28.1.70
Dear Mum, here’s the rest of what I was going to say in
yesterday’s letter, which you will no doubt have received by this time, and
equally no doubt can probably barely read. On Monday, I went back up to the
Crowls’ to give Reg a hand throughout the day at the Mentally Handicapped
Centre, to do stocktaking of the Christmas stuff they had left. We spent a
fairly calm but hard-working day doing this, and he took me to lunch at a place across
the road about 1.00. Did I say that Nina is finally moving today, in my last
letter? I don’t think so, but anyway this is the end result it would seem of
nine years of not-very-happiness in the Crowl household.
I got most of the following at the lunch we had, and
honestly I really feel very sorry for Reg. He’s a marvellous person and
fabulously generous, and to have had this sort of tension in his house for the
last nine years is pretty hard. In fact, up until this latest episode which has
resulted in Nina’s going, I had never thought he looked old, or behaved like an
old man, and it’s only now that he’s started to look tired and weary and a bit
fed up. [He was sixty-four at this time.] He’s even said he’s feeling old which isn’t
like him at all.
As I’ve said to you before I’ve always found Nina charming, so
that it seems incredible that she has been in that house for the last two
months and Not Spoken to Reg once! The only time I’ve ever come up against
anything other than charm was at Westgate that time, when if Reg and Margaret
and I went out and were relaxed about the time a bit [as in getting back for the all-important tea], we were told off not by Mavis,
but by Nina. And on one or two other occasions I’ve dared to argue about
something with her the surface Nina has gone and a much less pleasant lady has
appeared. Reg puts it down to her having been spoilt all her life because of
her heart trouble ˗ it would seem there is probably no reason why she shouldn’t
have ever worked, but she never has. And while she hasn’t ever lived off anyone
in particular, she’s nearly always lived with one of her sisters since her
mother died. She has a pension but obviously this isn’t enough.
And Reg is worried too about Margaret who must obviously be
left on her own some day. He says that Mavis’s sister Phil would look after her
for a start at least, but it seems both to him and me that she must get used to
not necessarily living with her relations. Margaret in fact is apparently quite
happy with the idea of staying somewhere else ˗ boarding with someone for
example ˗ but it is the relations, and especially Mavis who won’t hear of it. This
seems very short-sighted to me. I said for a start to Reg that at least she had
plenty of relations, but he was just sourly amused: Mavis’s brother and wife,
who would be the most able to look after her, have carefully never bothered to
look after Nina for more than some months when their mother died, although, Reg
says, he promised his mother that he would. So it seems as if there is no
likelihood of their doing anything about Margaret, either. What a business, isn’t
it? The Good Lord will no doubt keep an eye on her, but as with any problem, he
likes us, I’m sure, not just to sit around waiting for him to make a move. [After I returned to New Zealand, Margaret
got married, in fact, to Brian, who also had some degree of mental disability. He
died later, and Margaret seems to have coped since then, keeping in touch with some
relatives on Mavis’s side.]
Which brings me to me again! I went to a play last night (Edward II, with Ian McKellan, the new up and coming boy, it would
seem, and it was very good too, even though I must have missed about the first twenty
minutes!) and on the way home as I was doing my usual ten minute walk from the
tube ˗ I do most of my meditating there!! ˗ I fell again on the problem of where I
am going and what I am ultimately to do with myself. And honestly I must have
been getting so worked up about it lately, that I finally burst into tears (!)
and snuffled my way along quite a considerable bit of the road. That cleared
the air at least, and I’m sure I felt a conciliatory pat on my shoulder from my
much neglected Guardian Angel (I wonder what his name is? Fred, do you think?)
And at Mass this morning (that’s one of the advantages of
going to work at night, I can go to Mass on both Wednesday and Saturday) I said
to the Good Lord again to give me a push in the right direction, because I don’t
know if I can be bothered with much more of this rather futureless outlook, and
the idea has arisen in my head that it might be worth carrying on and
completely my ATCL [Associate of the
Trinity College of London, in piano], and possibly LTCL [Licentiate], and looking into teaching, because
the more I look at it the more it seems to be clear that I’m just not good
enough to take up repetiteuring full-time. I could get there in each case, but I’m
not quick-witted enough, I think, to know what I’m doing without having worked
at it. Therein has always lain my problem, I believe.
So I’m writing to Trinity College to find out if my
Practical bit of the ATCL is still valid and if it is, or even if it isn’t, I think
at least having that aim in view might be more valuable than carrying on as at
the moment, hoping one day I’ll know when I’m ready enough!
One of Mike’s friends, Mervyn, that I met again last night
when we three and Kathy went for a drink on Mike’s Irish citizenry, said
something about teaching ˗ he teaches foreign students more advanced English ˗
and that is probably where the notion has arisen. What sort of teacher would I make?
That doesn’t matter yet ˗ but I’ll see how this Trinity College business works
out. I begin to think that I must always have sort of aim in view otherwise I don’t
bother. We’ll see what gives from here, anyway.
Love, Mike.
[A good deal of this
was a real loss of confidence after being regarded as something of a failure at
the Opera Centre by the staff. I was actually a good sight-reader, and capable of working hard musically. I suspect if I’d pushed myself I could have made
a living in London, musically, doing a variety of jobs, and in time would have
had enough contacts to keep the work coming in. C’est la vie.]
