In retrospect the couple nigel and nigella were reflecting on their mosaic life that transcended the freakish.
In a mist drenched and fluctuating sun dispersed town with scant employment, and that plethora of minimal short term contract work.
The apparently genial and eccentric inhabitants were in a quintessential jokes and capers quandary.
Dark grey shale ribbed stone stark dwellings one felt might collapse with a finger prod but didn’t quite!
Yet!
Windows bear the tarnished realm of conformity that might stifle atmospheres but didn’t quench drole alignment.
Streets that wove interstitially whose most elevated distinctive mark was its ennui on rewind.
A laughable yet solemn cliquish hub wedged in between a brambled array of disrupted forest leaf wilt and rabid limp green wet knotted pastures.
Nigella had a short story shortlisted in a dimlit attic of a local newspaper with the title A day in the life of a donkey.
Nigel was a junior cast member in a fringe drama on a meagre shoestring budget that had now you see it now don’t short run then vanished without the most minimal of warnings.
Based on this animal pet theme.
Perhaps the portrayal might have been a tad gauche and slapdash in its delivery.
The humour a little too corny even thorny for seats scattered like seeds audience in an overshadowed, out of the way, dust speck town which simultaneously seemed to be playing reuse second fiddle in the context of up to date innovations.
There was also the tantalising magnetic lure of a major urban catchment area and its kinetic glow where there now appeared to be a perceptible impulsive swing away from this midget type village or small town yet somehow dense area that was at once a mortise lock gazing in on itself yet had this twist and turn yen to expand exponentially.
“Strange that day, Nigel, you know when I saw that donkey in the field.
It was a bumpy field very uneven, it was raised, elevated and had this tilt.
Most unusual, it had this human facet, almost as if it was on the verge of peering down on the village.”
A donkey ambled and rambled whilst the question loitering in corridor of this love alliance’s mind was whatever happened to that newspaper and its sponsor that shortlisted the story or the enterprising outsider who showcased the play.
This promoter had links to the neighbouring cityscape then disappeared to where?
Never to return?
Over the years Nigel and Nigella scrimped and scraped on casual work in nondescript schools, shops whose patrons a mere passerby and side of the road skeletal businesses.
They lived on a discount store though often dreamed about a more opulent lucrative lifestyle but it amazingly kept eluding them.
“Nigel I love it when you sigh.
At this time in our lives it is worth venerating the tapestry of it all.”
Nigella with tears welling up in tandem a burst dam release then a surreal quivering smile.
Nigel always likened his partner’s eyes to an intrusive piercing mirror, an unrelenting ubiquitous focussed lens from her which had this prolific capacity to skim and skirt both Nigel’s life which might seem dreary but had covert, concealed, clandestine little plays in effervescence about what was an existence that got more sparse with time, a shrinking hullabaloo that was surreptitious, hush-hush.
The town which oozed the plain and lacklustre held them in a judo grip but by the same token itself seemed to become slyly going into step by step morph contraction.
“Donkeys are symbolic to a vast extent.
They exude such, indeed much ken.
Are they guffawing at us?
But just as you and I had our first encounter as children when on a short trip with our parents.
It was one of the few forms of entertainment available in this mystery shroud of a spot.
Where disposable income might be too easily disposed of.”
Both Nigella and Nigel found that ever since they met whilst nourishing the donkey, this donkey, its Mise en scene, its portentous presence had this uncanny knack of pursuit of both of them.
The strangest coincidences.
Idioms, expressions, the way people interacted, the synonyms for donkey in this town created a situation where the word donkey and a donkey’s environs, and other creatures in the habitat had this hypnotising invisible secretive yet insidious skulk.
“Have you even sensed, Nigella,a disconcerting shift and shunt this isolated district, the size, there has been a slow exit to boot. On boot.
Does it have its own booty?
We both smirk at that one.
Even as we interact there is this intended or unintended prank simmering….somewhere.
As if we might be shoehorned into a loosely scheduled drama.”
Nigel and nigella often mused and bandied about words asinine and their variants.
But devoid of concrete proposal or narrative life pulse in this strangeville of a town that was now a drift sand physically and in terms of folks who no longer existed resembled an abstruse puzzle when it shouldn't.
A fade factor that is imperceptible in its licence.
“Did we set in train something that day we met?
The law is an ass.
The lawn is an ass and maybe ASS we are reminiscing like?”
Nigella wistfully with a gratuitous grin this time.
This day was a nab and seize for a second pause for solid recount.
Oh what a different mystical era it was in Nigel and Nigella’s formative age.
The simplicity of this area, though a shelter, fed off the pervasive advent of black and white television, electricity pylons, and familiar tone presenter radio.
How Nigel and nigella whilst living in birdnest style buildings didn't succumb entirely to a drab rut though they found themselves cramped.
A store of light tinge whimsy memories linger against a backdrop to a burgh whose population were in a state of flux with an element in a sneaky outward creep to an “Elsewhere Nirvana.”
At least for the time being though suspenseful.
The town itself was sandwiched by a concentric vista of numbingly lush pastures with gates for a suite of animals, donkeys, among the more popular pet of choice despite being on the receiving end of comedians and their rustic sleights and barbs.
An idyllic garden ringfenced this condensed area which once had an ample size but a quiet trickle exodus that might be a chimera.
Sheep, lambs, cattle were oft found wandering almost as if they were in search of something in tandem with the “human” inhabitants.
And “beavering” away in some curtain of droop haze, donkeys were braying as an act of mockery especially the most protuberant in this featured couple’s life.
“That donkey story of ours nigel, well, I'd say there’s a compendium of miniature tales, a subtle hint that donkeys have a deeper sensitivity behind the jocular mask.”
Nigella quipped.
How often do memories, house uproarious gags and occupations, neighbours and citizens who are apparently fragment phase performers doing bit part jobs.
By any normal barometer, typical parameters, this place of origin for a considerable quota of beings was anything but novel.
With the exception of the Stand Out Donkey.
There might be overlapping coincidences where this compressed municipality encircled by what almost was a stage scenic surround but there are those who would advise this is just an impression born of lethargy.
Even the periodic procession of animals and antic farmers, inhabitants, children, adults who tricked and joked.
But the donkeys as integral to this monotonous pageant had their uncanny brief too.
The donkey in question though often others had this pre-eminence and conspicuous emphasis because they appeared to be a less marginal facet in a daily ritual stunning in its sameness.
The donkey nigel and nigella had this sixth sense about had cachet.
“Having reflected on all our lives we could do something in our final phase.
Why not revisit that short story again and its parallel companion play about the donkey.
Do it to raise funds for this unusual hail from of ours.
Charge a bare bones minimal fee.
Stage it in the field where the first donkey we saw inspired us.
Make it a two person act with some cameos.”
Nigella suggested and Nigel concurred.
The local radio and flyers leaflets were in top excel mode as is there wont when they had ample opportune incentivisation.
The darlings of this piece with shrewd acumen managed to entice some ambitious youngsters to star as their various characters when Nigel and Nigella selected the cast.
The stage for very visual authenticity, was chosen in the field of the two thousand word tale and drama because of its incarnation in that environ and the link to the colourful vista.
And the excitement was palpable at least in the eyes of the originators of this eventual production.
Propitious weather(hopefully), weekend setting, low level outlay, cheap tickets and a beneficial cause.
But time dispelled their optimism.
The hastily assembled piece(under the circumstances)
laboured an onset yet only a risible number trickled into the lush verdant pasture.
There were some fresh nutritious food stands, straw dip liquid refreshments, and micro signature backdrop programmes.
But things petered out at an early phase.
Project down the drain doomed from the outset.
Halfhearted at best and the whole thing began to fizzle out and failure was a red blush embarrassing repetitive.
“What is this I recall your name?
The director of the original play…..that tanked.”
And the person less than enthusiastic in their admission owned up.
“Yes and the judge that only gave your partner a measly short list, wearing a hangdog face is with me.”
Nigel and nigella appeared confused.
“Here’s a sum of money for your cause and your gumption.”
“A belated prize of some kind.”
The expression on both Nigel and Nigella’s face an intermittent bright.
Within minutes a herd of cattle and a variety of other animals charged into the field at an awkward vehicle ramp angle.
“They are endeavouring to go somewhere maybe we should copy them.”
Nigella with a limp observation.
One of those hard to discover gates was partially opened.
Maybe a few but nothing more.
Either way nigel and loved one sauntered after the cows and company.
But the donkey stayed put.
And was perplexed as a few more joined in.
“We’ll just keep going and hope the herds don’t inconvenience others.”
Nigel astonished.
“There’s a massive group coming back to the town I know most of them from a distance.”
Meanwhile, the donkey, the subject of play and story was cavorting about with a gaiety.
unrestrained.
The judge of play and the other who gave the story a shortlist had unbeknownst to others stayed behind.
“The donkey, the judges, the pasture, encircled by damp hue’d plants, succulent fruit, tilting flora, brown weeds, and loops of briar.
We have been abandoned to a circuitous fate. “
They, the judges singing from the same hymn sheet.
“Ourselves and the donkey, have this enigmatic theatrical space to ourselves.”
A day in the life of a donkey and a few others too for that matter.
It erupted from the heavens, poured heavily, but some entrances had been partially blocked.
They couldn't escape immediately.
Whilst others in this narrative were strolling in unsignposted directions elsewhere.
It appeared.
By the way the names of both judges were
JACK ASSWORTH
AND DONNA KEYS.
They had the
BR-ASS neck to ASSESS others with names like that.
JUDGING BY “APPEARANCES.”
But that is a whimsical distraction.
Nigel and Nigella made counseled pleas to the two contingents meandering in opposite walkways.
“Maybe we both should return to the pasture where I tried to stage a play founded on a short prose submission.
And transform it into something where good fortune shines.
At no cost to you august wavering footsloggers.”
Nigella spoke in a firm twang.
As the two groups of people converged on the meadow the original sponsors were huddled together as they whisper.
“Maybe you and I could get this thing, play, story, to gel if Nigel and Nigella were to surrender their publishing rights to it.”
The donkey trotted
about in a limp manner and in contradiction to its initial pose now terribly morose in a mood shift.
The donkey spotted a barely visible exit smothered by clumps of bog squelch moss.
“Well, every dog has its day.
And maybe that donkey too.”
Again one of the judges opined.
“Between two or more crowds “GATECRASHING” an event that never really got off the ground and a town that never got off the ground that failed to find a launchpad either way this dilemma won’t ever come within an ASSE’S ROAR of being resolved.”
The other judge framed an exasperated murmur.
Later on in the week a “dramatic” announcement was made on the radio that an established but yet to be named novelist who lived in the major city some miles off was interested in writing a theatrical plot about the village and its fetish with animals and creatures.
The person concerned had been struck by the allure of one unique donkey.
As this author had passed several months before in a different “capacity” mesmerised by the spot they felt because of the innate comic dwellers encountered there might be a cameo chameleon post for everyone and every creature.
Even a donkey perhaps.
By the way, the common name for the donkey was JACK ASSPECT.
Making an ASS of themselves isn’t always defeatist for a creature like this!
Dedicated to my brilliant and beautiful Sister, Jay A.Pallen