Going Back

 Dear reader,

I had to go to the New Forest two weeks ago to read one of my poems and say a few words about my very dear friend, Lady Fiona Montagu, at her Memorial Service.  In order to do this I had to stay close to where I had lived for nearly twenty years in my twenty's and thirty's. My daughter, Jessica and I decided it would be interesting to go back to the house I had lived in all those years.  But it was a big mistake.  When I lived there it was, at the end of the 1960s, and a dilapidated old farmhouse with masses of charm.  The roof leaked, rats lived in the walls and it was cold but with a family growing up, three daughters, it was a solid and cosy home with lots to recommend it.  The now grown up children remember it with affection.

I left the house and got divorced and my ex-husband sold it to a millionaire cattle farmer.  It now looks  completely different.  A great deal of money must have been spent making it pristine.  New walls, new staircases, panelled rooms and Italian type tiles in the old hall.  And there were cameras in the grounds everywhere to detract uninvited guests. 

Jessica and I did ring the bell and the owner answered, but was not very welcoming, however he gave me a piece he had written about Ipley Manor (the farmhouse) and its acres  from Medieval times, which was very interesting.  I asked him whether he saw the ghost and told him I had twice felt it and knew which room it appeared in.  He didn't seem very interested but perhaps one doesn't want to know about ghosts in our houses.  It wasn't at all like the house that I remember and know now that my memories will remain, in my mind, as it was.

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From Gilbert White, October 25th 1784 in Hampshire

'Hard frost, thick ice.   In my way to Newton I was covered with snow! Snow covers the ground and trees.'

 

From Francis Kilvert, October 25th 1874 in Wiltshire

'A damp warm morning steaming with heat, the outer air like a hothouse, the  inner air colder, and in consequence the old thick panelled walls of the front rooms streaming with the arm air condensed on the cold walls....The afternoon was so gloomy that I was obliged for the first time to have lights in the pulpit.'

                                                                                    

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Going Back

 

The old farmhouse,

surrounded by

rhododendron bushes,

was a funny old place,

full of twists and turns

passages and panelled rooms,

a large sunny kitchen

with green lino floor,

a dark larder

full of hams and baskets of eggs,

while dogs slept in the small

drying room where it was warm.

 

There was a ghost, of course,

a smuggler killed fighting another

over a brandy run aborted.

I felt it, twice,

a middle of the night experience, ice cold, terrifying.

My dog wouldn't go in there,

just growled.

 

Tadpoles were caught in the streams,

ponies were ridden over the forest,

lots of apple crumble,

toad in the hole, beef stews,

and dumplings eaten

picnics on the lawn,

squirrels watching, watching....

a cosy family house

the children's home.

 

But now?

Years later it is reformed.  It is a

mansion.  Rebuilt with mega money.

All the farmyard magic gone,

the sun that used to filter

through dusty windows,

the back door with never a key,

the old farmhouse destroyed,

no longer a home but a fort.

A prison. Cameras everywhere

watching watching......

 

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With very best wishes, Patricia