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Cotswolds

Spring Is in the Air

Posted on March 1, 2009

Saturday the weather was mild enough to coax us on to our bikes for our inaugural ride of 2009. Snow drops are blooming and the daffodils are threatening to burst forth by next weekend. The hunt was out which would have been nice if we had seen it, but our timing was off and so it just meant lots more horse shit and cars on the road toting the binocular and camera slinging masses.

It’s a good thing we made the effort because unbeknownst to us it was Chris’s last day at the post office in G.P., which was our first stop on the bike ride. Chris runs a little cafe in the corner of the shop, and Saturday morning coffee and a paper there are a long standing Cotswold tradition for us. It was on her brown leather couch that looks out across the village green where, leafing through The Guardian, I found husband his current job, a fact I don’t mention given his disgruntled state over the continuing presence of Inspector Clouseau. Chris tried to soften the blow of her decision to leave — she said it had been on the cards ever since the post office hours were cut last year — with promises of bacon sandwiches from the new owner, but we were crushed. At least we got to say goodbye. And we’re bound to see her one Saturday enjoying a bacon sandwich since she still lives in the village.

At the end of our bike ride we stopped into the wine bar for a coffee where M. the barman enquired if we’d like to attend his hunt’s auction that evening, a last minute replacement for a couple who’d fallen ill. We didn’t know until we arrived at the town hall later that evening that entrepreneurial E. the bird plucker was his considerably younger date. I couldn’t help thinking this was bound to end in tears, but I was too distracted by the assembled company to let my judgements get the best of me. This included an Austrian count who is tall and pointy, as an Austrian count should be, and seemed to have donated every other lot in the auction. There was also a ginger haired man of indeterminate age who specialised in horse breeding data. He was like a Wall Street analyst of the horsey set, equines instead of equities.

When it came time to bid, husband came close on a lot for a day’s gate shutting, which I assume is a useful service when you ride horses across the vast plot of land that makes up your family’s estate and you don’t want to get off your horse continually to close gates. The lot didn’t specify where said gate shutting was to take place, and husband and M. thought it would be hilarious to have the donating family come up to London and spend the day closing front gates up and down our road. Husband bailed at £200 which left him with precisely that amount to purchase a life coaching session, exactly the kind of namby pamby, L.A. thing to ruin one’s reputation at an event like this, and the taint by association heaped on our host was exactly what husband was going for. It was very poor value indeed considering a week at a villa that sleeps fifteen in the Dordogne went for under a grand.

The true value of the evening came from E., who provided the information heretofore unknown to me that the hunt ball next Saturday was a floor length dress required kind of event. This sent me into a mad rush on Sunday during which I momentarily considered having my mother FedEx me an old bridesmaid dress, the only long dress I own, never mind the chiffon and rhinestone scattered flutter sleeves. Presented with this plan my mother, who just happened to be bruised and ace bandaged from her most recent bout of plastic surgery (neck and eyes touch up to her now nearing a decade old face lift), shrieked that said dress “looks like a sack” on me. Unlike my mother the only thing that will be giving me any kind of lift with my evening gown are my Trinny and Susannah Miracle Pants, the British equivalent of Spanx.

The last time I faced this kind of formal wear emergency imposed by the regulations of British society was two years ago when, two days shy of Ladies’ Day at Royal Ascot, I happened to hear mention of the fact that a lady’s hat had to cover her entire head to enter the Royal Enclosure. The reasonably priced number I had settled on weeks ago, somewhere between a “fascinator” and a beret in scalp coverage, was on the cusp of unacceptable. On a frenzied death march stopping in every milliner within a mile radius of Oxford Street I parted ways with a considerable sum of money for what can only be described as a hot pink, highly feathered pimp hat. May my evening gown for the hunt ball be as fabulous.

England

Oath to the Queen

Posted on February 27, 2009

The citizenship ceremony took place at three o’clock in the afternoon on a Thursday in the Gloucester registrar office, which sits on the edge of the town centre of the the Gloucestershire county seat. To describe the building’s large sash windows with mauve trim or the front portico’s three plaster wreath-topped columns makes it sound much grander than it is. The interior makes gestures in the form of elaborate window treatments and silk floral arrangements to acknowledge the significance of the civil ceremonies that take place in its rooms. But these co-mingle with other relics from the early eighties — abstract patterned ceiling tiles, green carpet, cheap wood paneled walls — to create an unmistakable municipal effect.

Still, the letter from the Home Office inviting me to attend left me some hope in the department of pomp and circumstance, promising as it did that a representative of HRM Queen Elizabeth II would be in attendance. This turned out to be one Major MTNH Wills, the Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Gloucestershire and whose name I recognize because his family owns most the land around our Cotswold village, known simply as the Wills estate. I know this because of my acquaintance with D. the shepherd (I love being able to say I know a shepherd), who is actually a little more than a shepherd; he manages the entire Wills estate. Major Wills wears a grey morning coat with matching waistcoat and trousers with his comb-over. Add a top hat and he could be on his way to ladies’ day at Royal Ascot.

My fellow citizens to be don’t exactly look ready for Ascot but they’ve made a good effort. The mother of what I am guessing to be an Ethiopian family is in a dark purple suit with rhinestone and pearl drop earrings, and curly bangs tinted the same colour as her suit. An Indian man in a crisp grey suit and pink tie is accompanied by a male friend wielding an expensive looking digital camera. A little ethnically Chinese girl twirls in her classic little girl party outfit of cap sleeves, wide sash, and full skirt with patent leather mary janes. (I hate to admit this but the thought does cross my mind that perhaps I could interest her family in reopening a very well trafficked and recently defunct Chinese restaurant in our village). Even the fully covered Muslim woman has managed a headscarf edged with rhinestones. I am straight from work and dressed in black boots, black tights, a black skirt and a black wool jersey shirt brightened up with a splash of charcoal grey. I now feel both self-conscious and crass since my main concern up until now has been to get this show on the road; I only had enough change for an hour from the pay and display parking meter.

As we sit waiting for the ceremony to begin we are treated to a CD of some rousing classical music by English composers of the Dam Busters March and Elgar ilk. There is a large framed photograph of QE2 propped on a pedestal draped with purple silk to add further ambiance. After a few minutes, the registrar begins by introducing Major Wills and informing us that after the ceremony our designated dignitary would be happy to pose for pictures with us. Major Wills does not look like he would be happy to pose for pictures with us.

The Major then stands and slips on a pair of glasses before reading from a prepared statement about the glories of Gloucestershire — the countryside, the fine market towns, the soaring wool money cathedrals — and how wise we all are to have chosen to settle here. I can’t help feeling a little swell of pride. The registrar goes around the room as one by one we stand and take our oath. Then Major Wills calls us up and presents our naturalization certificates, shakes our hand, and directs us over to sign the register. It is over quickly and the new citizens are soon clamouring to take up the registrar’s offer for pictures with the Major. I consider getting a snap on my mobile for fun but am too embarrassed. Instead I slip out the door where a smiling lady from the registrar’s office offers me a cup of celebratory coffee or tea. I decline but say I’ll take a cookie to go. She looks at me confused. “I’ll have a biscuit,” I say, correcting myself, and receive for my efforts a napkin-wrapped chocolate digestive. It is an apt reminder that I have chosen well in becoming a citizen of a country that shamelessly disguises cookies in the vocabulary of gastrointestinal health aids. I feel right at home.

Random

My Own Private Ellis Island

Posted on February 25, 2009

On Tuesday we returned home from a birthday celebration trip to Barcelona. For what might be the last time, I accepted a landing card from the British Airways purser, supplied my name, address, profession, and place of birth, then got in the non-EU passport holders line at Heathrow Terminal 1. Husband schlepped alongside even though he holds a British passport and that line was, as usual, much shorter.

Avoiding this landing card/long line routine is the original reason I applied for my British citizenship. That and the fact that British citizenship would make me eligible to work in Europe (Paris specifically, because in my fantasy life that doesn’t mean I need to speak French). It’s been months since I parted with the £600, lengthy application, and stack of old utility bills required to apply for citizenship. I hadn’t thought much about what becoming a British citizen actually meant until this week when the ceremony in which I swear my allegiance to HRM the Queen takes place. Now the doubts have set in. Have I earned the right to be a loyal subject in this fair land? Is being too lazy to fill out a landing card or wait in line at immigration control a worthy cause? It hardly inspires comparison to Ellis Island.

To make matters more confusing, America is on the up. Sure, the economy is in the pits but so is the UK’s. Obama is starting to restore the country’s reputation, the dollar is up, and the pound is down. I’m not renouncing my American citizenship to become a Brit, but even going “dual” feels a bit like betrayal. It’s like I got separated and now I’m getting remarried without getting divorced…which makes me a crazy Mormon bigamist. I told you I was confused.

In an effort to sort things out, I sat down and made a list of why I deserve to be a British citizen in addition to remaining a proud if not exactly flag waving American.

1. I am proficient in British. Specifically, I am totally au fait with the nouns: boot and bin tumble from my lips on a regular basis. Adjectives are a bit of a stretch. Bloody still doesn’t sound right coming out, but I did ask someone if he was cross the other night without so much as a pause. Verbs are fewer in general. Most are some variation of hooking up –to shag, to pull, to cop off– and in my eighth year of marriage I have little use for such vocabulary. I have been known to fancy something, as in “I fancy an Indian tonite,” by which I mean a curry dinner not shagging an Indian man.

2. I have made a genuine effort to fit in. My lean Los Angeles limbs have morphed to a pie-filled pear shape. My perfectly aligned teeth used to practically taunt “my dentistry is better than yours,” but now, with increased tea consumption, have mellowed to a less ostentatious gleam.

3. I am addicted to “The Archers,” an agricultural soap opera and Radio 4 institution. Imagine if “The Guiding Light” never made the leap to television and was set on a farm. Recent dialogue in an episode featuring a lambing scene included: “This one’s cervix isn’t dilated. Where’s the lubricant?”

What’s most remarkable about this last one is that I used to hate “The Archers,” whose chirpy opening diddy seemed to start up every time I turned on the radio on a long car journey. Now I love it, perhaps coaxed into its grip by a regular car commute and country life. But reasons don’t matter. My change of heart is the equivalent of developing a taste for Marmite, certain proof I am worthy of calling myself a Brit.

Cotswolds

R.I.P.: The Day the Chinese Food Died

Posted on February 17, 2009

It was a Sunday night in early January when I called Dynasty Cantonese Cuisine, the Chinese takeaway housed in a little freestanding stone building in our market square. The phone rang and rang. No answer. They must be too busy to pick up. I persuaded husband to bundle up and accompany me on the block long walk to place our order in person. This is when we first noticed the sign:

We are closed until further notice. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
–the Management

How disappointing. There was no food — well no food we wanted to eat — in the fridge, which led to the usual range of accusations from husband about my deficiencies as a wife, including my lack of ambition in the domestic art of grocery shopping. We retreated into the comforts of a new season of American Idol and cheese toast, my trusty standby dinner.

Another week passed and the sign remained. Theories abounded. “They’re just on holiday. They went away last year this time for a few weeks. They’ll be back.” Or, “Probably just some trouble with Immigration. They’ll be back.” Every theory ended with “They’ll be back.” I was skeptical. If the owners were going on vacation why not just say so? Vacations end on a date, not “until further notice.” The sign was ominous.

January came to a close and the Chinese failed to open. Panic started to spread in the village. People who had been known to snobbishly refer to Dynasty as “Die Nasty” looked thin and stricken. Toff and townie alike mourned the loss of barbequed spare ribs and chips on demand (French fries being a legitimate rice substitute in England).

There was a brief period last year when I swore off the Chinese. I found that a bottle of Gamay finished off with a 10PM meal of prawn toast, veggie chow mein, and Kung Pao chicken invariably resulted in me waking with a start at 2am, eyes wide and heart pounding, fuelled by the sugar and sodium bomb my body was attempting to digest. But by and large the Chinese holds a special place in my heart. It’s been with us since the beginning of our Cotswold adventure when we used to stop off in the village on Friday nights en route to our rented cottage in G.P. We’d natter over a glass in the wine bar with R. the barman while waiting for our takeaway feast to be readied. And it’s rescued us on occasion over the past year when guests have come to visit and somehow the dinner reservation was missed because another bottle of Prosecco at the wine bar seemed like a good idea. It’s even been the epicentre of village intrigue and scandal, including the tale of the local aristocrat who attempted to get a meal gratis and a rumored drug bust.

The charm of Dynasty was its anti-charm. It was a brusque, efficient, cash-only kind of place manned by a steely faced, thirty-something, presumably married Malaysian couple. The wife, a slight woman forever in an oversized t-shirt and baseball cap, ran front of house from behind a tall counter. Decoration was sparse, consisting of some peeling wall paper dotted with gold Chinese characters, an oversized calendar, and a shelf displaying soda cans on offer. Was there also a large waving ceramic cat on the counter or am I imagining that? Her husband fired the food in the kitchen behind, which was separated by a doorway that was hung with a plastic shower curtain liner cut in half. That day’s Sun newspaper was always on the front counter to provide entertainment while waiting for your food, which was just as well since conversation with the woman was hard work. Once, feeling chatty after a few glasses of wine, I thought I’d managed to forge a bond by coaxing out of her that she was from Kuala Lumpur, a city where I had also briefly lived years ago. After that I was convinced she had started to give me free prawn crackers until I realized everyone who spent £15 or more got them.

Now February is drawing to a close, the ominous sign remains affixed to the window, and the door locked. Around the village the mourning process is moving from denial to acceptance. Goodbye Dynasty. You fed us well. You will be missed.

Cotswolds Random

Nemesis

Posted on February 11, 2009
While I am settling beautifully into country life, husband’s taking it a little less well. His exact words to me within twenty-four hours of returning to England from Los Angeles in early January were, at volume, “You’ve ruined it.”

By which he meant I’ve ruined his concept of our rural idyll. The Cotswolds is no longer the joyous place where we arrive together each Thursday night for the weekend, our worldly cares evaporating as we leave urban grit behind and roll past open landscape, starry skies, and stone cottages into the market square where the wine bar sits waiting for us with convivial conversation, a roaring fire, and glass or three of wine. It is now the place where I live, littered with the detritus of daily life like dishes in the sink and half-read New Yorkers. I was careful to minimize such evidence before husband showed up for the first time since I’d permanently moved into the country cottage, but he could imagine it and that was enough to whip him into a froth.

He doesn’t seem to remember that this was all his idea in the first place. Gone is any recollection of the way he tarted up a very dull job in nearby Swindon that I interviewed for unsuccessfully last summer. He was a used car salesman touting the merits of an IT directorship for a, yawn, computing society because it was after all a means to an end: to live full-time in the Cotswolds. His brain didn’t seem to make the logical follow-on calculation that if I got a job near the Cotswolds, I would be living here full-time but he would still have a job in London. Now he understands. I live in the beautiful Cotswolds all the time. I am the enemy. It’s a good thing I get two nights a week on my own.

January passes and, luckily for me, husband finds another person to hate. He has a new boss, who coincidentally used to work with me at my former London employer. Husband’s new boss is a music industry big shot, French, and was known to occasionally have a silent conversation with my chest in the elevator. This last fact is known to husband but is not what causes the new boss, already nicknamed Inspector Closeau, to become his nemesis. Husband just doesn’t like having a boss and the situation prior to Inspector Closeau’s arrival was that of a boss in name rather than practice. I am no longer person non grata numero uno, but husband’s resentment towards me still grows because I am unavailable in person two nights a week for him to bitch about the Inspector.

Still, the heat is off enough that I can safely share with husband some insight into the loveliness of my new daily life. There’s the gym I’ve joined in Cirencester, or “siren” as we locals call it. It’s run by the local council, but it’s nicer and cheaper than any private gym I’ve been to in London. You can park (for free!), there’s a café, and you get a little USB type key you plug into all the workout machines so they record your workout. With these kind of amenities no wonder people live in Gloucestershire. It’s a no brainer, the same way homeless people gravitate to Santa Monica. I think this rather than say it out loud to husband.

In his exasperation husband put the London flat on the rental market back in December, toying with the idea that he could join me in my full-time country life. This would mean about four hours of daily commute time assuming all goes smoothly, and with the recession in full swing and the rental market sagging, it seemed a bit of a bluff. There are, in fairness, gentlemen of a certain means who regularly commute into London from Gloucestershire. I’ve seen them on the railway platform with their laptop bags and velvet collared coats on the odd morning last year when I trained into London for work. But I suspect most of them have a pied-à-terre in London to accommodate the not infrequent train cancellations, bad weather, and occasional night out in London. We essentially have a pied-à-terre in London, it just costs about twice as much as life in the country which takes the air out of any charm associated with having property with a French nickname. We may have a house in Poshtershire, but we’re several salary zeros away from these commuting gents.

At the end of January we got a call from the estate agent. She had an offer on our flat from an Italian couple moving over to England to work. They were offering £300 per week, £10 less per week than we wanted. This made it easy. I said no, thinking the matter was closed. She called back the next day: the Italians would go to £310. We thought about it. We debated the pros and cons and did the math, all day, all night, and part of the next day. Crazily, the cost of a monthly train ticket is more than half of our monthly mortgage on the London flat which means there’s a lot of potential commuting aggravation without that much financial benefit in consolidating homes. I told husband it was his decision. He turned the offer down. The agent came back with an offer of £320 per week. Husband apologized, said no, and took the flat off the market. It appears, for now, we have a London flat. Make that a pied-à-terre.

Cotswolds

Sunday Lunch

Posted on February 2, 2009

Yesterday we participated in that quintessential English institution, Sunday lunch. This one was a belated birthday celebration for M., our resident raconteur, barman, writer, painter, and gallery owner. It was hosted by his ex-wife and, like all good parties, took place largely around the table in her farmhouse kitchen. After pheasant pie and potatoes dauphinoise but before almond cake and coffee, snowflakes started dancing outside the kitchen window which was already framing a picture perfect, winter white landscape. I was pretty sure Hugh Grant and Emma Thompson were about to walk through the door and join us for the cheese course.

An entire cast of Richard Curtis characters wouldn’t have been more interesting than the assembled company. In addition to the charms of M. and his lovely ex-, we were joined by a another couple. The husband is a journalist whose work I know from my favourite paper, The Weekend FT. This fact alone would have been enough to sustain me for the entire afternoon, but he turned out to be only too happy to further oblige my stereotype of an idiosyncratic former Fleet Street journalist. He looked like Paul Bunyan in a tan leather, safari style waistcoat, and, while the rest of the table drank Rioja, he steadily drained the bottle of The Famous Grouse and a small pitcher of water that had been set out at his place. (Unaware this arrangement was intended solely for his consumption and being American and in need of hydration — British people consume an alarmingly small quantity of water — I helped out with the pitcher of water. Husband only pointed out my faux pas after the lunch.) Between courses he smoked hand rolled cigarettes and told me stories about his early years in Los Angeles with his old friend, Robin Leach, and New York as a correspondent for The Times.

Neither did his wife disappoint. She was dressed in what I call Toff “I don’t give a shit” – a ripped hot pink cashmere v-neck, jeans, and leopard print loafers. I think it was my compliment of her ring (Fabergé) that sparked the conversation in which I learned her father had been a Pulitzer prize winning journalist who, while stationed in the A.P.’s Moscow bureau during the Stalin era, eloped with her mother, a ballerina in The Bolshoi. Have you ever wondered who would play you in the movie of your life? Well, Clark Gable played her father in the film version of her parents’ romance.

I ended up feeling a little sorry for her. How on earth are you ever supposed to live up to parents like that? It’s enough to make me grateful for my own parents’ mediocrity. Just last week on a phone call with my dad I had to explain to him what Cava was. He seemed downright fascinated to learn about this economically priced, Spanish sparkling wine. “How do you know about things like that?” he asked, his voice filled with genuine wonder.

Cotswolds

If the Shoe Fits

Posted on February 1, 2009

Yesterday I tried on a jacket at Pakeman Catto & Carter, a gentlemens and ladies clothier in Cirencester housed in a three story townhouse that’s all polished wood, glass cases, and dark carpets. The jacket was a tailored number made of green tweed with a coral coloured windowpane overlay and green silk lining. It was handsome, half-price, and fit me like a glove according to the sales assistant who called me madam and asked me to spin around as he assessed the length and shoulders. It was, he informed me, a hacking jacket, which I assume is another one of those cryptic horsey terms so prolific around these parts, like “on the gallops” or “a jolly.”

The only other time in my life where I would have fit in without note while wearing a tweed hacking jacket was at Camp Merrie Woode, the all girls-camp in North Carolina that I attended for three summers in a row between the ages of twelve and fourteen. The camp uniform consisted of forest green shorts and a grey sailor smock with a matching green tie. I felt like a martian when I showed up fresh from south Florida with my trio of skinny neon belts and heart bedecked Vans slip-ons to accessorize what I thought of as the hopelessly unstylish attire I was expected to wear day in and day out for the next three weeks (in my defense, this was the eighties). The other girls, girls with names like Darnell and Eleanor from Vermont and Maine and Georgia, wore LL Bean moccasins or plain white Tretorn sneakers, both essentially unisex styles that hadn’t changed since their mothers had worn them.

For summer number two I showed up with a pair of Tretorns, but in an attempt to maintain some integrity mine had a madras plaid “V” rather than plain white. I also brought my beloved pump spray bottle of Aqua Net (aerosol was my preference but strictly forbidden by camp rules) with which to coif my feathered bangs, only to have it diluted with water in a prank by my evil cabin-mate, thespian Kren. That summer I was permanently turned off of horse back riding when I was forced to muck out a stall, a “mandatory” part of our equestrian curriculum. It was difficult to keep my polka dot driving cap on my head while I scraped shit and mud out of a temperamental horse’s hoof with a hook, but I persevered. Someone around here had to stand up for fashion.

At the end of summer three, I cried when I saw my father waiting for me when I got off the plane. When he asked why I was crying I said, embarrassed, that it was because I was so sad to have left camp. The truth was I was overwhelmed with relief to be home, away from the freaky canoe and equestrian young people and back amongst teenagers who had the sense to fawn over my prized pink ankle boots, the ones that made me feel like I had a shot at Simon le Bon.

Back in Cirencester I admired myself in the mirror then hung the hacking jacket back on the sales rack. It was a beautiful jacket, but wearing it somehow felt disingenuous. It was a beautiful jacket for someone else.

Random

One Upmanship

Posted on January 29, 2009

Just when we Americans felt all special for electing a black President, Iceland has gone and one upped us with their appointment of a gay, female prime minister. A former air hostess nonetheless, which is much more fun to say than flight attendant (and now, being practically British, I feel very entitled to use the term). There’s nothing I can think of that’s more fabulous than a lesbian career trajectory from the friendly skies to head of state, and it’s clear my great expectations problem now extends to cover the entire gay population. It’s also clear the only way for Britain to up the stakes is to oust Gordon Brown and bring in a cross-gender person of color. I’d even settle for a cross-dresser, of which there are reputedly many already wandering the Houses of Parliament. My soon to be acquired vote is going to Eddie Izzard.

Random

Great Expectations – Part 1

Posted on January 28, 2009

Our outing with R and R on Burns Night made me own up to a dirty truth: I have an issue with gay men. It’s not homophobia, quite the reverse. I simply have very high expectations of my gay male friends. I demand neither camp nor queen, but I do expect just a little bit of fabulousness. And on this count, Burns Night was a bit of a disappointment.

Don’t get me wrong. R and R are lovely people by hetero standards. R number one works as a marketing executive for an electronics firm. R number two appears to be more or less a kept man, having dabbled in antiques and more recently nutrition, inspired by his own experience with drastic weight loss and an earnest desire to help others. His dalliances with work remind me of the career path of every British au pair I knew in L.A.: nanny then masseuse or personal trainer en route to the most coveted post of all, wife. Only of course R number two has already bagged his man.

In my last post I wondered if R and R had been driven out of town by Telegraph torch-bearing conservative locals. I found out Saturday night that R and R take The Telegraph and The Times, so that theory was more off base than I realized. They shoot. They drive a Porsche and a Mercedes. The truth is they fit in to Poshtershire way better than husband and I ever will. And that’s without even factoring my new Prius into the equation. I’m fully prepared for a few cold shoulders at the wine bar once I’m spotted around town in that.

I blame my high expectations on one man, Mr. M.F. who made the very pages of this blog when he visited husband and me in the Cotswolds last spring. M.F. is my template gay man:

  • Liberal – check: always good for an embarrassing pic of George W. Bush.
  • Creative – check: online editor and author of umpteen humorous books including The Metrosexual Guide to Style and Death by Powerpoint.
  • Funny – check: full marks for sarcasm and witty retorts, many directed at husband, much to my amusement.

He’s far from flamboyant in his trendy nerd glasses and prepster apparel, but is he fabulous? Oh very yes.

We ended Burns Night with a fireside whiskey at our local inn. As R number two took orders for a second round, I could tell husband was fading. A wave of panic washed over me as I flashbacked to a dinner party husband and I hosted a few years ago in L.A. The guests were a couple who were friends of mine and somewhere during the appetizers and a prolonged discussion about golf, husband deemed them boring. Shortly after dessert he disappeared. After about 15 minutes I went to look for him. I checked the bathroom first then found him watching television in the bedroom.

Despite the earlier haggis induced excitement, I feared Burns Night would end with similar antics. Husband would excuse himself to the bathroom, slip out the back door, and I would find him home in bed half an hour later after lots of embarrassed excuse making. But my panic was for naught. We spent our second drink merrily discussing a whole lot of nothing, exactly the kind of things we talk about with other married friends.

England

Burns Night

Posted on January 26, 2009

Saturday we celebrated Burns Night, this year being the 250th anniversary of the Scottish poet’s birth. It’s the first time I’ve done so during my tenure in the UK, so I consider it another rite of passage in my journey to becoming a British citizen, which is now scheduled for the 22nd of February. I am, as they say, chuffed to bits to be a part of a country that turns out in full bagpipe and family tartan regalia to celebrate a poet each year. Husband points out that the British will use any excuse for a piss up. Still I think it’s a nice idea. Perhaps the US could come up with it’s own annual drunken celebration of a poet—Bukowski day seems fitting.

We attended our Burns Night supper accompanied by R. and R., the only gays in the village. We haven’t been out with them since last spring and I was worried something horrible had happened like they had split up or been driven out of the Cotswolds by right wing locals brandishing torches made out of the Telegraph. Thankfully this was not the case and they were available to join us at the pub in the next village over. The choice of pub was a tactical decision based on the availability of a “vegetarian” haggis option, a requirement for husband.

Haggis, sheep stomach lining stuffed with bits of offal, is a central feature of Burns Night. The meal starts with the recitation of a poem, during which the slick, frisbee sized disc of haggis—easily mistaken for a grey jello mold—is sliced open with great pomp and circumstance. There are real bagpipes if you’re lucky, we had a cd of—groan now—The Red Hot Chili Pipers. Unlike cowardly husband, the gays and I went for the real thing, which arrived following our cockaleekie (chicken and leek) soup and was accompanied by neeps and tatties (parsnips and mashed potatoes). In case you’re wondering, it was worthy of school cafeteria mystery meat status yet delicious. It tasted like a spicy veggie burger, and everyone in the immediate vicinity who had eaten haggis before claimed it was the best they’d ever had, with a surprisingly pleasant firmness to it. It disturbed me that we had lapsed into discussing our meal in the language of bowel movements, but a wee dram helped distract me.
In case you want to try your own haggis at home, here’s a link to the proper poetic accompaniment. Clue to translating the Scottish dialect: slice in stanza three. I am far from being an expert in Scottish dialect, i.e., I needed the subtitles in Trainspotting and I had to concentrate really hard while reading Marabou Stork Nightmares, but this is as vivid a cue as one is ever likely to get:

Trenching your gushing entrails bright
Like onie ditch;
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reekin, rich!