A Delicious Life: One Moment at a Time

About the Author

Gary Yardley has been running an international consultancy company for twenty-four years. His hallmark is creatively identifying business opportunities that accelerate an individual’s potential. His work demands he connects quickly with people from vastly differing cultures, background and beliefs.

He enables others to create experiences of substance assisting them towards their dreams. He has, over his career, written fourteen business books on leadership potential and extolling successful values.

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Dedication

This book is dedicated to all those who patiently care day and night for the elderly. It is all those little things you do that soothes a restless spirit trapped within the confines of a bed. Your smile, your thoughtfulness and kind acts may go unnoticed in today’s world of an instant everything, but never by those who are awaiting their last breath, a lingering demise. To Jessie, I do thank you for sharing the magic of a sensual conversation, one I very much needed as a young man. You offered me the chance to explore a different life sway, one less hurried and all consuming. Your frankness assisted a daft bugger to discover the inherent beauty contained within your stories freely given, creating the possibility that I, too, might make my own indelible memories shared.

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A Delicious Life

Published by Austin Macauley at Smashwords

Copyright 2018 Gary Yardley

The right of Gary Yardley to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All Rights Reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with the written permission of the publisher, or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

A Delicious Life

available from the British Library.

www.austinmacauley.com

ISBN 9781786931573 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781786931580 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781786931597 (E-Book)

First Published in 2018

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd.

CGC-33-01, 25 Canada Square

Canary Wharf, London E14 5LQ

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Acknowledgements

Tatiana, thank you for your relentless perspective

To Stella, your patience wanting of ordered words

To Celestina, your delight in a playful grammar

And lastly Jennifer for adding your discerning belief.

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Disclaimer

Some names, places and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

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Introduction

This is the extraordinary true story of Jessie and her beautiful sensual journey through a delicious life lived and loved. During her last few months, she chose me as her confidante, an unwitting pupil to share her treasured memories. A life story which touched me, one whispering an enriching sensual pathway awakening a young man lost and haunted by his recent past. She had wanted her last sensual conversation and I very much needed my first.

I met Jessie at the twilight of her time while she waited with indignant impatience to breathe her last breath. She had been left to die in ‘God’s little waiting room’, a small nursing home in the inner suburbs of Sydney. The hidden rest home was disguised behind the decaying facade of an old Victorian mansion, grand on the outside, ramshackle, dowdy and stale on the inside; just functioning yet always moving forward regardless of the death toll to all who dared to dwell within her walls.

I had taken the job of night nurse at the home to fill in the restless night-time hours by channelling my energy into caring for others, and just maybe myself. I remember the first handover and the recounting of its eleven residing characters. She had been described as a charming, vivacious spinster who had withdrawn more into her shell, becoming hushed to her life ending. They felt she might be slipping away, not towards death, more into a stilled aloneness offering no future to enjoy. I had been asked to check out her mental faculties and to see if I could draw her out a little from her building solitude. The novelty of a male nurse might just do the trick to tickle her spirit outwards to find her needed solace.

Before even meeting Jessie, I had decided I would try nightly to make this woman laugh or smile at life’s silliness. Little did I know of the fascinating delights locked away in her astonishing mind and what was to be in store for me if only I could listen to more than just her spoken words.

It wasn’t long before my first astounding conversation with Jessie on the first of many bleak winter nights. The corridors held a dark eeriness, the old windowpanes rattling to the heat on the inside, expanding the cold air on the outside. I paused in the gloomy passageway to the muffled sounds of someone trying to sob herself to the hidden escape of sleep. There was no anguish heard, just an unerring acceptance that this was a part of her existence; to be alone and to relive the mixed fortunes of her past.

I felt compelled to enter her room, not in response to the tears heard, more of being drawn into the silence between the sobs by a voice unspoken, wanting company to express her words. It felt like a haunting whisper asking of anyone to become its final audience. Sliding around her half-closed door, I saw her ghostly frame lying scrunched against the heavy white sheets and turned away staring at a bare wall of crackled cream paint. From beneath her wrought-iron bed the night-light shimmered a deep lemon hue giving her nightgown and shawl a radiance of a spirit trapped in turmoil. I sunk into her battered tan vinyl bedside chair which had seen many better upholstered days. I knew she had felt my footfalls and heard the settling groan of the chair. I stayed present allowing her sobs to yield to the silent voice hidden now awaiting company.

Hello Jessie, is there anything I can do to help you to sleep without tears tonight? I knew she wouldn’t reply straight away. Her dignity wouldn’t allow her to sniffle in front of a stranger because this was not the done or proper thing. With the knowing patience of a drawn-out night ahead, I waited in silence, a stilled pause, wanting Jessie to emerge in her own good time.

Her small room had been stripped bare of the charming fittings of the Victorian era and replaced by grey squeaky linoleum floors, a hospital bed, emergency signs and starched austere linen of the barest thread count. The only surviving period features were the beautiful cornice and ceiling rose decoration way up high, more reflective of Jessie herself, her body ravaged by time, leaving her mind open and up on a high, reliving the painful reminders of glad times now forgotten.

In slow and awkward turns and twists, she sat up, gained her composure and looked at me as if examining an unexpected oddity. Her weary eyes shone a glimmer of hope at the possibility of a fresh audience.

Kind sir, will you show me how I can die?

I studied her washed out face of tears, her proud jaw set full of resolve shaking off her sallow sagging skin.

Why are you asking me this?

Young man, I have lived over ninety-eight beautiful years and I wish to die but I am unable to do so.

What’s stopping you? I asked. You look like an engaging woman who knows her own mind and you do seem to have a clear grasp of your own will.

It’s not that simple. She tugged on the frayed ends of her shawl.

Excuse me, why not? I asked. She smiled softening her tone as if talking to an innocent child.

You are a funny one. You see, my genes won’t allow me to pass with ease because all of the women in my family live to be at least a hundred and that is just the way it is.

She continued on to say all her once beautiful impeccable senses were now working against her. Where once there had been such wonder in a delicate touch, now there resided a dull ache and stiffness of movement.

I have lived a sensual life where each day has been a joy to behold, and this is not how I wish to remember and experience my good fortune gone. So, I shall repeat my question; kind sir, will you show me how I can die?

I’m sorry Girl, I can’t give you your wish. But what I can do, if you like, is to sit with you during the night and listen to you talk of your beautiful life memories.

She raised an eyebrow of curiosity, now expectant of something new. Will you do that, young man?

She waited for my nod and sighed.

And along the way please tell me how other patients wait with any patience for death to visit and then pass a silent, peaceful crossing into the night.

And there it was. A quiet agreement forged out of loneliness for Jessie to relive the story of her delicious life, to recapture the beautiful essence of her extraordinary adventures and me, to challenge her spirit wanting to learn more about sensuality. I knew little or nothing about this strange yet alluring topic rarely being discussed amongst mates or even taught in schools. No, this felt more a life lesson waiting on you to stumble and hopefully learn its foreign graces.

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The story of A Delicious Life unfolded over those next couple of months. These stories occur in the sequence of when they were told, not chronologically. She, quirky enough to never give a date just a vague period and, if I had the audacity to seek clarification, she would give me a wry smile and say, Back then it was a different time and place.

Between forty and sixty percent of each story is as told to me in her own quaint style, a spoken fondness for extolling the beauty of language. The rest follows the essence of her tales but lacks the exactness of her words. I have tried to keep these tales told within the propriety of the sensual and the erotic because they were neither pornography nor salacious rhetoric. I have also drawn from the beautiful life lessons she gave freely extoling her generous spirit. She would have been tickled pink that I had listened and just maybe learnt a little along the way about becoming a sensual man.

You may be wondering what an old lady from a bygone era could ever offer in the way of enlightening another in the delights of sensuality. At first I thought likewise but I had no cognisance of the urgency and the desperation of the ravaged times which had gripped her life and influenced her choices.

She often worried what she spoke of, to a passion, might be perceived as somewhat shocking or would appear to be seen as a trifle silly old woman voicing sensuous things in a delightful whimsical tone of an early senility. She would then pause and say, Bugger it, I am too old to care what others think plus it is my right. I am old enough to be honest about my sensual yearnings to both the world and myself.

I have added snippets from our discussions together. Sometimes these would occur over many hours before the tale would be spoken. She rarely went without a smile although at times this beamed only to mask the hidden tears of both sadness and joy.

After recounting each story she played music and asked to be alone to drift off listening to the tunes, once again to relive the beauty of the moment just spoken. I have included most of her songs, well, the ones I can remember. They were almost always male artists, referring to them as her ‘gentle-men’ accompanied by a warm chuckle ending in a wistful sigh.

I finished my night shift to a freshly made pot of Earl Grey tea to reinvigorate her for an early morning chat; a special time allowing me to ask Jessie a question or two about the night-time tale voiced after reflecting on the meaning during the wee hours of my shift passed.

This is her delicious life and I hope you will find some inspiration from her stories and lessons freely given. If you were to ask what I wish from my own life, my answer now and will always be—I want to live a delicious life.

Young man, life is a simple wonder; an hour is filled full of distractions, a day to its routines, a week with chores, a month with concerns and a year with events. You see, a moment will always be too brief, an instant expression of the emotion without reflection; just the movement it causes, sending never-ending ripples throughout your life. It is like the second hand on a watch; it moves fast and there is no second to waste and no second time around before it is forever gone. The true beauty of life is to live completely in the present and then collect these glimpses of an existence to be cherished and treasured at your leisure, allowing them to fuel your desire to live a timeless moment.

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Enchanting Moment 1

Gently as a Man

The next evening was a blustery, chilled Sunday night and I was busy taking care of others, plumping pillows and saying goodnight. There is always this clearing away of daily clutter from passageways, checking and tidying to ensure the ordered routines were in place to settle the night down to its creaking hush. It wasn’t until quite late before I had a chance to sit and talk with her uninterrupted.

She was one of the three residents who could hold a conversation, the rest were victims of senility or ruptures in the mind’s vessels causing strokes, taking away their ability to ask or do. These restless trapped souls needed constant care and regular tender attention to ensure a degree of comfort to ease their quiet distress awaiting a sometimes relentless struggle.

In comparison, Jessie appeared a grand wilful character; a proud tall robust woman now succumbing to an age worn crouch, a humble bowing in readiness to meet her maker. She despaired in weariness of aches where each unsettling movement reminded her, without any respite, of life’s joys long gone. The mere act of shifting her weight in bed brought sheets and blankets to tussle with an awkwardness, caught up in the wriggling desire to bring the barest of momentary comfort.

Hello Girl, how are you this evening? I eased into her bedside chair.

Good evening young man.

She was propped up in bed, wrapped in her pink shawl and shuffling piles of handwritten notes and faded papers.

May I ask, what is it with these papers strewn about the room? Have you been busy collecting your somewhat messy thoughts or have they escaped you girl?

Shush now, my papers are the way I like them. Except, dammit, the one I cannot find. It is infuriating to not have things close to mind.

At last she looked up from her papers and I could see she’d brushed some colour to her cheeks and lips.

Now, whilst you are here I could do with some fresh air. The smell of this place pervades into my bones. I know incontinence is an awful thing but on these cold nights when the heater is up high it has such a pungent acidic odour. Could you please open the window?

I arose and pulled the sash to open the window a smidgeon; the cold dank air immediately tumbled through. Happy now?

Thank you. The thought alone of this foul chemical smell over the next two years dampens my spirit, let alone making my nose somewhat redundant.

Jessie girl, be grateful you still have some of your senses or else I shall get out the old English Lavender Talc to dust over your crankiness. I returned to the bedside chair.

She ignored my remark and carried on regardless of my desire to play. You know, some days I cannot smell; it’s as if the brain has become used to it or finds it so offensive. I am afraid my nose might decide to take away the gift of this sense due to misuse or lack of variety. Sorry young man, I do seem to be prattling on a bit tonight.

Try grumbling, you old grouch! I said with a warming smile while still trying to draw her out.

Oy young man, less of the old! I thought we had this conversation, or maybe we should, you impudent young pup!

She chuckled, her weary hands now relaxing to her lap.

Young man, tell me what gets up your nose in this place, as you have to clean up this smell and far worse?

I hesitated, struggling to find adequate words. Not much. To be honest, it scares me to see the end of life battles and I wish it on no one. The confusion is the most unsettling. Dementia has robbed them of any logic but sometimes they’ll have a lucid moment or they make pitiful sounds and I feel their distress calling. It’s like they’ve been forgotten never to be heard again.

She bit her lip; her eyes were reflecting her thoughts about the true gravity of life—its unrelenting growth and decay. I changed tact and grinned. Jessie, do you ever feel invisible at times? You know dear, like you are deaf. Would you like me to speak up so you can hear more clearly?

If I could reach you with my walking stick it would have another more valuable use; like knocking some cheek out of you. I’ll give you dear!

She laughed a deep belly laugh belying her sadness yet unable to slow the quickening feeling of something lost now settling in, not knowing the cause but only feeling its weight.

Young man, the moment has spoken and she will, often. Listen to the simple message and try not to fathom its meaning. You must do what your heart or intuition tells you. Please, you must honour her grace.

We settled into those drawn out seconds of stilled minds reflecting different thoughts but both reverent of our pasts lost. I knew she was ready to tell her story. She’d spent the day preparing her thoughts and refreshing her memories but now she appeared to hesitate, an uncertainty to how I might respond to the telling of her sensual experiences.

Now young man, are you sure you want to do this? I must warn you, I might just shock you.

I wondered to what could be so shocking or troubling but she didn’t wait to hear my reply. She had carried this memory close to her heart every day for over seventy plus years and, if she did not speak now, she feared she never would.

***

One could sense her restless agitation and trepidation had been slowly building, tipping her body forward in the bed finding the bedside table to rest her elbows, her head cupped in her worn wrinkled hands.

"Oh I must speak of this man because my heart will break if I can never recount and share his story. His name was James, a real gentleman, polite, attentive and caring. I first saw him at a local dance and felt my heart taken in an instant by his charming presence; a dashing character seeming to capture the eye of everyone he met. I had never even realised he had noticed me. Therefore it came as such a great surprise when I received his card inviting me to accompany him to a formal dinner in the officers’ mess.

Forgive me, young man, because I haven’t set the scene into its proper order, as one should do, painting the picture of those moments now departed.

This occurred during the middle parts of the World at War, myself being in my early twenties, serving as a secretary in the British intelligence at a remote English country estate. Lots of gloomy thoughts and things were going from bad to worse with no real glimmer of relief. Spring had just sprung and the air felt rampant, full of everyone’s hopes expecting a turn of good fortunes. The English countryside flourished her abundance, filling out the scraggy hawthorn hedgerows guarding her twisting lanes, and dancing to a new more vibrant cycle of life.

The night of the dinner had crept up all too soon. There wasn’t much choice about my dress; I had to wear my heavy serge uniform. But a woman does like to feel special. After rushing around, I borrowed some silk stockings. Oh my, they felt a sheer delight; delicately sending tingling tantalising tickles of impure sensations. I can still feel the wilful, silken caressing of my long legs underneath the prickly wool uniform. I felt so alive; each step taken became an inviting reminder of finer things and exhilarating possibilities of what might be.

Right on time he arrived at my billet, a little cottage on the outskirts of the village. At first he appeared so proper and formal I assumed something must be wrong. And then he smiled a gentle carefree grin, such a charming illumination slicing through me like a hot knife slips through creamy rich yellow butter.

When he put out the crook of his elbow, a gentle offering to take, I knew I would be his to our first innocent touch felt and taken; my senses were reeling, heady and all aquiver. We walked to the officers’ mess past fresh sown fields. The ploughed earthiness mingled with the calming scents from the blush of spring buds. I became transfixed and intoxicated by drinking in all of his potency and nature’s vitality.

We arrived and he introduced me as his ‘dear friend’ Jessie’.

The evening rushed by in a blur of sights and sounds with little, or nothing, registering except the odd obscure details; like how he held his glass, with his fingers entwined around the vessel, firm and strong yet appearing smooth and sexy. I felt myself wandering to thoughts that made me blush, such delicious ideas leaving me envious of his glass. I know it sounds silly but I can still see the glass as clear as if it were here in front of me now.

The stroll home down the moonlit country lane felt akin to a light-hearted skip wanting of her own spring delight. We both slowed wanting to savour and prolong our shared moment. The crisp evening breeze captured the filtered light of the swaying scraggy hedge, illuminating our path to its dancing patterns. The scrunch of the coming frost, trying in vain to cool our rising ardour, reaching our tender exposed ears and noses, tingeing them chilled, wanting to seep further under our clothes. Together our strolling bodies’ heat started to affirm their own huddled exchanges of love’s first wanted embrace.

We talked… well, he spoke; I, more fearful of what to say to this wise gentleman. James, I guess, would be some ten years my senior and I felt like a young girl of seventeen on her first date. The sound of his voice, hmm, such deep rich resonant tones playing a song and captivating my heart. Few if any of his words were registering, my mind having been carried away to the sound of his hinted lustful tones, my ears strained to hear more. I could sense his virile intentions voiced behind his carefully chosen sentences. My body nestled in closer seeking the heat of his unspoken desires to a quiet agreement; shamelessly I would be his for the taking if he wished. I know, shocking to say, but it was how I felt back then, and still do till this very day.

All too soon we arrived at my cottage. I felt desperate at the impending ending of our evening and wished only to invite him in, but this wasn’t the way things were done back then. He walked me arm in arm to the door, stepped inside a second to make sure I felt safe and then turned to leave.

I called out his name, ‘James’, not knowing what else to do. He stopped and paused, then turned back to stand close, a breathless distance while appraising my quivering lips. Gosh I so wished for the taste of his lips on mine. But no, he reached out and took my hand, to gently kiss it, like real gentlemen used to do. And then he placed my hand on his trousers; such a delicate touch yet firm enough to register his swollen manhood, an urgent hardness which felt rock hard like dense granite.

Unsure of what to do, I found myself breathless and unable to respond. In a stilled second, I felt his body pulse and he whispered three short words, If you wish. Then he turned and left before I could say or do anything.

If I wish! I felt myself instantly overwhelmed by a woman’s dampness, a delicate oozing sensation from every pore of my body. Moisture began beading across my upper lip gaining a swift passionate momentum, trickling a wondrous course all over my body, now sweltering a smouldering pooling between my breasts, triggering a sudden flood to flush away my evening’s creeping dampness. Yes, I succumbed to a shameless release pulling me to my panting knees. I found my sanctuary on the floor, reeling to powerful surges of emotions leaving me feeling saturated and longing to touch him once more.

After a while, I gathered myself up except my senses. No, they were now long gone, held hostage by another’s want. I dragged my wracked, spent body into bed and retired to a fitful rest for the remaining few hours before a new day awaited—a different unshackled life."

Jessie fell silent scrutinising me, unsure of how I would respond to her admission. Did you get your wish, did you… ever get to touch him again? A faint heart-wrenching gasp escaped before she could speak.

He had left the next morning on a mission. I waited patiently on his return opened up like the first buds of spring, yearning to feel nature’s rising heat, the renewal of life. I thought the winter’s darkness had passed yet it turned out to be a false spring. I never saw him again. To this very day I still do not know what happened to him. No word or explanation given, an instant cold snap crushing my very brittle existence. It felt like carrying around a patch of black ice over my heart, invisible to the eye, yet dangerous to the touch. Many times I felt myself slipping and sliding headlong into my own personal abyss; to be opened expectant, and then to be crushed, to a tragedy without substance, not enough time to know and too much time to not want. My heart has never let him go—my James, my gentle-man.

I’m sorry to hear of your loss. I brushed her speckled, bony hand and spied the tears welling but not willing to fall.

May I ask how your one evening with James influenced the remainder of your life?

She sat a stilled pause seemingly stretching time. I turned to leave her to the quietude of loss, a solace settled in both her and the poignant night.

"He shaped me like no man has. Oh he was, in the truest sense, a real gentle-man. He respected me as an equal, treated me like a lady and touched me how a woman should be by a gentle taking of my hand wanting to hold. He knew what I wanted and then took me a step further to where I wanted to be. He never presumed nor did I think him to be improper. Oh I felt him in my hand and in my mind all the way inside— pulsating, firm and forever young. He knew the important difference between desire and lust; to be desired as a woman by another brings her such a wicked joyfulness.

From that day onward, I knew what kind of man I wanted to desire and be desired by. I do thank him for his outrageous gesture, for I realised that night, it was up to me to ensure my desires were fulfilled. Although his actions were at first shocking, they live on as a sensual, confident and tender memory, a reminder to cherish life’s riches, to take risks and accept opportunities without fear of rejection."

She began to organise the papers on her bed into a single pile, like she had some strange order to the stacking, signalling the end of the conversation. She asked if she could be by herself to return to her own thoughts and to listen to her song sung to remember her James on the compact disc player.

Jessie’s song:

Wonderful Tonight by Eric Clapton.

As I write this, I can recall the smooth eerie strains of her music escaping room eight, drifting down the darkened corridors renewed. It didn’t matter that the sounds wafted on haunting the remaining hours. It felt like a dear old friend staying near. The nostalgic strum of the guitars and the deep gravelly tones gave me a vivid image of the young Jessie strolling down the moonlit lane, arm in arm with her dashing James.

***

The next morning she requested the first of what would become our ritual morning cuppa. She liked to wake at the first light of dawn refreshed regardless of the amount of sleep taken or needed.

Well, young man, do you have any questions or did I shock you like I warned you I just might?

You never know girl, I might just shock you by my question asked?

Hmm, I doubt it young man, far too many years of life experience. Mind you, one does love a challenge. Go on then, shock me.

I hardly know you and there you were rushing off headlong into your story without even a decent hello. Definitely no time to enjoy slow meandering to a gentle chinwag with you is there.

And your point being? Oh yes, you don’t have one… like your supposed question of shock. Two can tease young man.

Fair enough… are you ready over there?

I could be dying a slow death before you get around to asking, you daft bugger.

Okay here is my question; why didn’t you grip him like he held the stem of the glass to your own improper thoughts, making you blush? … knowing I might have just pushed my luck and over stepped the bounds of propriety, but she had called me daft!

Oh my, you do know how to shock. I’m a little lost for words that you saw through me. She sat there searching her answer before laughing her delight to an endless giggle.

Gosh you are indeed a cheeky one, almost to the point of rudeness yet so very right. I have asked myself the same question over the years. I guess the image of the glass and her stem remains so vivid today because of what my mind has always wished I could have replaced it with. How did you make the connection, if I might ask?

Because he had held what you could never hold for yourself, stretching your own longing, wanting of more when there would be none. Plus, you had a twinkle to your eye like the crystal glass voiced. She looks at me a little uncertain at first.

Maybe not so daft after all. I’ll have to keep an eye on you young man.

Let me reassure you, being daft comes naturally.

She smiled and then asked if I could do her a favour, one, at the time, I felt unable to comply yet she was adamant I agree to.

Young man, when you do meet James one day, please tell him Jessie loves him with all her heart. And say thank you as I still hold dear his one obdurate moment of strength to live a sensual life.

She smiled knowing her request had now confounded my daftness.

What do you mean, see him one day?

She sighed a beautiful soft murmur as a grandma would do when trying to explain something obvious yet oblivious to a young child.

Young man, I believe James to be stuck in spirit and seeking a way to make contact again; it is like he has unfinished business, perhaps a message he wishes to give or receive. I ask this of you if you are fortunate to meet his spirit. Please could you release him from his eternal quest passing on all my tender love? Hmm, you see James was my forever tempest in a teapot and I do feel him embroiled and trapped forever in eternity.

She told me she had often imagined glances of him across a crowded room or at a busy intersection.

I see fleeting glimpses of him in others, a walk, a word or a smile and, each time I do, there is no longer any sadness; just a graceful reminder that to be sensual is to embrace the beauty of life. One day, please do as I ask.

I felt stumped to how I could ever fulfil her request.

Do you by any chance have a picture of James so I might at least recognise him or have a vague idea of what he looks like?

Don’t be daft young man. You won’t need one, he will let you know.

I couldn’t argue with her sounder logic to these things so I said yes wondering how on earth James would recognise me, a complete stranger.

He will know, young man. Trust me, tomorrow night we shall talk more about his world if you wish.

I nodded, quietly hoping that, with the passing of time, I might know what to say to her James. I had no problem considering the concept of talking to spirits. It’s just that I lacked any real conversational skills chatting to dead folk but at least I could promise from my heart to pass on her simple message of love. She had this beautiful knowing gentle, forlorn look knowing of my quandary saying;

I do understand young man and you have my heartfelt thanks agreeing to what might appear to be the whimsy of another.

I bade her good day and she me a goodnight.

To be unfortunately trapped in dying endless words repeating truths unspoken and unheard, wandering lanes now alone, wanting more, now lost.

***

Enchanting Moment 2

Reflections – My Kiss

I remember thinking tonight she might be somewhat reserved due to a mild embarrassment after having exposed herself with her story of a love lost. I needn’t have worried because I found Jessie sitting up in bed, shawl wrapped around her, papers strewn across all available surfaces and an eagerness I had never witnessed before. It seemed she had found a touch of her vibrant old self charging her very own new mission to complete. Little did I know at the time what else she had in store for me to delight in. I should have guessed with the shuffling of papers something interesting might be afoot.

Hello Jessie. Did you find your itinerant paper from last night or did it decide to come to its senses and emigrate to greener pastures?

Enough young man, please come and sit here. I have much to tell you and the night is passing so quick.

I am not sure what it is but the old, who have known such excruciating drawn out patience, can also have such insistency it borders on a life or death like intensity.

What’s the rush? I teased. You still have two years before you can shuffle off the planet, girl.

Young man, now sit and be quiet as this is what I want to talk to you about. You know I asked you to tell me about how others face their own mortality and then die with a refined dignity and grace… well, I have changed my mind. I want you, instead, to tell me about how you live your life, your hopes and what you wish for, if you would like?

Before I could reply, she started to launch into the next tale.

Whoa! What’s the rush girl? Could you please rein it in a moment…? And if you would, please tell me about your day?

I haven’t got enough time to waste on all this.

She paused then looked forlorn with an unseen ache deflating her verve. Then she sighed an apology with a belated, yet impatient, smile.

The day has been long and I do not want to bore you, or myself, with the tedious humdrum of watching its endless hours pass by.

"Jessie, you were brought up better than that. Be polite.