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Authors: Suzanne Bugler
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the stark graveyard chill of the silent, black night outside, when we were so snug, so cosy within.
That first year, we had a whole stream of guests; at Christmas, at Easter and all through the long summer holidays.
‘Come up,’ I’d say on the phone to my friends back in London, and to family. ‘You must come and stay.’
I bought in extra food, and towels and linen in soft cotton checks of yellow and blue. I placed eggs from the farm in a ceramic dish on the side in the kitchen, and arranged apples from our tree
in another. At the front door I lined up our wellies, along with a couple of spare pairs for other people, and I stacked chopped wood in the living room beside the fire. At Christmas I decorated
the house with holly from the garden and twigs that I collected myself and painted red and silver and gold. I planned; I created the dream. It hurts me now, to think of it. I see myself, before
guests arrived, putting out a cake or fresh bread on the table, pouring milk from its supermarket carton into a white, old-fashioned jug. I wanted it all just so. It was imperative that people
should see what a great life we had here. I wanted to send them home again wistful, envious even; such reactions reassured us that we really had done the right thing in moving. David played his
part too. He took the men outside, showed them around. He said how great it was to be out of town every weekend, to wake up to just the sound of the birds, with no planes, no cars driving by. He
even made jokes about catching up on his sleep on the train.
I remember my friend Karen, on the one and only time that she and Ed came to stay with their children, saying, ‘Oh my God, you’re so lucky. It’s just so gorgeous
here.’
We were sitting in the living room with a glass of wine at the time, in front of the fire which I’d lit though we really didn’t need it. The children were still playing outside with
their fathers. We could hear them calling to each other from far out in the fields; the sweet carry of childish laughter.
‘I know,’ I said, and how pleased with myself I felt, back then. How content. ‘I could never go back to London. Not now.’
And when my parents came to stay, and I overheard my mum saying to Sam, ‘Oh aren’t you lucky having all these fields to play in? That’s where a boy should be: outside, running
around,’ it validated what we had done. It made it seem so right. The same when we walked through the woods with David’s sister Nicola and her husband Tom and their kids, with Sam and
Ella leading the way, showing off to their cousins the giant tree with the foxes’ lair burrowed under it, and the little stream gurgling out from under the stones in the bridleway. Then, too,
I felt that everything really was good with our world.
People drift off, though, over time. They find it harder to get away. Not family of course, but friends. People like Karen and Ed; they are now names inside a Christmas card.
We’d made the break: what more could I expect?
The thing about moving your life, as we had done, is that you must move it in its entirety. You cannot look back. You cannot do it in half measures, keeping an open door. It will never work if
you try to do that.
SEVEN
Yet there were times during that first year that I felt myself to be very much on trial. Perhaps it was my imagination, but I was aware of the eyes upon me when I walked
through town to do my shopping or approached the school gates, all those people looking at me, waiting to see me fail. I wonder if it is a peculiarly British thing, that desire to see others fall
flat on their face, but it is there all right; that ‘who do you think you are?’ attitude directed towards anyone who dares to attempt to do something different with their lives, the
hand-rubbing delight when it all goes wrong.
I’m sure no one meant me malice as such. I was more of an object of sport. ‘How are you finding it here?’ people would ask me in a
That first year, we had a whole stream of guests; at Christmas, at Easter and all through the long summer holidays.
‘Come up,’ I’d say on the phone to my friends back in London, and to family. ‘You must come and stay.’
I bought in extra food, and towels and linen in soft cotton checks of yellow and blue. I placed eggs from the farm in a ceramic dish on the side in the kitchen, and arranged apples from our tree
in another. At the front door I lined up our wellies, along with a couple of spare pairs for other people, and I stacked chopped wood in the living room beside the fire. At Christmas I decorated
the house with holly from the garden and twigs that I collected myself and painted red and silver and gold. I planned; I created the dream. It hurts me now, to think of it. I see myself, before
guests arrived, putting out a cake or fresh bread on the table, pouring milk from its supermarket carton into a white, old-fashioned jug. I wanted it all just so. It was imperative that people
should see what a great life we had here. I wanted to send them home again wistful, envious even; such reactions reassured us that we really had done the right thing in moving. David played his
part too. He took the men outside, showed them around. He said how great it was to be out of town every weekend, to wake up to just the sound of the birds, with no planes, no cars driving by. He
even made jokes about catching up on his sleep on the train.
I remember my friend Karen, on the one and only time that she and Ed came to stay with their children, saying, ‘Oh my God, you’re so lucky. It’s just so gorgeous
here.’
We were sitting in the living room with a glass of wine at the time, in front of the fire which I’d lit though we really didn’t need it. The children were still playing outside with
their fathers. We could hear them calling to each other from far out in the fields; the sweet carry of childish laughter.
‘I know,’ I said, and how pleased with myself I felt, back then. How content. ‘I could never go back to London. Not now.’
And when my parents came to stay, and I overheard my mum saying to Sam, ‘Oh aren’t you lucky having all these fields to play in? That’s where a boy should be: outside, running
around,’ it validated what we had done. It made it seem so right. The same when we walked through the woods with David’s sister Nicola and her husband Tom and their kids, with Sam and
Ella leading the way, showing off to their cousins the giant tree with the foxes’ lair burrowed under it, and the little stream gurgling out from under the stones in the bridleway. Then, too,
I felt that everything really was good with our world.
People drift off, though, over time. They find it harder to get away. Not family of course, but friends. People like Karen and Ed; they are now names inside a Christmas card.
We’d made the break: what more could I expect?
The thing about moving your life, as we had done, is that you must move it in its entirety. You cannot look back. You cannot do it in half measures, keeping an open door. It will never work if
you try to do that.
SEVEN
Yet there were times during that first year that I felt myself to be very much on trial. Perhaps it was my imagination, but I was aware of the eyes upon me when I walked
through town to do my shopping or approached the school gates, all those people looking at me, waiting to see me fail. I wonder if it is a peculiarly British thing, that desire to see others fall
flat on their face, but it is there all right; that ‘who do you think you are?’ attitude directed towards anyone who dares to attempt to do something different with their lives, the
hand-rubbing delight when it all goes wrong.
I’m sure no one meant me malice as such. I was more of an object of sport. ‘How are you finding it here?’ people would ask me in a
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