Never move to the countryside. Just. Don’t. Do. It. Remember when I moved from London to Somerset? The abuse? The gunshots? The ostracisation? I vividly remember unlocking my BMW (which I soon wrote off driving through flood water) and noticing broken eggs all over the soft top. Oh my god! My chickens have been doing pilates! Then I spotted the shells had lion stamps on them. Ah. I was not well liked. Rural communities mistrust women who don’t have a husband, children, wear an apron or murder animals.
And so, in my new village, I’ve tried to join in with the ‘community’. I answered an ad in the parish magazine and offered my services in running a film club. The nearest cinema to me is in Darlington and it’s not great. There’s an Everyman in Harrogate but it’s expensive and an hour’s drive away. But, hooray, I was accepted as a committee member.
The first meeting was in the local pub. I objected to the choice of the initial three films to be shown in the village hall as ‘titles we’ve all seen many times’. I was overruled. Undaunted, I offered to write pass notes on each of the upcoming selections. To blow my own trumpet, for many years I edited reviews for the renowned film critic Dilys Powell; her ancient typewriter was missing several characters, so I often had to guess. I suggested double bills: Cary Grant comedies, say, or an afternoon of the Marx Brothers. Nope. The Lady In The Van it is.
Given most people in my village are older, I asked about subtitles. Even with my new hearing aids, I still cannot make out dialogue. I’ve just received this: ‘We trialled the sound in the hall, and it can go very loud! We had three people with hearing support, and they opted for no subtitles for an English film. The sound-equipment quality is very good. We also had several individuals commenting they find subtitles distracting…’
Volume makes no difference to the deaf. All cinemas are loud. We cannot hear consonants. We want to relax, not struggle. I told her she was being patronising: I know my diagnosis and volume is not the issue. Subtitles are distracting? Try having no clue what’s going on!
It’s strange, isn’t it, that since I left London all I have encountered is conflict and hardship. Take the acorns – a bumper crop this year, poisonous to horses – in my (rented) paddocks. I kept telling Nic I’m too valuable to spend days picking them up, knelt on a bin bag (I was reminded of my one trip to Glastonbury, when I spent the entire festival stood on a bin bag), that we should hire a migrant or an unemployed school leaver or heavy machinery to suck them up. But no one wanted the job and the machine didn’t work, so when I went down to inspect, there were still carpets of the small brown b*****ds.
So, I’ve spent the last three days pulling up acorns that have sprouted into the mud, ruining my nails and my mood. Even Alice the spaniel, who is hyper and never tires, a real water baby, started to share my bin bag, shivering, brown eyes pleading to go home.
When a friend told me three years ago she was moving, newly single, to Somerset, I kept sending her emails, begging her to reconsider, that it would be a mistake.
The Pig near Bath and Babington House might be within striking distance, but she will never be able to afford to eat in either. Being female and single in very rural countryside is completely different to moving there in a couple, or as a family.
Now I hear she is selling up, and moving with her dog, a chocolate labrador, back to London, though she quite enjoyed not having to brush her hair. I’m sorely tempted to send her a message: ‘I did warn you…’ If only I could follow suit.
