Our Kid

Family..the we of me (Carson McCullers)

Our Kid, Andrew Patrick Corrigan, came to stay with us this week. He complained that he hasn't been included in a posting ever despite being a regular reader of the blog. This posting is,therefore, some compensation for that fact and a determination to add him to future postings so he continues to read them.

Our Kid is two years my younger and as head of the dwindling Corrigan family I have my work cut out at times remembering that fact. He had intended to come down to the Kitten's wedding (see Alice's Adventure in Blogland link) but when that fell through, he came down anyway. The girls all like Uncle Andrew because he is a gentleman and because he loves them. He can be blunt in speech but this tends to disguise a sensitive and empathetic nature. He is also very intuitive and yet thinks situations through carefully. This is not a paradox - he trusts his gut reaction and works out the reasoning behind such a reaction.

I lean on him heavily to remind me of some of the values, especially where family is concerned, that I have lost sight of or have allowed to be buried under layers of "sophistication", "culture" or "civilisation".

We certainly needed his strength, both of character and physical, this last week. MuleBoy and Kitten have parted and this week saw the ending of their tenancy of the house they shared for the last two or three years. This aspect has been as messy as the breakdown in relationship has been overall. Generally Kitten has been very down and any attempt at clarification has been misinterpreted as pressure. Yet I hate working in a vacuum and not knowing the details - I am a control freak in lots of ways - if I can't play in my way, I will take my ball home and not play at all. Trying to find out what was going on has been difficult - not because of any deliberate obfuscation - but poor communication and poor organisation. Suffice it to say, we ended up hiring a transit van for 24 hours and for about 48 hours our front drive and garage looked like the set for the Steptoe and Son yard. We cleared beds, settees, furniture, gadgets and personal belongings galore from the house. Our Kid was a tower of strength in this and moved a number of heavy items himself. I am much fitter than I was in heart and lungs but lifting heavy objects is still not on my list of recommended activities. Without Our Kid we could not have done what we did in the time we did it. Once we got the stuff back home, we had to organise charity collections of unwanted large items, storage of wanted large items and disposal of rubbish at the tip. On another occasion, I must write about the sheer busyness of the local tip and its lack of real organisation. Besides his physical strength, Our Kid was also an inspirational leader and organiser. When emotion was getting in the way of work, he chivvied us up and along.

Kitten is established in her own room surrounded by her own furniture and possessions. She doesn't want to be back with her parents but as I said last Saturday, "I may have lost money but I have gained a daughter." She has almost cleared herself of financial commitment to the house and is in negotiation with the landlord on that point. She has expert help available if she needs it.

She is looking forward to her American adventure in two weeks time. And we to our Spanish adventure in three weeks time - a visit to La Tasco, a tapas bar, in Gunwharf, was a rehearsal for our stay in Seville.

Our Kid, meanwhile, has flown back to Bradford from Southampton airport. He did manage to leave behind a pair of jeans, which we will now have to post on to him. We, Best Beloved and I, are hoping to spend time with him in November or December. Hopefully we can persuade him to spend Christmas with us if his work schedule will permit.

The next couple of postings are 1975 and As You Like It. They deal with periods of history of the Bench Theatre and are intended to be published in the Benchpress newsletter under the "Notes from the Green Room" column.