The Living and the Dead in Winsford

26

‘And do you know why our church is painted white?’

It’s early afternoon on the second of December. Castor and I are in and around Selworthy, a village quite high up in the hills, between Porlock and Minehead, quite close to the sea. We have joined forces with an elderly lady and her considerably younger dog, an energetic labrador. We parked the car next to the church, and are on our way up to the Selworthy Beacon: it’s a bit on the chilly side but otherwise fine, and we hope to be able to see for miles from the summit.

‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t know why.’

The old lady chuckles with pleasure. ‘I assume you’re a foreigner, if you don’t mind me saying so; but it’s very unusual to find white-painted churches in this United Kingdom of ours. They are supposed to be grey, the colour of natural stone, both in towns and in the countryside. . Unlike in some other parts of the world — Greece, for instance.’

‘Yes, I have noticed that,’ I say. ‘That the churches are usually grey.’

‘That’s right,’ says the lady, pausing for a moment to adjust the woollen scarf she has wrapped around her head. ‘But we had a vicar here who painted the church white. He had good reason for that — or at least, he thought he had.’

We turn round and confirm that we can still see the church quite a long way down below us, through all the wintry green foliage of the trees. There is no doubt at all that it is whitewashed.

‘He was very fond of hunting, you see — this was a few hundred years ago — and while he was out hunting for deer or pheasants or whatever, down there in Porlock Valley. .’ She points in that direction with her walking stick. ‘. . It’s called the happy valley, and they say it really is that, and it certainly is the most beautiful valley in the whole of England. . Anyway, while he was wandering around looking for prey, he would take a swig now and then from his hip flask to keep up his body warmth and his good humour. . and then, you see, as dusk began to fall and it was time for him to go home, he hadn’t a clue where he was or which direction he should be heading in. . And so he had the church painted white. So that it was clearly visible, and so that he’d be able to find his way home no matter what state he was in. And it really worked — you can see it wherever you are in the valley. You can’t miss it.’

‘Is that really true?’ I ask aghast.

‘Of course it’s true,’ says the lady. ‘Do you think I’d make up stories to impress a visitor from a long way away?’

We part company shortly afterwards. She and her Mufti turn off along a path to Bossington — it’s too steep for an eighty-year-old to get to the summit, and in any case, I’m told, all there is there is a pile of stones and masses of wind.

But Castor and I keep plodding along. I think for a while about the lady’s farewell words — a visitor from a long way away — and how appropriate they are. It’s exactly a month since I moved into Darne Lodge — I have a copy of The Times in the car that confirms this; and even if I no longer regard the passing of time like I used to, even if I’m now a sort of desert dweller and an emigrant from all normal life, I couldn’t avoid noticing that they had started decorating for Christmas in Dulverton. We drove through the village on the way here, and as I stood in the queue to pay for my newspaper I saw a poster advertising ‘Dunster by Candlelight’ the coming Saturday — a big event, it seemed.

For normal people.

We trudge up the last long slope to the cairn at the summit, and I entertain the thought that I will never return to Sweden. No, that’s wrong, I don’t entertain the thought because I’ve been doing that to excess for a very long time: it’s the feeling that I entertain now, the discomfort that swells up relentlessly in my midriff. This must be the first time since I came to live on the moor that I have felt such pangs of homesickness, such longing for home.

But longing for what, exactly? If I’m not really longing for anything any more, if I don’t even want to carry on living, why should I long for home? A feeling of belonging, perhaps, of being well known — is this the link I’m fumbling for? Context and security and the reassuring presence of somebody else? But why are such emotions attacking me now on this windswept hillside? We have no future, Castor and I: I shall outlive him and then die, that is the contract we have agreed upon. That we sign up for every day, my dog and I, is that not the case?

I try to shake it off me, whatever it is, but it’s not easy and I know that it was the old lady’s words that started it all off.

A visitor from a long way away.

It could just as well be a description of what is involved in being a human being in this world.

On the way back to Selworthy — we are following a different path now, there are lots of them — we come across a little stone monument. According to an inscription it was raised for a man who liked to walk up to this summit with his children and his grandchildren, talking to them all the time about the beauty and richness of God’s nature surrounding them on all sides. According to the same text, the monument is intended to be a haven where a tired wanderer can rest, protected from the wind: as Castor and I have both coffee and liver chews in our rucksack, we sit down in the lee with the pale but nevertheless warming sunlight shining into our faces. I read a poem on the wall:

Needs no show of mountain hoary,

Winding shore or deepening glen,

Where the landscape in its glory

Teaches truth to wandering men:

Give true hearts but earth and sky,

And some flowers to bloom and die.

Homely scenes and simple views

Lowly thoughts may best infuse.

Even these lines touch me deeply. I really don’t understand why I am so affected and why so many doors to my soul are standing open on this lovely December day, but that’s the way it is. I’m suddenly reminded of the novel A Happy Death by Albert Camus, which both Rolf and I read during the short time we were together and the theme of which we discussed: choosing the time and the place of one’s own death. That dying is the most important moment in life, and hence that one shouldn’t leave its circumstances so casually in the hands of others, as most people do.

Would I like to die here and now? Is that the question that should be occupying my mind? I don’t think so, but perhaps I would like to die on a day like this in a place like this. Perhaps even this very place?

I contemplate Castor as he lies stretched out on the ground in the sunshine. I contemplate England’s most beautiful valley in all its glory. I listen to the wind in the treetops, and it occurs to me that as long as we live we shall never be able to ignore the passage of time, nor the Christmas decorations in Dunster, nor what we are guilty of having done.

That is why we need the door of death through which we can take our leave.

The sun is swallowed by clouds. Castor sits up and stares at me. It’s time to go back to the car.

*

There are two vehicles in the car park next to Selworthy’s white-painted church. One is my rather dirty dark blue Audi, the other is a silver-coloured Renault with a badge indicating it is from the rental firm Sixt. Despite the fact that there are at least ten empty spaces, the driver has parked it so close to my car that I can barely open the driver’s door and squeeze my way in.

It is while I am performing this difficult manoeuvre that I notice the newspapers lying on the dashboard just above the steering wheel of the rental car — it is right-hand drive, whereas mine is left-hand drive. There are two papers and I recognize both of them: one is the Swedish Dagens Nyheter, and the other the Polish Gazeta Wyborcza.

I manage to sit down in the driver’s seat and close the door behind me. I look around. No sign of anybody. I start the engine and drive away. My heart is beating fast: I know that this is one of my vulnerable days, and I hope the fear that took possession of me in a flash will fade away provided I don’t feed it with unnecessary thoughts. As long as I concentrate on other things.

On the way home we drive once again through the narrow medieval streets of Dunster. I stop and buy four bottles of red wine and two of port. It will soon be Christmas, after all.