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Andrews UK - Janet Ollerenshaw

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89 pages

English

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Old Bess, young Bess, Elizabeth, Lizzie... are we at the beginning or the end? In a Back to Front and roundabout way, Bess tells the story of how her paths have crossed and sometimes run alongside those of the people she has been sent to guide and support.As her personal story unfolds we learn that she has not just one path but many and that chronological time is irrelevant when it comes to spiritual guidance and purpose. Although Back to Front can be read alone, through Bess' story we are able to 'join up the dots' with some of the characters that peopled Inside Out and Upside DownBess is the swan sailing serenely across the water, while her coronet wings protect her young charges and her webbed feet paddle furiously beneath the surface.

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Publié par	Andrews UK
Date de parution	08 mai 2018
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781785388965
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0200€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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BACK TO FRONT
Janet Ollerenshaw

First published in 2018 by
AG Books
www.agbooks.co.uk
Digital edition converted and distributed by
Andrews UK Limited
www.andrewsuk.com
© Copyright 2018 Janet Ollerenshaw
The right of Janet Ollerenshaw to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

This work is dedicated to my parents,
Chris and Desmond Dunn
This year (2017) both aged 91, they have celebrated 70 years of marriage.
They are an inspiration to everyone in the way that they have always supported one another, my brothers and me.
They have nine grandchildren and ten great grandchildren all of whom love them to the moon and back.
I count myself exceptionally lucky to have been born to such a wonderful couple who, although not perfect, are perfectly suited and are undoubtedly extraordinary.
Mum and Dad; I love you!
* * *
I also wish to make special mention of my cousin, Dr Keith Barnard (1942-2017) a fellow author who encouraged and supported my writing aspirations.
Thank you; I miss you.

My heartfelt thanks go to;
My parents whose unconditional love has supported me in every venture I have undertaken;
My children whose acceptance of their slightly ‘crazy’ mother has allowed me to demonstrate my craziness in writing;
My teaching colleagues and fellow students who gave me the confidence to write; and
My brothers who made me stronger than I believed I could be.
In particular, I thank Mark, without whose constant encouragement, love, support and unfailing enthusiasm, this work and its predecessors may never have materialised.
To my agent, Darin Jewell, Andrews UK and to the many others who have made possible the production of these books and the realisation of a dream, I give you my everlasting gratitude.
...To everything, turn, turn, turn.
There is a season, turn, turn, turn.
And a time to every purpose under heaven...
From Turn, Turn, Turn by The Byrds, lyrics © T.R.O. INC.
* * *
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 The Bible; King James Version
The swan sails serenely over the surface of the still waters. In its wake, a trail of arrowed ripples disturb the mirrored image of the cloudless sky and a brief burst of rainbow colours suffuse the dying day with a bouquet of liquid light. Oily pinks, gold, silver and blues mingle with green water; dark feet furiously paddling below the surface, an orange and black beak and snowy white feathers on the proudly curved neck and coronet wings embrace a clutch of fluffy grey cygnets nestled safely on their mother’s back.

Chapter One
She was no ugly duckling! But then neither was she any great beauty. ‘Plain as a pikestaff’ was the most usual way her father affectionately described his youngest daughter. Emily Amelia was the seventh child and fifth daughter and although her sisters, Julia, Sarah, Susanna and Ursula, always insisted she should have been the second and Susanna (or Sarah) last, they were not! It became a family joke and in every ancient, sepia photograph of the five girls that I ever saw; irrespective of age, height or demeanour, they stood in the same order. Grinning and pointing at their female siblings, their brothers, Christopher and Gabriel, like protective guardian angels, would stand one on either side of the row of girls. The ‘holy horrors’, as they were dubbed by their decidedly un-angelic brothers, were, in my humble opinion, neither holy nor horrible.
Perhaps it was entirely coincidental. Perhaps it was some slightly twisted joke played on them by their parents or maybe it was purely by chance that their initials spelled out that name. The family were not overtly religious. Oh they claimed to be CofE on all documents requesting such information, and they attended services often enough to be considered ‘proper’ but there was little devotion to the church and apart from obligatory attendances at fetes and festivals, the entire family avoided any form of declaration of faith. The children were not baptised, despite it being ‘expected’ at that time and it was quite apparent, from my observation of the reactions of other villagers, that they were considered to be somewhat heathen and bohemian in their behaviours.
There was much whispering behind hands cupped round gossiping mouths whenever one of the girls passed through the village; muslin covered wicker basket swinging gently on a bare arm, with dusty shoeless feet and a flimsy frock floating about her bare brown legs in the summer breeze. Or, in winter, boots, several sizes too big and unlaced, flapped against woollen stockinged stick-like legs and an overlarge cloak, its hood pulled down close over flowing curly locks, was wrapped around a too thin body. They were not poor; they simply didn’t see the need to conform to society’s expectations of fine clothes, good food and empty manners. They were respectful and polite, educated and intelligent; they spoke quietly and listened genuinely with obvious interest. They were kindness itself and were always prepared to help anyone who was brave, or desperate, enough to come to them for assistance. Nevertheless, the villagers, wary of the unconventional, largely left them to their own devices and they, in turn, remained on the outskirts of society much as their rambling old home was situated on the outskirts of Minchington village.
Christopher and Gabriel were the eldest and second children of Marion and Arthur Morgan; both were born prior to WW1 and were respectively eight and six years older than their sisters who were born in five successive years soon after their father returned from the front line. The handsome boys were wild and inclined to be wayward and headstrong; a consequence of their often absentee father and an over-indulgent mother who, despite her maternal responsibilities, was inclined to take long rambling walks across the countryside, collecting herbs and flower, to daydream and to read books when she might perhaps have better spent her time disciplining her sons.
Emily Amelia was my best friend. Actually she was more than that; she was my saviour and my soul mate. Now I don’t mean that in any soppy romantic sense because the truth is that we were only about three years old when she first saved me.
* * *
Perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself; I suppose I should begin at the beginning although, to be honest, I’m not very sure where the beginning is. Sometimes it seems that there is no beginning and no end; only timeless in-betweens...
Locked away in the deep recesses of my mind there are memories of a time before time, where shapes, sounds and senses are indistinct. Feelings are softened and there is an overall air of well-being and comfortable nothingness. Remote figures come and go, busying themselves with vague yet seemingly necessary tasks that power the perpetual motion of a wordless routine wherein nothing is set and yet all happens just as ordained. A mighty machine made up of many parts, connected and yet unattached, intrinsic and yet separate, vital and yet insignificant. And, above all, the omnipresence, the driving force, the great magician who holds all together in the palm of an invisible hand which, whilst the other turns the mighty wheel of inevitable providence, fends against the ever intrusive and inevitable interferences of chance and chaos.
It is only with hindsight that I can, albeit poorly, describe these memories. I offer no explanation; that is for you to discover if you so choose, I merely set out to tell my tale and if perchance it resonates with you, let us simply rejoice in our mutual acceptance of what is.
* * *
In my most vivid recollections, I was an inquisitive child. The world I found myself in was full of mystery and wonder. As soon as I was mobile, I would crawl out into the meadow-like garden that surrounded my parents’ country home. At the time, having nothing with which to make comparisons, I did not know how fortunate I was to live in such relative luxury. The house was a large, stone built farm house with a stable yard and associated outbuildings. There were paddocks and barns, chicken runs and rabbit hutches, all in various states of disrepair, and there were many cats and dogs, both working and house pets. Blackie, the pet sheep, lived in the kitchen and the geese who were supposed to be guarding the driveway, often crept into t