Trouble at home
Jeremy Clarke
0 n Christmas Day I was still limping from the battering I'd received at our last karate training session of 2001. Traditionally the staff at the old people's home where I live have the day off, and I have to work, and I limped about the place at the double. It's light work — carrying trays mostly. But with the two residents to look after, and the entire family over for the day, plus the halt, the lame and the blind from the village, I was on the go constantly. Also, being a sort of Sebastian Flyte-type figure when at home, I was permitted no alcohol to sustain me.
The two residents, Miss Busby (103) and Uncle Jack (91), stayed in their rooms until lunchtime, watching the new wide-screen, surround-sound television sets that Santa had brought them. Miss Busby was so enamoured of hers that she was happy to watch it without it being turned on, Uncle Jack. on the other hand, had insuperable difficulties with his new remote control. When I took him in his mid-morning coffee, I found him jabbing the wrong end of it agitatedly towards the set and using vocabulary that he must have learnt when he was in the army. As neither of these expedients were having the slightest effect on sound or picture, my offer of assistance was welcomed. 'What's happened to your leg?' he shouted as I limped out again. `Mai-geri, mawashi-geri, empi, Uncle,' I said. `Ahr he said.
Actually I was expecting more fisticuffs later in the day, when the family assembled for lunch. Ours is rarely together, and when it is there are normally unresolved tensions simmering just beneath the surface. This year, for example, as well as bringing her husband for the day, my sister was also bringing the gasman, with whom she is having a passionate love affair. Rumour had it that there was no animosity at all between husband and gasman. On the contrary, it was said that husband and gasman had even been going on long bucolic cycle rides together. However, my brother and his wife were said to disapprove very much. Not of the adulterous relationship itself, perhaps, so much as the public exhibition of it at Christmas. Trouble was on the cards.
Lunch passed off relatively peacefully, however. Uncle Jack was chivvied out of his room like an old stoat and forced to sit at the head of the table. His pre-lunch gin had made him very red in the face, with a tendency to belligerence. 'Someone's birthday?' he said, observing that the ceiling was festooned with streamers, When I went upstairs to fetch Miss Busby down, she was so engrossed in her new television set (still turned off), that she took some persuading at first. Then she said she'd come — as long as she wasn't going to be considered a nuisance.
I helped her out of her chair, handed her her stick, and we set off. As progress was so very slow though (several minutes even to reach the door), and wavering, we agreed to dispense with niceties and I slung her over my shoulder and carried her down. And that is how a 44-year-old man with a limp and a 103-year-old lady draped over his shoulder suddenly appeared in the dining room as grace was being said. Miss Busby occupied the last remaining place at the table, so I ate my Christmas dinner in the kitchen with the dogs.
After lunch, came the distribution of the Christmas presents from under the tree. Noticing in previous years the smaller children ripping open their presents without bothering to take note of whom they are from, this year I gave a couple of the more spoiled ones an anonymous, prettily wrapped, half a house-brick each. I received a packet of designer socks — though I must admit that Jeff Banks is not a sock designer I've ever heard of — and a dictionary of rude words.
The Queen's speech caused more than the usual confusion when I switched it on. Some complained it was too loud, others that they couldn't hear it. Uncle Jack said he preferred her singing. My sister said we shouldn't have a queen at all. Jealous of all the attention being lavished on Her Majesty, one of the more spoiled children went and stood right in front of the set and steadfastly refused to move until he was smacked. A combination of Her Majesty, my sister's comment, and the smacking had upped the tension slightly I felt.
About four I limped into the sittingroom with a tray of teas and found that, at last, hostilities had broken out. I don't know what had been said, or by whom, but everyone was standing up and putting their coats on, hurriedly, before words turned into violence. Even Uncle Jack was staggering about hunting for his jacket. 'Where do you think you're going?' I said to Uncle Jack. 'Mind your own bloody business,' he said.
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