ISLAND OF FLOWERS

She lived amongst an island of flowers.

Voluntarily marooned on her island like a willing Robinson Crusoe, my grandmother found her earthly paradise in the late 1960's and remained ensconced there for over half her life.

And why not? If you find something perfect then why not hold onto it.

There's often a common misconception that we always need to keep moving to where the grass is greener but there is something reassuring about those who accept sometimes that things can be good enough or green enough just the way they are.

Perhaps that's why visiting 85, East Wonford Hill provided such a feeling of peace for the rest of us when we stayed there. There was a sense that once you heard the emphatic clang of the iron back gate and arrived in this flower-filled private world, where Radio 4 was always on and the laundry forever swayed with dancing sheets and tea cloths outside in the garden, that you were free of the stresses of the world outside of it. And with its two steep flights of red clay front steps set back from the road below it, 85 in many ways felt like a Kurosawa-like fortress, protected only by its myriad of tulips, daffodils and trees. Perhaps my grandmother believed beauty would deter the beast(s) and act as an effective security precaution at all times. It's certainly a nice thought and fits with the fairytale nostalgia with which I now remember the place.

This was a world where time had partially stopped and only the occasional chime of a grandfather clock or the routine rituals of breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea and supper reminded you of the conventional rhythms of a normal day.

Some people imagine they'll find peace from the chaos of the world in some far off exotic location. Not for us though, by which I mean the close friends and family. We found it at 85 where paper reading, tea drinking and flower gazing were the only concerns you had when you went there for a short break or holiday as guests of the Queenly host, Barbara Soper.

Yes, it was a bubble world but oh, what a bubble. The only toll we had to pay for enjoying this private paradise was having to engage in the odd conversational combat bordering on acrimony with my grandmother, who always found something wrong with the world outside her flower island to complain about! If you tried to soften her position of argument then she would only double down and go even harder on her grumbles and dissatisfactions with whatever was bothering her in the wider world beyond her iron gates. If you tried the reverse and agreed with her wholeheartedly, she would perversely soften, revealing the contrarian inside of her. Perhaps it was because she had found a form of perfection in her private world that it bothered her to read in the newspapers of an outside world so broken.

She couldn't fix what was beyond her secret home and garden so instead judged it harshly at times as she could the rest of us and our imperfect lives.

And as world events unfolded day after day, year after year, decade after decade, 85 remained an oasis of unchanging calm. The biggest technological advancement in all the time I visited was probably the invention of the remote control for the television, followed by the arrival of a VHS video cassette player.

Often delighting in MGM musicals and ballets, my grandmother seemed positively childlike in her rapture at the power of art, especially the potent combination of dance and music.

Evenings in her living room watching videos of Gene Kelly tap dance, Darcey Bussell plié or a New Year's Day concert of waltzes from Vienna felt as spontaneous as a night in the cinema or theatre with the added bonus of being able to enjoy them with my grandmother's apple pie and cream and a coffee with brandy.

And always the common demoninator of the things that brought her joy was beauty. Beauty in the things that brought the purest source of joy to the human heart without any complication (she'd already had enough complication in her own matters of the heart earlier in her life.) That wasn't to say she couldn't defer to trash at times. A love of Coronation Street and Strictly Come Dancing would remind us that she wasn't always as lofty as she liked to believe, but perhaps that was the perennial paradox of her northern, working class roots raging against her southern, middle class life.  

However, amongst her island of flowers she reigned supreme and if it weren't for the parameters of her garden fences containing her passion for blossoms, one might have imagined an entire acreage of floral abundance akin to that of royalty for her to extend her flowery ambition.

But within the confines of her island we were all happy to visit her and her numerous Man Fridays (in the guise of her many dogs) and revel in the perfection of her kingdom.

Both she and 85 are greatly missed.