are often covered with shiny, glossy fruit which simply cries out to be picked. Blackberry bushes are bejewelled with their little black treasures. Crab apples are small, scabby, misshapen and gnarled. They don’t exactly fill you with confidence.

 

I haven’t been able to find any crab apples since we moved to Suffolk. I appealed on Facebook in August and got three replies. (Thanks Carolyn, Nicola and Pat). Earlier this week, on one of the last days of summer, Mr Leigh and myself went down to our neighbour’s farm armed with a tub and some cardboard boxes. It was a beautiful day. The sun glanced coyly through thick growing trees, casting dappled shade on the ground. As we followed Carolyn to the site of the crab apples, bouncing along on the rutted track, we seemed to be leaving the 21^st century behind and meandering back into a quieter, kinder time. Carolyn left us to it and we stood gazing at the branches of the intertwined trees loaded with fruit.

 

For an hour or so, we picked crab apples while birds sang. It was idyllic. The peace and quiet was only punctuated by helicopters flying low overhead (we live near an Army base) and muffled cries of pain as we stung ourselves on nettles and caught ourselves on brambles.

 

I couldn’t tell you how many pounds we picked. Enough to make crab apple jelly to feed an army, for sure. Driving slowly back as the sun slid languorously down in the sky and the shadows lengthened, I gazed out of the car window at the gentle inclines of rich red Suffolk soil and thought about how something which looks completely unprepossessing can be so filled with goodness.

You can’t eat crab apples raw unless you want to take the roof of your mouth off. They’re sour and inedible. They’re not going to win any beauty contests. Once you soften them up and add sugar, however, they’re transformed into a shimmering rose-coloured jelly.

 

Sixteen years ago, I was fairly unprepossessing myself. If you’d told me that I’d be living in this beautiful place with all of Nature’s bounty on my doorstep, I’d have laughed in your face. I needed to be softened up and sweetened a bit.

 

So, now I’ve got crabs and by the end of the week, I should have plenty more. I’m in my element, taking something which doesn’t look that nice and transforming it into something beautiful. Jelly making is a mixture of alchemy, chemistry and a sprinkling of magic. It’s good for the soul and pretty beneficial to the larder too. 

Images by Pixabay

Ruth is a freelance writer and novelist. She is married with three children, one husband, four budgies, six quail, eight chickens and a kitten. Her first novel, “The Diary of Isabella M Smugge”, published by Instant Apostle, comes out in March 2021. She writes for a number of small businesses and charities and blogs at Big Words and Made Up Stories. Ruth is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at ruththewriter1.