Sports Day

As you know, we spent last night in the camper van at the side of the road.

It had been a glorious day, hot and sunny enough to have a very comfortable picnic: but as we laid our heads on the pillows we heard the first spots of rain pattering on the roof.

The pattering turned to a heavy drumming, which in the end turned to the dog moving up the bed to sleep somewhere else because I had forgotten to shut the window and he was getting wet: which fortunately alerted me to the small damp patch beginning to develop on the quilt in time to take restorative action.

We lay in bed and listened sadly to the rain. We had known that it was forecast and refused to believe it, because it was Oliver’s Sports Day and I had been quite sure that the forces that manage the Universe surely wouldn’t do a thing like that.

Mark was entirely sanguine about it. It would be all right in the morning, he promised: and of course he was right, and I had been entirely wrong to doubt the kindly Universe, because by the time we got to Aysgarth the world was dry and warm, not sunny, which is good for Sports Day, but still and pleasant and lovely: and our little boy was there, freckled and beaming and tousle-headed and bouncing up and down with excitement outside the school hall, and we hugged each other until we almost burst.

We all went into the Sports Hall, hand in hand with our newly reacquainted son: not for the sports, but because the day started with a concert. This turned out to be absolutely brilliant: strings and woodwind and a rousing brass section, and the lovely soaring voices of the choirs. In the end my favourite bit was the bagpipe band. Bagpipes are a sound that I like very much, and I don’t at all blame the Queen for wanting one to be an alarm clock outside her window in the mornings, I would do the same if I were Queen and had more money and fewer neighbours.

Oliver was not in the concert, as he is fairly devoid of musical ability, and also for entirely understandable reasons the school is fairly reluctant to give the small boys trumpets, so he sat next to me and we clapped until our hands hurt, and after that came the Sports.

This was wonderful. I am not remotely interested in sports of any description, and Oliver was only in three races out of about forty, so I was hardly captivated by his performance: but it turned out that the four Houses were absolutely neck and neck in the competition, and in the end it was quite thrilling, because every boy ran his heart out. We were watching from just by the finishing line, and it was brilliant to see the ferocious determination on their faces as they pounded up the track: and then the marvellous toothy grins as they clapped the winner on the back cheerfully as they strolled back.

It was easily one of the nicest sporting events I have attended. The boy who has had the double lung transplant because he has cystic fibrosis won his race and was awarded a standing ovation by every delighted parent and boy in the place, and he jolly well deserved it, it was such an ace feeling to watch him and share a bit of the pride in it.

After that came the speeches, which were helped along with glasses of fizz to make everybody feel mellow and cheery and chortle in all the right places, which I did, partly because I had been too nervous about being late to eat breakfast. Also it is not often that I go to somewhere where the speeches have started My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, and they have meant it, because one or two parents have got thrillingly glamorous titles, although disappointingly they just wear tweed jackets like everybody else and not robes or coronets or swords or anything, which I think they ought to, what is the point in being called Lord Something and not at least having an ermine collar or a ceremonial dagger?

Last was the picnic, which was lovely, because the sun shone, and the boys charged about happily, and we sat on rugs on the cricket pitch and ate pork pies and roast ham and garlic cheese and salads, and drank lovely fragrant elderflower fizz, until in the end we felt a bit uncomfortable and full.

We tidied everything up and repacked the picnic bags and I am sorry to say that I slept all the way home.

It was a lovely day. We have got Oliver at home now until Tuesday, which is splendid, and then in a couple more weeks it will be the summer.

And we are grateful to a benevolent Universe.