Mary spent the day painting. She was working on an abstract piece that had been holding her attention for the better part of four months. She had begun to paint it in a rage the last time
she had broken up with Finn. At the time Mary had been con¬vinced that he was seeing another woman. He kept coming over late at night with strange perfume on his clothes. One night she accused him of being unfaithful and was outraged when Finn said that she was so out of touch with herself that she could not recognise her own smell. Now she was not so confident that he had been seeing another. Perhaps he was as devoted as he had always seemed to be. Mary wondered if she had been looking for excuses — sometimes she needed a reason to push Finn away and grab time for herself.
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09
When I started living with squatters in London I was twenty years old. I’d left home when I was seventeen, lived in Montreal for a year and a half before dropping out of university, then spent most of a year living with my sister’s family in the Yukon. So while I wasn’t completely unworldly, I’d never met an artist before. In Vauxhall I was surrounded by artists – painters, weavers, sculptors, photographers. Their way of viewing the world – through objects, spatially – was a revelation to me.
I do like this notion of being so out of touch with oneself that you don’t recognise your own smell. That’s a bit of raw power there, I think. Good, but clunky.
When Finn arrived at six o’clock, he bounded up the stairs to Mary’s workroom. ‘Hello, honey, I’m home,’ he shouted.
‘How did you get in - have you still got that old key I gave you?’
‘I’ve kept it next to my heart all this time,’ Finn declared attempting to manoeuvre his way around so he could see what Mary was painting.
‘I don’t want anyone to see it yet. It isn’t going very well. Stop it, Finn, leave me alone,’ she shouted as he trapped her behind him and examined the painting. Mary was working in oils and the canvas was large. Red slashes cut diagonally across the black and red background like sprayed blood or bayonet wounds. It was totally unlike anything she had done before. Mary usually worked in watercolours and painted still lifes, street scenes and an occasional bit of socialist realism.
This made me laugh outloud: “Mary usually worked in watercolours and painted still lifes, street scenes and an occasional bit of socialist realism.” To tell you the truth, I can’t remember if this is intentionally funny, or unintentionally funny. I didn’t really know anyone who painted ‘socialist realism’.
‘What’s it called?’ asked Finn.
‘I don’t know,’ she replied.
‘It’s not like you, Mary.’
‘Not like sweet mild-mannered little me at all, is it?’
‘What’s it about?’
‘Nothing,’ she said firmly. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here. Let’s go for a walk on the river. It will stay light until after eight o’clock.’
Minutes later, they set off across the Spring Gardens towards the Thames. Finn knew better than to ask more questions about the painting. The breeze blew Mary’s skirt round her legs and pushed Finn’s hair over his dark glasses.
When they reached the embankment the wind was even stronger but the air felt warm and soft.
‘The Thames looks quite blue today. It must be the reflection of the sun and the sky,’ Mary said, trailing her hand along the back of a bench.
‘Mmm,’ replied Finn, ‘it looks almost swimmable.’
‘You know, it used to freeze in the winter. I saw a painting somewhere by one of those Dutch painters of a fair on the Thames in the 1700s. There were marquees and games and even bear-roasts on the ice. Some winters it got very thick. Imagine being able to walk across the Thames!’
‘That would be wonderful,’ said Finn. ‘We would be able to skate from here to St Paul’s. I’d feel so much more at home. If only there were maple trees along the embankment.’
‘The City brokers would skate from their homes in Rich¬mond and the Isle of Dogs all the way to Southwark Bridge. ” There’d be sleighs and people selling roast chestnuts.’
‘The bankers would all have portable telephones in their pockets which they could talk on while they arabesqued their way to work. They would skate faster while making deals.’
‘Thank heaven it’s summer.’
‘Even if it rains every other day,’ said Finn.
They walked along the Embankment, following the broad curve between St Thomas’s Hospital and the Houses of Parliament. Big Ben donged at quarter to seven as they crossed the foot of Westminster Bridge. A lot of people were out strolling between County Hall, the old Greater London Council building, and Waterloo Bridge. Finn put his hands behind his back and skated on ahead.
‘Don’t let your ankles cave in,’ he shouted. ‘Keep the blades pointing forward or your feet will crash into each other.’ Mary laughed and watched him weave through the crowd. He turned and headed back towards her, executing the occasional pirouette.
One of the best things about living in Vauxhall was being close to the river. We used to spend a lot of time on the riverbank. When the tide is low a little strand is revealed and there were steps that led down to it, and we used to potter along beside the water, turning over the bits of scrap and other rubbish in hopes of finding something interesting. We used to ride our bikes along the embankment to go hang out in the bar of the NFT. I went everywhere by bike and that meant criss-crossing the bridges, Vauxhall, Lambeth, Waterloo. The Thames carries the history of London along it; but the river also brings with it renewal, the refreshed, the pastoral, a touch of nature in the middle of the city.
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