Having seen myself as predominantly a fiction writer for the last ten years or so, I’m finding myself increasingly drawn to reality. Not that I no longer believe in the necessity of fiction for telling truths, just that I seem to have to lost the taste for making it. Is this just laziness on my part? Or an inevitable preoccupation with health and ageing? At any rate, I’m reminded of my mum (again) this morning as I spoon marmalade onto an oatcake. In her last weeks, she took to ‘ordering’ toast and marmalade at random hours through the day (and probably night) from the harassed care home staff as if she were in an exclusive hotel although by this time she had given up a life-time’s dedication to the impeccable manners which would have served her well in the Ritz or the Savoy and had taken to scooping the orange goo out of the plastic container with her finger. Not an inspiring end to a life or an enviable one although much is made these days of the importance of being ‘authentic’, of the ability to be yourself and know yourself. And much to be said, perhaps, for contentment, for the ability to let go of what no longer serves us well.
I have my eye on that ticking clock this morning. Partly this stems from conversations last week on the edge of the dance floor. One friend recounts his mother’s comment as she potters round outside the home she has lived in for more than twenty years – ‘I’ve no idea whose garden this is’ – and we discuss the challenges of dealing with the ageing process and not just in relation to our parents.
An odd consequence of the tango culture is that the perceived need to ‘get dances’ above all else means that there is rarely space to chat with fellow followers. Last week was an exception although tales of a summer spent travelling or staying happily at home in the heat both left me feeling rather out of sorts, having been strapped for cash and lacking the energy to do either. I’m inspired by one suggestion of the Canaries in autumn before I remember my growing credit card bill.
Not everyone has had the best time, of course. I approach someone with whom I have never before exchanged more than the briefest hello, to find that she lost her husband a month ago. I knew that he had been ill for some years and that she cared for him at home. As she spoke about his last months, the inroads of the illness, and the happiness of almost 50 years of marriage – ‘I’d been with him since I was 14’ – what shone through was her extraordinary strength and the remarkable gift of love which she’d been able to give him. I snivelled my way through the conversation, moved by a detail here, an anecdote there, recognising that she evidently felt loved in return. As she spoke about the final days, I remembered singing to my mother as she lay unconscious, an odd departure for two people who never in life shared an interest in music. Our conversation ended with an update on another older friend with his own health issues. ‘He’s determined to die on the dance floor,’ she said.
Photo: Sarah Lee for The Guardian This morning an email introduces me to Paul Mayhew-Archer, diagnosed with Parkinson’s seven years ago. Deciding he could either laugh or cry, he chose to laugh and took his stand-up show ‘Incurable Optimist’ to the Edinburgh Fringe this year. An English graduate and an ex-English teacher like me, Parkinson’s has given him a ‘greater sense of purpose’ than ever before and he is now working on a romcom set in the Oxford Dance for Parkinson’s class which featured in the documentary he made for the BBC in 2016.
I have recently been suffering another crisis of confidence about my capabilities as a dancer. Part of the self-doubt no doubt familiar to most tangueros, the ‘P’ thing adds an extra edge. Today I’m hovering somewhere between feeling motivated by the lives of others and heading for the marmalade. But how hard can it be, really, to get over myself and just make the best of what I have and can do? Time to follow Fred and Ginger and pick myself up, dust myself off, start all over again:
Before the fiddlers have fled,
Before they ask us to pay the bill,
And while we still have that chance
Let’s face the music and dance.
Stephen Moss's interview with Paul Mayhew-Archer 'I wanted to show people with Parkinson's can do comedy' was published in The Guardian on 20 July. The documentary 'Parkinson's: The Funny Side' is available at BBC One Inside Out South.
'Pick Yourself Up' was written in 1936 by Jerome Kern (lyrics by Dorothy Fields) for the film 'Swing Time', which features a Fred Astaire whose 'two feet haven't met yet' apparently struggling to learn to dance with teacher Ginger Rogers
'Let's Face the Music and Dance' from the film 'Follow the Fleet' with Fred and Ginger was written by Irving Berlin, also in 1936.
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