“The grass needs cutting” said Eva, over breakfast.
“But I have some esoterica to listen to, on Radio 3” explained Adamson. “ ‘Ursula’s Horn-Rimmed Glasses’, an unknown opera by the unknown composer Vladek Hodget. Anyway – where are my muffins? It’s Thursday.”
As a boy, Adamson’s grandmother had always given him muffins on Thursdays, while his mother practised Northumbrian folk songs, like ‘What Fettle, Geordie, Hinny?’ and ‘Divvint Drop Yer Dottle On The Proggie Mat, Pet’ - and while his father hid in the cupboard.
In lieu of demanded muffins, Eva went off to dust. Eva always rated the practical over the esoteric, but Adamson was more poetic.
“That man you’re going to marry” her father had warned her, “will listen to unknown operas over breakfast. I know his type.”
“And I might have to write some poems later.” Adamson called out. Having been married for 40 years, Adamson at least recognised the significance of a sudden need to dust.
You wrote me a poem once, thought Eva ruefully. That was 40 years ago.
Distracted, she knocked ‘The Monarch Of The Glen’ off its wobbly nail and it crashed to the landing floor.
Recognising this further sign, Adamson called out “Er - I’m just taking the cat for a walk”.
“Cats don’t need taking for walks, they’re perfectly capable of walking themselves!” replied Eva, but in this she was quite wrong. In fact the cat was quite amenable to being taken for a walk, especially if it went past the fish and chip shop.
The cat’s name was Rover, because Adamson had really wanted a Mynah bird, which was flatly refused. So in one of those convoluted domestic compromises, he agreed to settle for a cat, but insisted it be named Rover. Rover was commendably stoic about the choice, though he studiously ignored Adamson if he shouted the name in public.
“That man you’re going to marry” Eva's father had said, “will end up taking cats for walks. You see if I’m wrong.”
Eva entered the dining room with a broken picture frame, raised eyebrows and duster stowed regimentally under the armpit. Rover could also recognise signs and, quickly reasoning that he was perfectly capable of walking himself, he left.
Adamson regarded the shattered monarch, and attempted levity. “Oh how the mighty have fallen...”
The eyebrows failed to fall. Recognising the moment for another domestic compromise, Adamson said “I’ll get the lawnmower out”.
For 20 minutes Adamson mowed competently, accompanied on earphones by Ursula’s Horn-Rimmed Glasses and supervised from the fence by a returned Rover. Moved by the aria where Ursula is finally reunited with her spectacles, he carelessly ran over some fallen apples, jamming the mower blades.
Eva sighed a sigh that had matured for 40 years. “I’ll make some muffins”, she conceded.
“Come on, Rover” said Adamson, brightly, and after first checking quickly that no one else seemed to have heard, Rover followed.
And so it came to pass, that Adamson and Eva had to leave the garden – because of an apple.
(Apologies to Leonard Barras for nicking his style and characters - try to find the original if you can, the man was a genius)
