The Guest List - My Dream Dinner Party

It’s Feb 2021 and we’re in the midst of a pandemic. The dinner party was arranged over a year ago and it’s been in the planning stage ever since. I sent out the invites back in March and got some lovely replies. Dolly even said she would cancel her concert at The Super Bowl. I told her I’d rearrange the party but she was adamant - my event was far more important. She must have heard about the other guests. 

Michael sent a beautifully handwritten letter on Hotel notepaper, all the way from Bangkok. He said he would come by train. Joan and John had actually got together and sung their reply, which was spectacular and very touching. The response from Father X was predictably formal, typed on expensive looking vellum, informing me he had several food allergies, and signed in a spidery script. I used the letter to light the fire that evening.  Miriam was the only one unsure whether she would make it. She was supposed to be filming but hoped she could come as she ‘loved a good nosh up.’ She would let me know nearer the time. I was on tenterhooks for a while, waiting for the final reply, till I got a scribbled message on the back of a beer mat pushed through the letterbox, ‘Thanks, I’ll be there, JBJ’  I was slightly disappointed at the brevity of the note and the absence of kisses from my long time heart throb, but I guessed he must be busy. 

Now the dinner party is looming and,  amazingly, all the guests have agreed to my suggestion of self isolating for ten days before the night, and remaining here for ten days afterwards. This adds quite another dimension to a simple dinner party. I’ve changed all the beds and put chocolates on the pillows, but I’ve made it clear that if anyone goes down with covid they’re on their own, no matter how famous they may be. I’ve ordered the champagne, the flower arrangements and some ridiculously expensive candles that don’t actually smell as nice as the Aldi ones, and bought the ingredients for a meal that I hope will be impressive but not so complicated or time consuming that it keeps me away from my guests.  

Tonight is the night. 

I wonder, nervously, who will be first to arrive. I think I’d prefer Dolly or Miriam as I’m sure they’d keep the conversation flowing. There would be laughter and possible a quick song. I check the table, give the wine glasses another wipe and remove my apron. I don’t normally drink alcohol but I pour myself a large glass of Dutch courage just as the doorbell rings.  

I peer through the side window, my heart thumping. Yes! Dolly is at the door, looking tiny and glamorous, with the biggest bouffant, and a designer suitcase by her side. She is smiling that massive smile and laughing at someone in the shadows. Michael has arrived at the same time.  I welcome them in, take Dolly’s case and Michael’s rucksack, and offer them drinks, hissing at the husband to fetch the canapés. It seems Dolly and Michael are well away, which is a little worrying. Although I want my guests to get on, I need them to be here on my terms. Does Michael not realise he’s the one man I’ve been wanting to marry for the past thirty years? I decide I’ll give it a bit of time before I mention that. And Dolly, well, Dolly is a visual treat and part of the entertainment. 

Miriam and John also arrive together. I’m glad to see John has his guitar - and Miriam is looking as dishevelled and barmy as I’d hoped she would. Joan - also with guitar - is next here, and by this time the pre dinner drinks are going down well and conversation is flowing nicely.  I do a quick head count and surreptitiously signal for the husband to move away from his spot overlooking Dolly's chest and go and fetch more canapés. 

Suddenly, conversation stops and everybody looks up. There is extremely loud music coming from outside. My heart throb has arrived. I check myself in the mirror, open the door and JBJ bounces in, guitar blasting out. I thrust my burning cheek towards him for a kiss but he’s gone, lost in the music, and already in the middle of the group. Before I can offer him a drink there is a tapping at the door, and I retrace my steps. Here is the guest I’ve been waiting for. Father X stands, bent, resting on a stick, looking weak and vulnerable. His eyes are pale and watery, practically unseeing. I invite him in and call for the husband to take his coat. I feel my heart lurch as I grab his arm and guide him towards the music. 

I realise the old priest must be deaf as well as practically blind as he allows himself to be led into the room and settled in a chair. He doesn’t seem to register the group in the middle, bouncing up and down, playing guitars and singing like there’s no tomorrow. It would be a really happy sight if it weren’t for my stomach churning every time my eyes rest on the priest in the corner. 

As we settle at the table I explain about the place cards, which contain not just their names but the reason each guest was invited. In turn they pick up their cards and read aloud. 'Joan Baez, John Prine and Dolly Parton are some of my favourite singers and seemingly kind, caring people.' They smile at each other and nod and look happy with that.  Michael reads aloud, ‘Michael Palin, you are funny, kind and appear totally genuine. For this reason I would like to marry you if it ever becomes possible.’ He laughs, gives me a wink and takes a gulp of his wine. 

Jon Bon Jovie picks up his card: ‘Jon, you have been my heart throb for many years.  My children laugh at me but I go weak at the knees when I see you.’ He grins and blows me a kiss as I blush deep red. 

‘Miriam Margolyes, you are funny, rude, intelligent, outspoken and full of great stories,’ Miriam laughs, ‘and I love the fact that you wear outrageous clothes and don’t care what anyone thinks.’ She looks up and gives me a powerful high five. Finally, it’s Father X. Dolly nudges him and his eyes come to rest on his card. ‘I can’t see well enough....’ he starts. I grab the card and tell him I’ll read it. ‘Father X, I met you a long time ago,’ I begin, hesitantly, ‘you...... were the priest we saw before we got married.’ I think I detect a slight flinch. ‘I...... thought you might never get another opportunity like this to meet these famous people, so..... here you are.’ I slip the card into my pocket, as the priest, puzzled, casts his eyes around the table. Dolly pulls him to her bosom and everybody cheers.  I breathe a sigh of relief and give the husband a nod to bring in the prawn cocktails. 

The food - and the booze go down well. The dinner party draws to a close. The guests make their way upstairs and queue for the bathroom.  I’ve put Miriam and Dolly in the attic as they're both game old birds, and watching them climb the stepladder could be the best entertainment of the night.  It also keeps Dolly well away from future husband, Michael, and heart throb, JBJ.  Father X looks lost and worried. He wants to go home. He’s forgotten his wash bag and needs a clean cassock for the morning. He assures me he’ll self isolate for ten days at the presbytery. I call him a taxi, remind him to wear his mask, and wonder if he’ll last that long. 

As I get undressed the priest's place card falls to the floor. I pick it up and read it slowly, although I know it off by heart. ‘Father X, you are here as you were very unkind to me a long time ago. You asked to see me and my fiancé two weeks before we were due to be married. You told me, an atheist, and Dave, a Catholic, in no uncertain terms, that mixed marriages don’t work.  I cried. I was angry and upset and felt strongly that you should have kept your views to yourself. Tonight you meet us both again. You can see we’re still married nearly 50 years later. You were wrong and we were right. I wanted you to see that. I think an apology is in order.’ 

I screw up the card, and drop it to the floor. I'll use it on the fire in the morning. 

With thanks to Dolly, John, Joan, Michael, Miriam and JBJ for being such great company. And to Father X for making up the numbers.

The Guest List by Jill Reidy

Who should I invite 

On this so special night 

I could do with a really good mix 

Intelligent chat

But not too much of that 

It’s more about getting my kicks 

John, Dolly and Joan 

As a trio unknown

Michael was fantasy spouse 

And old JBJ

Well what can I say

That hair, those eyes, that mouth 

Then Miriam M

Mad hair, what a gem  

And no chance of being a bore

She’ll entertain us

With a joke and a cuss

And her belching and farting galore.

The elderly priest, 

A reminder at least 

Of the bigoted views from that day

Once so mean and unkind

He’d be trapped as we dined 

Would I voice what I wanted to say?

Thanks for reading...... Jill

Disclaimer: Just one part of this is true - guess which? 

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Altered States - "Turn on, tune in, drop out"

The effects of an over-indulgence of Bacardi and coke in my youth shaped my almost tee-total lifestyle.  I should have known better.  Being a licensee’s daughter, I’d seen enough of the downside of having too much to drink in other people.  The strange feelings I had in my head, referred to as ‘being merry’ was no enjoyment.  It was a scary, altered state of mind that made me feel horrible.  The experience taught me to be wary of alcohol and anything else likely to mess with my thought process.

When I was a young teenager, just getting into the Moody Blues, progressive rock, Rolling Stones and later Beatles stuff, it was cool to know who Timothy Leary was.  I thought he was a named character in a Moody Blues song. When I found out that he really existed, I understood him to be a psychedelic guru who opened people’s minds to another level, to see things in a different way and hear music beyond the sounds coming through the speakers from the vinyl. I didn’t know how he did it. I was happily naïve.

LSD – lysergic acid diethylamide – a hallucinogenic drug which Timothy Leary, actually a clinical psychologist, considered to be useful in psychiatry therapy. It was a known recreational drug in those heady, hippy times of the ‘60s and some of the songs from the musicians of the day sound like they were enhanced by something and the lyrics made no sense, well, not to me, but I loved them anyway and still do, in my un-altered state.

 

 

 

Nice to be Here

 

Nice to be here, hope you agree
Lying in the sun
Lovely weather, must climb a tree
The show has just begun

 

All the leaves start swaying to the breeze that's playing
On a thousand violins
And the bees are humming to a frog sat strumming
On a guitar with only one string

 

I can see them, they can't see me
I feel out of sight
I can see them, they can't see me
Much to my delight

 

And it seems worth noting water rats were boating
As a lark began to sing
The sounds kept coming, with Jack Rabbit loudly drumming
On the side of a biscuit tin

 

I can see them, they can't see me
I feel out of sight
I can see them, they can't see me
Much to my delight

 

Silver minnows were devising water ballet so surprising
A mouse played a daffodil
A mole came up blinking underneath an owl who's thinking
How he came to be sat on a hill

 

I can see them they can't see me
I feel out of sight
I can see them, they can't see me
Much to my delight

 

I know you won't believe me, but I'm certain that I did see
A mouse playing daffodil
All the band was really jumping, with Jack Rabbit in there thumping
I found that I couldn't sit still

 

I just had to make it with them 'cause they played my kind of rhythm

 

Ray Thomas  (1941 – 2018)

 

 

Thanks for reading, Pam xx

 

 

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What Dreams May Come - For Branwell, With Love

I can’t remember much of last night’s dream. Vivid though it was, it faded into nothing by the time I was ready for the day and I blamed it on the amount of chocolate I’d eaten just before bedtime. Dreams are nothing more than wishes, it is said. Hopes and dreams of both the attainable and the unreachable, we can only wait and see. I would love to retire to my chosen place in Scotland, eventually.  If that dream doesn’t come true, I’ll have to cope with a compromise and increase my regular visits instead.

Patrick Branwell Bronte couldn’t cope when his hopes and dreams came crashing down to shatter his heart and soul. My interests and studies of the Bronte family have brought me to believe that Branwell, as he was known, was every bit as talented as his sisters but never approved of his own efforts.  I wish he hadn’t obliterated himself from the family portrait he painted.  His lack of self-approval led to unsuccessful career appointments and eventual self-destruction, after the love of his life, Lydia Robinson nee Gisborne let him down. She was the wife of his last employer, the Rev. Edmund Robinson, a sick man close to the end of his life, who sent Branwell packing when he discovered what was going on. Such ‘goings on’ is shrouded in the uncertainty of whether there was an affair, or if it was Branwell’s fanciful infatuation. When Rev. Robinson passed away, Branwell expected to be reunited with Lydia, but it was not to be. According to Rev. Robinson’s Will, she would be cut off without a penny if Branwell was back in her life, so she distanced herself, married someone else, yet regularly sent money to Branwell. He was a broken man, haunted by unrequited love and seeking solace in alcohol and opium.  He was further disturbed by Lydia calling out to him in his dreams. He died aged 31, of tuberculosis aggravated by alcoholism and laudanum addiction.  For me, Sally Wainwright captured his character, and his sisters, perfectly in her drama To Walk Invisible.

 

I wrote this poem about him a few years ago.

 

Patrick Branwell Bronte

 

Poet and artist, your fallen talents go to waste

And are trapped within the torment of your mind.

Forbidden love, so heavenly to taste

Now haunts and disturbs; no beauty left to find.

The call of temptation and no wish to be chaste,

But to be drunk on the perfume of bodies entwined.

Oh Branwell! Your vision clouded by opium and gin

And the burdening weight of adulterous sin…

                                                    PMW

 

Branwell wrote this sonnet for Lydia –

 

Lydia Gisborne

 

On Ouse’s grassy banks - last Whitsuntide,

I sat, with fears and pleasures, in my soul

Commingled, as ‘it roamed without control’,

O’er present hours and through a future wide

Where love, methought, should keep my heart beside

Her, whose own prison home I looked upon:

But, as I looked, descended summer’s sun,

And did not its descent my hopes deride?

The sky though blue was soon to change to grey-

I, on that day, next year must own no smile -

And as those waves, to Humber far away,

Were gliding – so, though that hour might beguile

My Hopes they too, to woe’s far deeper sea,

Rolled past the shores of Joy’s now dim and distant isle.

 

Also by Patrick Branwell Bronte, The Doubter’s Hymn

 

Life is a passing sleep

Its deeds a troubled dream

And death the dread awakening

To daylight’s dawning beam.

 

We sleep without a thought

Of what is past and o’er

Without a glimpse of consciousness

Of aught that lies before

 

We dream and on our sight

A thousand visions rise

Some dark as Hell some heavenly bright

But all are fantasies

 

We wake and oh how fast

These mortal visions fly!

Forgot amid the wonders vast

Of immortality!

 

And oh! When we arise

With ‘wildered gaze to see

The aspect of those morning skies

Where will that waking be?

 

How will that Future seem?

What is Eternity?

Is Death the sleep? – Is Heaven the Dream?

Life the Reality?

 

Thanks for reading and may your dreams come true, Pam x 

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Then the day came...

by Colin Davies

It's about 5 days before when I actually start to think about it. I’ve been mulling it over in the back of my head since the date and theme were announced, but to actually think, deliberately, and with purpose, 5 days. That’s 120 hours from the speed of the idea to standing up with my smart phone throwing caution to the wind.

It works like this. I suddenly realise I haven’t got a clue what I want to write. I know I want to stay on topic, I’m very anal about that. No matter what the subject I must deliver at least one poem that hit’s the theme, however tenuous. So hour one, realisation, rabbit in the headlights, an idea is needed.

I stare out of the window at the passing world and create two lines. These are going to be the basis around which the whole work is created. I smile and know I now have 119 hours to make it work. Hour two, slight panic.

Everything in the next few days is simple and carefree, I have four, three, two days to come up with something else, not an issue, I’m throwing words away in this time, like they mean nothing.

Then comes the next momentous event in the process, I’m an hour from going to bed on the Thursday night. Less than twenty four hours from now I will be sat in the Number 5 Cafe listen to the works of other truly talented poets and it hits me, “I want these people to like what I do.”

The carefree attitude that has caused me to be so disposable with my scribblings changes. Ego has come for a visit and told me to pull my socks up.

“How can you be taken seriously by these people” he says stretching his hand towards an imaginary photo of the Dead Good Poets dressed for graduation as if they had just stepped out of a John Hughes movie “They know what they’re talking about, you must try harder, for my sake.”

“Ok, Ego,” I reply somewhat in shock, “I’ll make a sandwich and get on with it.”

Ego smiles at me, but not in a happy way, more a kind of “You’d better” sort of sneer.

I go to the refrigerator to gather everything required for the assembly of a cheese sandwich. I pick up the butter, bottle of salad cream and pull the draw open where the cheddar lives. I notice a couple of bottle of Beck’s Veir hiding at the back of the middle shelf.

“You alright there fellas?” I ask greeting them.

“We are too there sir.” replies to one on the right in a West Country accent, “writing poems again?”

I smile, “Am I that obvious?”

The Veir on the right just smiles while the more Welsh sounding bottle on the left pipes up, “The theme for this month, what is it?”

“The Olympics?” I shrug.

“And what have you got already?”

I have an overwhelming feeling of embarrassment which I try and hide from my hopie friends by looking down at my feet and mumbling.

“What was that?” said Left.

“Speak clearly?” demanded right.

“And that is how I won gold...” I pause, breathe, “at the sexual Olympics.”

Some people say that the cruelest sound in the world is the echoing howls for an animal in pain that you have no chance of helping. I argue that your beers laughing at your humble attempts at verse from the inner sanctum of your own fridge can make you feel worse.

I slam the door shut. It’s doesn’t stop the sound of the chuckles, just reduces the volume. I continue with my bread and dairy composite and return to my laptop. I want a glass of milk to help, but the bullying I know that would come from the beer is too much to handle.

Now, I have to make this work, Ego is relying on me. I finish my sandwich, put on my headphones, select something I think will help, at the moment that always seems to be David Bowie. For this task, it has to be Diamond Dogs.

Stretching my arms out, interlocking my fingers and cracking my knuckles I breathe deep. The keyboard looks slightly blurry. I begin to type, pushing the flashing black cursor over to the right giving this new work a title “The Sexual Olympics.”

The blank page looks bigger than the room, I blink, take another breath. It’s this next moment that I can never get used to, as part of my preparations, my routines, I always take this opportunity to fall into a very deep sleep of which I am unaware until my partner Heather, taps me on the shoulder at 4am to ask me if I’m coming to bed.

I look up at her with surprise and notice the look on her face. She has just read the title and is wearing disapproval very well.

“And what did the beer have to say about this?” she asks.

“I think they’ve stopped laughing now?”

She shakes her head, “You’ll be fine, do what you always do and write it at work tomorrow.”

 

Her trusting tone makes everything calm, Ego smiles and nods in agreement.

The preparation is what you have to do for you. Everything you read is just an opinion, you have to try them on and see how they look, and what works, works. For me it’s being remanded by my ego and ridiculed by my beer. Everything else is just my own fault.

***

Colin Davies is a local author, regular contributor to the Dead Good Blog and a highly respected poet.

His incredible book, Mathamagical, is available from a variety of sources, including Amazon.

To find out more about Colin and his writing visit the Mathamagical page on FaceBook.

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4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42

By Ashley Lister

SPOILER ALERT. DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU HAVE ANY INTENTION OF WATCHING THE TV SERIES LOST. I GIVE MY INTERPRETATION OF THE ENDING HERE AND I DON’T WANT TO SPOIL IT FOR ANYONE. SPOILING THE SERIES WAS THE JOB OF THE WRITERS.

I could do it. I could do the desert island thing. And I wouldn’t need those eight records that everyone else wants to take to a desert island. I would just need the following:

1) Broadband. How the hell am I expected to blog each week without a broadband connection? I don’t mind if I have to lose my mobile. If I’ve got my mobile logic dictates I’d feel obligated to phone the emergency services and say, ‘Help, I’m stranded on a desert island.’ But, if I have a PC with a broadband connection and an active email address I don’t think I’d feel that need to call for assistance.

2) Microsoft Word. I’m a writer. This is one of the essential things a writer needs.

3) Alcohol. I’m a writer. This is one of the essential things a writer needs.

4) Chocolate. I’m a writer. This is one of the essential things a writer needs.

5) The companionship of the writers of the TV series Lost – so I could maybe eat them when the food ran out.

I mention the writers of the TV series Lost because that was one piece of fiction that I thought was brilliant – right up to the crushing disappointment of the final episode.

The episodes were beautifully written and well-acted and the scenery was to die for. The lovely Barbara Thomas (a previous guest blogger here) introduced me to Lost. She and her husband Jim discussed the myriad possibilities of the Lost-universe and encouraged me to venture my own theory as to what was happening.

I said I thought it was a metaphor for purgatory. The characters were waiting to move onto heaven or hell, depending on where they belonged.

I was assured by several knowledgeable people that variations on my theory had been suggested on many online forums, where it had been dismissed as being too clichéd. Particle Physics was more heavily favoured. Multiverse theories were bandied around and strongly supported. Adam McCance (another previous guest blogger here) said it was all Hurley’s dream.

Guess what happened in the final episode. Can you guess? I’ll give you a clue: I was right. I’d been right since the first f***ing episode.

So, because I was lured into watching six seasons of this series to suffer the disappointment of an unsatisfactory ending, I’d want to take the writers of Lost with me. However, in retrospect, I might not eat them. I’d be worried it would leave a nasty taste in my mouth.

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