The other morning, there was a 'crazy baldhead' inside our cave. Actually, he wasn't at all crazy; he was a plumber, from Agen, the prefecture of the Lot et Garonne, a good two and a half hours' drive from here. It's just that I love that phrase that Bob Marley sung on one of the Wailers' best-loved songs. I forget which one. But he did have a bald head, this plumber from Agen. He drove all that way to service our water softener. After 17 years, I thought it was high time and, ever on the look-out for something that might go wrong in a life that's worryingly comfortable, I had convinced myself that it wasn't working as efficiently as it should. If, indeed, it was working at all. How does one really know, except for that gentle, loving touch of softened water on skin?
Anyway... he told me how he happened to end up in Agen, famous for its magnificent aqueduct, its prunes and very little else. Wishing as a young man to get out of Dunkirk, as young men have done since 1940, he and his partner of the time found what looked on paper like a dream placement in the Corrèze, our own first port of call before moving to the Lot. His partner of the time found a nursing post in an old people's home and when he spoke to the mayor of the commune about the possibility of work as a plumber, the mayor virtually begged him to come. He would have more local clients than he could shake a pipe-bender at, the mayor would find him official communal work and the commune would provide them both with a house free of charge until they found a house of their own. It was almost too good to be true.
Over a Sunday lunch with his extended family, he revealed his good fortune and announced his imminent departure. That was great, someone said. But did he know anything about the Corrèze? No, in fact he didn't. Neither he nor his partner had given it much thought, thinking it was just some department down south. When they did their research, they discovered what it would mean to live as two young people in the Corrèze, the under-populated middle of nowhere. Very beautiful, of course, but the village in question was almost an hour's drive from the shops and the only night life to speak of would be to stand outside their borrowed house listening to the silence while marvelling at their unpolluted view of the Milky Way. Which is wonderful in its way, but wouldn't suit the young at heart.
So, reluctantly, they turned down the opportunity of a move to the pays vert, the green country. He ended up in Agen, a somewhat bigger place not too far from either Bordeaux or Toulouse. He and another partner, with whom he settled down and had a family, have now reached the stage of their lives where they're happy to live just outside the prune capital of France and enjoy the delights of the countryside. I knew what he was talking about. I've reached a stage of my life where all I really want to do is listen to – and write about – music. And watch films. And read books. And walk the dog. And cook a few meals with fresh vegetables from Giselle's barn. And enjoy the view of a morning, when the mist swaddles the valley below like a plumped-up duvet.
There'll be plenty of time for all that this month. The girls have taken the tests and driven all the way to Calais and thence to the damp north-west of England, there to undergo quarantine in a Cumbrian farmhouse, take more tests and try to sort out my recalcitrant mother-in-law. I would have gone with my wife of 30-odd years, but she had one of her presentiments and I know her well enough to heed her presentiments. As it transpired, her mother had another fall while they were on their way, a particularly bad one this time. She has been taken to Carlisle hospital for an MRI scan and a prognosis, which means that the Good Wife's presence there is yet more essential. Despite my own worries about the drive north up the traffic-choked M20, M25, M11 and A1, they had a trouble-free trip. What's more, the sun shone and didn't stop shining till they got to the A66 at Scotch Corner, whereupon it started raining as they drove across the wild moors. They don't call Cumbria the wettest part of England for nothing. Incidentally, they stopped at a roadside farm shop to buy a cabbage. I forgot to ask them how they cooked their cabbage and whether they enjoyed it. I believe there was an order from Sainsbury's waiting at the rented farmhouse, so they had something to accompany their cabbage.
As for the water softener, the 'crazy baldhead' was quite amazed by its longevity – particularly since he'd never seen such a dirty one in all his born days. He said that if it had been housed in our kitchen and serviced regularly, it would have done exceptionally well to have lasted 17 years. But lodged in a dirty old cellar without any attention other than a regular dose of salt... well, it defied all logic. Had it really been 17 years since the Kinetico representative called to hand us over our unit and pose for the Grand Designs publicity opportunity, which was of course cut from the final programme? Yes, 17 years during which the house has settled and weathered. Time next to renew the linseed-oil paintwork.
The man from Agen took our unit to bits, washed all the parts and put it all back. While we waited for it to re-fill, I made us a cup of coffee and sheepishly offered him a chocolate-coated rice cracker as an accompaniment. I explained that he might find the experience resembled eating flavoured polystyrene, but he gamely took one and pronounced it not bad. Then came the crunch: the test of the water to deduce whether or not the unit was still functioning properly. I waited with baited breath as he dropped some drops into the plastic phial of softened tap water. Well, doctor? Yes, not bad. The reading suggested that it was still working acceptably. Not quite as efficiently as it might have done 17 years ago, but all things considered...
I sent him off on his merry way with directions to his next port of call and a promise that when our machine is finally consigned to that great landfill in the sky, he will be the man I contact to supply and fit a new one. The latest models are, he informed me proudly, even more efficient after 17 years of research and development. So now we have a water softener that looks positively pristine, even if it's on its last legs. That's one less thing to worry about. Now I can concentrate on my poor beleaguered wife and her poor broken-down mother.
