Taunted in Taunton

          I remember once watching a young lad performing cartwheels. He was standing, talking with a family group, yet he was so full of beans that every minute, it seemed, he would cartwheel on the spot then return to the conversation as if nothing unusual had happened. Such restlessness, I thought, such energy and fitness – qualities that I can lay some claim to as well, though much diminished over time and never in such abundance that they were ever manifest in gymnastics.

          Still, what remains of these attributes was called upon this week when I volunteered to lend practical assistance in the case of an aunt-in-law, who is old, disabled and becoming quite confused. My task was to take a train to her house in Salisbury – which is currently vacant as she is temporarily in a care-home, following a period of hospitalisation – and prepare it to accommodate a live-in carer. It may not sound like much of a job, but there were challenges. It’s a dilapidated old rabbit-warren of a place, in which the aunt has lived alone, except for dogs, for 50 years. During that time, she has accumulated a great deal of medical apparatus deemed useful to her condition, along with all the paraphernalia associated with her interests and hobbies. All this has been added to family heirlooms, furniture, doggy accoutrements, utensils and the everyday household effects that she has acquired without ever having willingly discarded a single item. Simply walking through the front door is an obstacle course and a foretaste of what to expect in the less frequented parts of the house. Still, I knew what I was in for and, for three days, put my shoulder to the task, the nub of which was to rearrange the contents without disposing of anything – for she would surely notice if I did. It was a logistical and physical challenge.

          Yet it became more than that. It had been the urgency of her need for practical support which led me to volunteer for the task, rather than personal empathy which, I must admit, was somewhat lacking. With none of us being allowed to visit the aunt for the past year, the lack of face-to-face contact had perhaps diminished familial intimacy and relegated it to second place in the caring stakes, leaving practicality to hold sway and nuisance to take its corrosive toll (I speak for myself). However, the balance changed due to the intimacy of my task. Whereas I began by surveying the scene in a critical, judgemental frame of mind, I found that, by handling the stuff of someone else’s life, poking through documents, clothing, mementoes and redundant equipment alike, I soon came to some understanding of how and why her way of life looks as it does, so different yet neither better nor worse than mine. Handling someone else’s shoes is as close as I got to standing in them, but it had the same effect, flooding me with empathy for the expectations, triumphs and disappointments that are common to everyone’s life.

          At the end, I made my weary way to the station through the centre of old Salisbury, where the threadbare  gentility of the fabric of this medieval cathedral city is evident in the discreet pandering to paying tourists. At least the church is attempting to embrace modernity while hanging on to the best of its legacy. If only the aunt, who lives within its ambit, could do the same…but there I was, back to being judgmental. Out of sight, out of mind?

          Having bought some refreshments for the journey, I settled into an almost empty carriage with a sigh of relief and, after a couple of glasses of wine, dozed off. I was awoken by the announcement that we were arriving at Taunton, where, during the brief stop, I watched a young girl on the opposite platform execute perfect cartwheels in front of her apparently uninterested family. I hope things turn out well for her.