GLORIA'S ORCHESTRA

I’ve had another afternoon at Stanstead Abbots. It was for the last of the annual Christian Aid walks, being also the 50th one.

They have decided that the walkers nowadays are fewer than the people needed to do all the marshalling.

In fact this year we had a particularly good number of more established age walkers coming through.

It was rather more fun this year picking what to wear, having freedom due to the rather better weather forecast.

I was really flattered when, as so often happens, they invite me for a portrait, often with their friends.

To make it simpler for the organisers they used the same walk route as last year so all that we marshals had to do was go back to where we were, but this time I moved to being close by the church and pointed the walkers to go around the corner to find the hall with the refreshments. Richard and Kathleen were in high spirits.

Peter Ruffles also came to see us again at the same place as last year, which was a great pleasure. He helped me this time to take a picture of our church magazine, perhaps for the Christmas competition.

Fran Spence from the URC church at Hertford, who were running the check point in the Hall, brought out tea together with not just one but two biscuits!

She was greatly chuffed to get a copy of my booklet ‘Gloria’s Letters’ knowing how very few copies have been printed, but then of course she is actually in the book itself from when she blew up Christian Aid balloons for me last year. Peter Ruffles received his copy likewise, although not in his case for blowing up balloons.

Believe it or not, within half an hour of the printer, Peter, delivering the completed ‘Gloria’s Letters’ to our house we find Gordon walking along Hoddesdon High Street in his pyjamas and carpet slippers !

He got his car keys from upstairs to give something from the car to Peter, and when he turned around the front door had shut. He was locked out! The only hope was that he might find his daughter in the town, trusting that she might have a key he could borrow.

Admittedly he also had on his kitchen apron; you have seen the one with the big Union Jack on the front. And the tomato stains.

Does this look like a Genius to you?

Then there was just enough time to get dressed before the third excitement of the morning; going to the monthly church Retired Men’s lunch. It certainly made an unusual story to tell them!

Meanwhile, Dorothy Blatcher was working on another way to make money for charity. She hit on the idea of giving a Mexican Evening, with the extra speciality which she reckoned would fetch them rolling in ...Food.

She even lent me a hat, so I felt quite excited by it all.

As an honoured guest I actually arrived during a funeral on the previous day, and then spent the night sitting in the lift. Interestingly, the only other user of the lift was a young mother (note young) with a push chair and lively child.

All the old folk, and there were plenty at the funeral, all chose to try to manage to negotiate the staircase carefully rather than admit defeat.

But moving on to the Mexican Evening, the guests came straight in to find our dear and respected Nigel in suitable dress adeptly producing quesadillas on a portable stove right there and then.

After some going back to eat seconds, and even thirds, they assembled replete to sit and be led through Dorothy’s pictures taken on a trip around the Yucatan peninsula.

In case you are wondering where Yucatan is, to the south of America we find that the Gulf of Mexico is enclosed between the peninsula of Florida (north) and the peninsula of Yucatan (south).

Dorothy was clearly blessed by fortune. She said that if she had realised that she would have to give a talk she would have taken more pictures. A good time was had by all.

Beyond all these fascinations, I have been catching up on my domestic responsibilities.

The little pink elephant has been looking a bit pale recently, so it made a comforting session to look through Nan’s Rules with him.

Elephants have long memories, so it will be interesting to see if he still remembers Nan’s Rules when he gets bigger.

In case you didn’t know, this colourful little chap is called Skip because that is where he was heading towards when rescued.

Now to change the subject.

For the past four or five years I have been contemplating calling the girls together again to make the promised singing group discussed in Letter Three. Remember we planned to be different from all the others by performing singing sitting down.

Then there was talk of lending me a white violin. This depended on when the owner could find it in his house. Now if I had a white violin somewhere in the house I am sure I could at least manage to stumble across it in the last five years, even by mistake. But still it gave me the idea of turning orchestral.

Firstly there is the Grand piano. The squeeze box came from a Garden Fete in Seaton Delaval. We can borrow Ben’s Tom-Tom drums from the church. The orange guitar was in a recent church sale, while the bamboo pipe was made long ago by a lady music teacher in York.

Start the music and I think we make a pretty good orchestra. In addition, do you know any other musical organisation who freely gives so much backstage information about the source and history of their instruments?

All we want now is to get in touch with a good agent. Tell us.

With lots of love, from Gloria.

Ends