Easter Reverie

As a scholarship boy I had
responsibility for the younger boarders

On Easter Sunday morning, on a quest for ginger, garlic and matches, I walk up Oakridge Road, on its sunny side. The reality all around me is more than I can take in: so many details! Everything has a meaning, but how can I unravel it? When I say “meaning” I probably mean “impact”. Little things discarded in the gutter – broken glass, torn paper and so on; the faint sparkle when the sun shines on a well-worn granite kerb; the shadowy interior of a workshop whose door bears the owner’s name “Khan”. A young African woman of impossible beauty* approaches, in an embroidered Afghan coat. She’s looking to the left with amused glances but I see nothing there. How is it possible to live a normal life with such beauty? A young black man passes from a different direction and doesn’t even notice. I wonder if I see things that others don’t. Though I have always felt like an outsider, I’m closer now to being ordinary than ever I’ve been. How can the beauty in the world be earned or possessed? It’s priceless yet over-abundant, defying the elementary laws of economics.

My reverie is broken by a “Sold” sign outside a house, one that I was interested in a few months ago. It reminds me that I need a proper place to live. All at once my vision of priceless beauty evaporates, like dew-diamonds on a lawn in the sunshine. Survival-anxieties change our mood, but this is the human condition, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Why can’t I go on as a wayfarer on the margins? Certainly, whatever I do, this earth will support me till I die. Am I like other people or not? I can never decide. Of course we are all unique, so the question is a little stupid. I never feel that I am in charge of my destiny, though I strive. I can be very determined in doing what I know how. For all my effort, I remain a leaf blowing in the wind: fragile, dependent on Fortune. I see blessings in my life, things which arrive when needed as if a guardian angel is always in attendance ready to reassure me with gestures and more substantial gifts. Perhaps I don’t trust enough, perhaps I trust too much. How can I know? Today I don’t seem to know anything.

The other day, when the daughter of my headmaster brought me that battered case full of school photos, I discovered I am the same person as fifty years ago: still on the edge of things. In a boarding school, I had my allotted place. But the wider world came later as a great shock.

My footsteps take me to the Church of St Mary & St George, its dome of verdigris a landmark in these parts. It’s 10am on Easter Day. Maybe I can slip in to attend a service, anonymous amongst an enlarged congregation. The door is open and I hesitate in the porch. A woman is speaking, punctuated by occasional polite laughter. No, I cannot intrude upon an in-group. The Christian Church may open its arms to all, but not to me now.

—————–

On Good Friday, I’d gone into town to buy a bread-bin and came across an informal procession, with marshals in yellow vests alongside. I dared not join, but kept up with them on the other side of the road. I want to be part of my community, to participate in its age-old rituals, but on my own terms. We reached the gate of All Saints Parish Church, next to the market square. The procession arranged itself into an expectant open-air audience. I asked my neighbour what it was about. She was very pleased to be asked and explained that after leaving church services of different denominations, the congregations had merged. A bearded vicar with a microphone now started to speak. A man in Salvation Army uniform held the loudspeaker. A boy stood facing us on the raised lawn with his arms outstretched. Around his neck was a label proclaiming “The King of the Jews”. It twisted in the wind uncontrollably. Further out on either side were a man and a woman also with arms outstretched in a crucifixion pose. The vicar spoke of Golgotha, the place of skulls, and I did not want to listen more. We know of enough horrors in the world already. These ordinary sensible English people, the kind to whom you would happily lend your lawnmower, were eager to rehearse an old story of pain, humiliation and alleged triumph. I found it repellent. The woman gave me a card which accused the world of not understanding the reason for Easter. I did not want to be with these people any more. Putting the card in my pocket, I slipped away.

In the market square, a corpulent Pakistani in white robes sat peacefully on a public bench, with his two restless grandchildren climbing over it and teasing one another. Shoppers bustled past. Market traders called out their wares. This was the real community. Yet I still prefer to stay on the edge.

* In matters of beauty, it behoves us to be unashamed racists, so that natural selection isn’t entirely perverted. To me, Black is Beautiful, per se. Such is Nature, let us not betray her.