Taking a Walk Down a Country Lane In Summer

Chapter One- Emma

Chapter One- Emma

         Benny must have left the window open when he left this morning. The vague sunlight shines in the window and picks up the dust in the air. He's always doing that, and especially in the spring when it gets cold if you do. The breeze picks up the cream and yellow curtains and they billow around.

       Snuggling into my blankets, warm and cosy, it annoys me, and i get up to close them.Just outside the caravan, i spot the herd, coming to close and one taller beast reaches up to eat a strawberry leaf. I shout and they scatter, wickering amongst themselves, laughing in their own way.

      When i say to people- very rarely- that i share my caravan with Benny, they either think he is my brother or my boyfriend. To get this down here now, he is neither, but he might as well be family because he is the best -ive got. And when i tell them- usually first- that i live in a caravan, they think i am a gypsie. Again wrong, we travel, yes, but me and Benny- or Benny and I- belong to the circus.

         A real circus, with curious animals, and artists and magicians and trapee artists and dancers. The field now on the mornings after a show are quiet. Quiet except for the horses guzzling grass and nuzzling each others flanks. They are as much a family as the people around here.

    I say here, we move around so much, but Devon is always nice and that is where all our caravans sit. Two people per caravan, maybe three, sometimes four, and about fifteen horse-drawn vans. Then there's the three motorised animal trucks, each with sleeping compartments and loners who join us as we arrive.

       Hell of alot of people when you think about it. In my time with the circus, i have seen amazing things, and whilst some were just tricks, they all had something beautiful that people came to see.

        And that is not so long a time. I have known the circus since i was three years old, and that is eleven years. I think of what else i would have done if i hadnt been found by the Mothers, and jump, still smiling as i hear a loud knock at the door.

     It's a wooden door that echoes. I can hear the persons heavy breathing so i know she is burdened with something. Its saturday morning, and i pull open the door when i already know who's standing at the botto of the steps.

     Mamma Sam. Her arms are laden with baskets of clothes, and her warm face, round and full in her seventies, still grinning and smelling faintly of baked goods. If she wasnt holding a thrid of the camp's dirty washing, i would have flung my arms around her wide middle.

      I smile instead and hold up a finger, before going back inside the caravan and taking first a wicker basket of equally grimy clothes and a large towell. Closing the van door behind me, i spot a handful of other campers doing the same.

      "We havent got all morning, Emms." Mamma Sam laughs with her rich cornish accent and you have to concentrate to understand her. "And how's the flock the s'morning?"

       "I've got enough for breakfast and more for tea." I tell her,and we laugh like friends as we head off walking slowly towards the back of the camp, down by the river.

      There is already a few people around now. The mothers are loved second to none around here. They are the ones who cook, wash and sew, they laugh and clean and smile and they found me at the care home. Thats where all us kids came from. At every care home, the Mothers watch for a little child, and if they see promise, then they get adopted and join the circus. Better than running away anyway.

        First, there's Mamma Sam. She is the plumpest and the best cook, but she first joined over fifty years ago as a stable girl. We dont have stables any more, nor stable hands, but Mamma Sam says she wont leave the circus 'til she fades away to nothing. Mamma Sam says alot of stuff like that.

        Living in the same large caravan as Mamma Sam is Mamma Tango. Of course, when she wasnt eighty-two and grey-haired, Mamma Tango danced. Danced beautifully, but now she fixes costumes and paints pictures and teaches the little ones everything they know.

       Youngest of all, Minty lives with them too. Minty isnt called Mamma, she's just Minty- short for Araminta, and always reads, cooks and tells everyone she meets a new famous quote she's just found. Minty was the one that adopted me, and i'm not sure why.

        Back to me. I'm just me. I have light brown hair, that curls and waves all over the place, and pale blue eyes. My nose still looks pixie-ish, like my ears and high jaw bones, but 

even Tony the Rubber Man- who fits through toilet seats- says i am too skinny and too pretty. Don't know how anyone can be too pretty, and i thought i was just ordinary really, but i still blush when they say it.

        Down by the river, the other Mammas and a few girls are waiting for us with the clothes. They have bowls of warm river water, and we all take a few baskets each and shove them into the water. Scrubbing and hanging then on nearby trees for nearly an hour. And we talk as we do, and often sing too. Josie leads. About mid-twenties, Josie sings 'like a lark' everyone says, and i've never heard a lark but her voice is prettier than any blue tit or starling.

         The younger children undress and splash around in the river, until one of the Mammas gets splashed and she chases them out and smothers them in towells until they are clean and dry again. The sun still shines without any gusty wind, and it's a sweet, nice morning.