DEVOTED TRUTH

Vesta Tilly, the famous male impersonator and heroine of Queer chanteuse, and Clara Butt a wobbly contralto, lived in St. Aubyn Mansions in Hove actually.
Both music hall artists there are two blue plaques declaring their residency.
If you walk a few paces towards the pier you will arrive at Marroccos, a wonderful Italian establishment who serve black ink stained seafood pasta and a selection of ices.

The dawter and her beau took me to Brighton.
As devoted young folk they are making sure this old dame doesn’t spend life on her own. The old git is always invited but he cares not for anthything outside his armchair.
So we set off, in the sunshine, to the coast. It’s only 45 minutes away from the cottage.
Blue Tooth on the dawter played my 70th birthday playlist.
Sun belting down as Smokey Robinson belted out ‘Just To See Her’ .
I sat on the back seat and sung along.
Steely Dan, Stevie Wonder and Cuban stuff had me moving my shoulders and hips as we drove past Lewes and arrived in Trafalgar Street car park.
There’s a little caff with big sandwiches and favourable staff.
‘Hold onto your panini’ they said.’The seagulls will have ya.’
And bugger me if those huge birds don’t swoop down pecking at your pecorino.
After a cup of Rooibosh tea we set off for a mooch.
Brighton was lovely.
Loads of sunny children, delightful dogs, and smiling lesbians.
A lot of lesbians actually. Vesta would hve been proud.
We walked through the lanes.
A four piece band, consisting of a double bass, guitar, banjo and fiddle player, performed on the side of the road and played hill billy versions of Bob Dylan.
An attentive audience clapped and whooped
We walked past ‘Dirty Harry’s’ the best shop for vintage dungarees, then right and left to ‘Feathers’, a crystal shop selling Turquoise jewellery, joss sicks and readings in the back room.
After buying bits we went to the White Rabbit pub. Sat in the back, with the suns rays and a group of men.
The sound truck in the caff was tinkly cutlery, and gentle giggles.
The sound track in the pub was utterly different. Noisy bass guffaws, and the scraping of metal chairs on the ground.
Back in the day the old git and I went for our first and last fancy holiday to Barbados.
We had a lad – ‘The flower man’ who chewed on Impatiens, commonly know as Busy Lizzies, who drove us around the island and bought us cannabis and gin.
He offered his services, of an intimate nature, until we finally told him that we weren’t in need of his hospitality.
By the end of the holiday we had run out of money. So we sat on our balcony – next to a fancy restaurant – and bought potatoes and packet soup. The microwave pinged as we enjoyed next doors sound track. The chinking of glasses and high peeled laughing of the wealthy patrons. Their soca music played as we enjoyed our pea and ham soup and baked spuds.
I thought we should make tapes, when we got home. Sellable sound tracks to enable people to have an Italian experience in their home in Basildon, or a Spanish Tapas evening in Reigate.
We were too late to the party, there are loads of cd’s out there doing it already.
But today our backing tape consisted of squealing children on the sea front. The booming men in pub and the cheery chatter from the caff.
In truth, I’ve always had a sound track to my life.
Now, more than ever, I provide my own background music.
Headphones in I can turn any journey into a Symphonic adventure.
I Know he was a pig, but Wagner, when the clouds are low and rain threatens, you can’t beat a touch of ‘Tannhauser’.
Bach in the frost is a wonderment.
Not to mention Charley Haden and Pat Metheny, when sadness hits, it encourages the tears to roll.

After the pub we walked to the car and drove to HOVE actually.
There was a fair old queue outside Marraccos
Children in swim suits.
Gay men with chihuahua’s in their handbags.
Italians who know a thing or two about gelato and us.
We decided on blueberry cheesecake and strawberry and almond.
The beau went to the beach whilst the dawter and I queued.
She went to use the facilities and I ordered something else entirely.
The blueberry and strawberry had gone.
I had kiwi sorbet and raspberry ripple and she had chocolate chip peppermint and salted pistachio.
Those queues are not there for nothing. The ice-cream was utterly delicious.
We found a bench and sat looking at the sea and licking our cornets.
On the way home we had Latin music a fitting accompaniment to oxeye daisies and new beech leaves.
I apologised for being the third wheel but the dawter said I wasn’t.
We left it at that.
But I am aware that the truth about devoted children is a difficult one to face. Now that I’m a sort of widow – not quite the old git is hanging in – but the truth is that they feel responsible for your well being. Learning how to accept that generosity has been hard, but I’m getting there.
I can sit on a bench slurping my ice cream and turn my back on them so I’m not so intrusive.
I can sit in the back of the car, clapping along to ‘I Like It Like That’. A song written by Tony Pabon and Manny Rodriguez, an influential boogaloo song from the 60’s.
I close my eyes and as the music plays I am not old, or my mother, retired or invalid. I am a a gal who likes to jiggle to boogaloo beats.
My very patient dawter allows me in. There are those that say I brought her up and so she owes me her devotion, a kind of payback. I don’t see it like that.
She has a life so when she says I’m invited along to a day trip to Brighton I accept in the knowledge that if she didn’t want me around she wouldn’t ask me.
Vive les familles.