Big Bertha
A lot of things began in the summer of '75. Having just bought a dusty old Victorian house whose vast emptiness echoed my every thought, Elvis and I were staked out in the once elegant parlour on an old mattress with a camping stove and a whistly radio, adjusting to the reality of this life-change commitment. I started on a list, whilst Elvis, my Portobello stray, popped out to check on the country mouse situation. We were going to need a lot of paint first, and then some hasty furniture.
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Victoria Hall was a grand old dame of a space that hosted the multiple needs of a now increasingly diverse community. I had recently attended a joyous hoe-down there when the new colourful incomers had flowed in from the surrounding hills with kids and dogs (even a goat), to stomp and float to the Pied Piper songs of urban refugee musicians.
My next attendance was on a crisp Thursday morning, when the Victoria Hall had recovered her customary dignity, this time to the monotonous rhythm of the auctioneers rap, and the firm definitive thump of his gavel. All along the walls stood a host of forlorn furniture wallflowers: stripped of their former polish and domestic eminence, their proud owners departed, these homeless homely spectres of times past waited to be chosen. I happily ogled this Tutankhamun haul of grand and twiddly Victorian and Edwardian debris that had once provided the backdrop to a local elite of a lost age. A dusty forest of crafted pine and oak, beech and mahogany, a calamity of fine china, clouding mirrors that had seen more than they could ever divulge, and more than a dash of ivory - all the once illustrious accessories now deemed hefty and impractical. Raised in a bland utilitarian post war era, I was hungry for bygone twiddle and frippery, and couldn’t wait to raise an aspidistra.
So there was I, a conspicuous lone and leggy seventies wench in the midst of a predominantly male mid-Wales institution. Coveting much of what I saw, I learned fast to play down my enthusiasm. But once in the swing of it all, I successfully raised a be-jangled hand time and again for elaborate old wardrobes, chests and dressing tables at 50 pence a go, tables and chairs, lamps, mirrors, rugs, and boxes of random bric-a-brac. Still hard-pressed to reach my £30 budget, I finally splashed a hefty seven quid on a lofty but shabbily painted bedstead, on the hunch of it having a good proportion of brass. As the gavel fell, a deep voice muttered into my hair " Way too much, babe. You could have had a whole ounce of good Moroccan for that." My reply, as I turned to the tall dark and attractive voice was " yeah, maybe, but I somehow think the bed will last a lot longer."
Given that my spoils now way exceeded the capacity of my trusty mini moke parked outside, I accepted the offer of transportation from my new financial advisor and his rusty truck. As the bed was being loaded, I scraped at its hideous green paintwork with a key, revealing a flash of shiny brass. The Man grudgingly acknowledged that maybe I wasn't such a mug. And so began perhaps my most enduring intimate relationship ...
My new home readily identified with all the twiddly swag, though still echoing for more. Most of the adoptees responded well to a stroke of polish and a dose of woodworm killer, but the bed was looking ill at ease, so my weekend priority was to re-dignify her. I stripped her bare, polished her proud knobs, painted her iron frame pink, and named her the good ship Bertha. Soon she bore a new mattress, a sumptuous flounder of quilts and pillows, and Elvis and I set sail for new horizons.
For over forty years aboard her tall and sturdy frame I have sailed a thousand oceans of sleep and trawled their depths for my dreams. My lofty nest, my quilted sanctuary - she has stoically carried me and my burdens, my hopes and my fears, in sickness and in health. I have shared her with cold feet and warm, with lovers and leavers, (though never, lest you wonder, with The Man), with my baby son, with many cats since Elvis, a host of orphaned creatures, and a thousand books. Here I have fallen and arisen well over 15,000 times. Here, maybe, I shall stray into the realms of my final dream.
But Bertha, did I ever contemplate your previous existence? No, never. Only now, as I acknowledge your significance, as I caress the brass cornerpost that I must lean on whenever I rise, do I realise that you carried others for far longer than me. Once upon a Victorian time, you were a virgin craft. What tales and what secrets you must have borne; life and birth and death without doubt; crisp cotton nightgowns; feathers and fleas; blushes and sighs; farts and splutters; sickness and fevers of days gone by; tears and giggles; cold backs and harsh silences; sweet nothings and bitter truths; and God-fearing prayers ... all this I must and do deny and ignore, but priceless Bertha, I dearly hope I sleep with the ghosts of a host of purring cats ...