Autumn was now over, and the cold, dark winter nights were drawing in fast. We made sure we has plenty of provisions to hand, such as calor gas bottles, mantles for the lights, bags of coke, firelighters and matches. It became necessary now to light the old coke boiler, but this job in itself was a daily tribulation. The idea of a flue pipe running from the boiler, up the lounge wall, and out of the top of the caravan was, I’m sure, designed to take the fumes outside. So why, I wondered after lighting the fire each day, was the boiler belching these choking black acrid fumes, back into our living quarters? By the time the coke had eventually become red-hot glowing embers, it was well past our bedtime, and so was of little use to us then. Keeping warm in bed however was the least of our worries. It was our heavy bedspread which caused the problems – the enormous multicoloured fur coat filled with bone and tissue! Totally immovable once in place, and even more likely to smother us to death than the pungent smoke from the boiler! We also had mice, although why they chose to live with us, when the house fifty yards up the garden, was a much better place, I will never know. They never managed to steal any food from us; the afghans saw to that by catching every stray crumb before it even hit the ground! So I think the only thing which kept the poor little souls from starving , were our clothes; at least it would appear that this was the case, by the amount of extra holes that had suddenly appeared in our garments. As luck would have it, it turned out to be an exceptionally wet start to the winter, so it was little wonder that the grassy area outside the caravan became extremely boggy, the sixteen permanently filthy paws had to park themselves somewhere I suppose, but why, oh why was it always on the furnishings? Eventually the bench seats we sat on got so saturated that they began to disintegrate, so we had no option then but to cover them with plastic. It seemed only sensible to take the sodden carpet up at the same time and replace it with lino to permit easy cleaning. Normally this type of floor would worry me, because the dogs could easily slip on it, but the floor area was so small that they had nowhere to go even if they did slip. The incessant rain not only ruined our lawn, carpet and furnishings, it also put an end to our building project. All through autumn mountains of earth had been shovelled out manually in readiness for the extensive trench to be filled with concrete. Once this was done building could start, then at least we would have something encouraging to see ABOVE ground level. The trench was filled in far sooner than we had anticipated, not with concrete, but with rain water, so all we had to show after months of intensive labouring was a rather picturesque but useless moat. From the moment winter spread its icy fingers over us, we experienced the most unendurable conditions in the caravan that one could imagine. But as if that were not enough, we then had to cope with a catalogue of unsavoury events. I lost count of the number of times I almost threw in the towel. The only thing which helped keep my sanity was the fact that I was a born optimist, and luckily this kept me going until the following spring. Because there was now only one wage coming in, our funds were fast becoming depleted. Building materials had to be paid for, we had ourselves and four dogs to feed, and there was the weekly rent to pay my parents for the facilities we used, namely water. The reason we hadn’t amassed a great amount of capital over the past few years was because we had a hefty mortgage, and when we sold our home, as luck would have it, there was a dramatic fall in house prices, so we eventually ended up with very little profit. I couldn’t get another job because there was no one to look after the dogs, so during the long dark evenings we would entertain ourselves by juggling our dwindling finances on paper to try and make ends meet, whilst we listened to the monotonous hiss from the gas mantles and the infernal drumming of the rain on the thin aluminium roof. Yet even worse was to befall us, for when we were at our lowest ebb, an unforeseen bombshell hit us. We were suddenly presented with a prodigious bill for the small plot of land on which we were building our home. Apparently before our move, my parents had employed a valuer to assess the value of our land, and so we were now asked to pay the full going price, which was a considerable amount to us. At that particular time, my parents were anxious to amass as much money as they could, in order to pay off a hefty debt they had just incurred. They had borrowed money in order to buy a plot of land on the Welsh coast, on which they were having a holiday chalet built. It was considered to be a sound investment because when rented out, not only would it give them extra income they needed, it also provided them with a nice little holiday retreat during the out of season weeks. Initially when my mother had said that a small area of the grounds could be mine if I moved back home, I had been under the impression that it was going to be a gift, some compensation for all the inconvenience and loss of money we had borne during our move. In addition there was the fact that I was working full time for her as an unpaid kennel maid, gardener and home help all rolled into one. However the bill had to be paid, which reduced our capital to virtually nothing, but at least we still had one wage coming in. Spring finally arrived, and not before time. We had finished the foundations and were eager to start building above ground level, thereby having something to see for our efforts. We were fortunate, in that the stone we were to use was from the old cotton mill at the foot of our lane, the very buildings in which my interesting but rejected cockroach had been housed all those years ago. The mill has recently been ravaged by fire and was being demolished for safety’s sake, but that was our gain because we bought the stone for a very reasonable price. The delivery charge was negligible, the mill site being so near. Indeed it could be said that we were but a stone’s throw away! During the day I would try and get as many chores out of the way as possible in order to spend the evenings working as a builder’s navvy and within a matter of only six months the outer shell was almost completed. There was still a very long way to go before it was even half way to becoming habitable, but at least now we had an idea of the size and shape it was going to be. It was during this, our second summer, that a single incident was yet again to change our whole direction of life.............to be continued
Posted on: Tue, 22 Oct 2013 07:08:29 +0000
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