The clear winner for this week’s update is the home group social. For those not already in the know, this is a church group and, on occasions, might seem a tad eccentric.
We now have six leaders, or so it was recently announced. This consists of three husbands and their three wives. Now it is obvious that I am not leadership material since I fail to understand these things, nor have I ever aspired to step into the mysterious world of church leadership. If I were a leader, people wouldn’t know what hit them.
Already I digress. Our six leaders had clearly got together and hatched a plan. We would all arrive at Howard and Hilda’s house and have our end-of-term church social. It is the show house of the group, all very grand. I not only take my shoes off just inside the door but I make sure my socks are a matching pair, clean, and ultra-presentable.
Mind you, I felt sure the occupants were in our home group as I miss the so many meetings. But then, who am I to query anything as I have other fish to fry on the regular Tuesday, namely the children in the village youth group (not that I fry them, you understand. I’m sure the Safeguarding Police would have something to say).
As we arrived late, on account of frying the other fish, the frivolities had already started. As we arrived and greeted by Hilda, we were ushered into the dining room to collect a plate (small, very small) of finger food nibbles and a tee-total drink. Next we were directed to the grand lounge which was as big as my first flat. We all sat on chairs around the edge of the room; you would need to raise your voice to speak to someone on the other side of the room. My feet nestled into the plush, deep carpet and I admired the delicate watercolours on the walls. Then my eyes clocked the television, about the size of my first bathroom.
Only one young man was in earshot of me so we chatted for a while, otherwise it wasn’t the done thing to wander over to chat to someone else and sit on the floor or, horror of horrors, the arm of a sofa. Then the fun started.
The fun, was an alphabet quiz. You had to make a list of Christmas words using each letter of the alphabet. I knew I was outclassed so I decided not to even try and compete with the learned group members. Now when it came to sharing the results, my status of being outclassed was clear as a bell. Once again I was proving my, at times, mischievnous and rebellious nature.
Hyacinth offered her alphabet with “A is for Angel, B is for Bethlehem, C is for Christ right through to Z is for Zephaniah” she said. Everyone was very impressed. There I was, nervously clutching my piece of paper. When it was my turn I decided to make a bit of a joke about it and some of mine included “G for Gaviscon, H for Hangover, I for Indigestion” and so on.
There were some spontaneously polite chuckles. One or two others hesitated though, perhaps not knowing whether they should laugh or not. I had managed to shore up my reputation in one simple party game.
Perhaps the funniest thing happened afterwards. Marjory, a retired school teacher and member of the group, very devout and generally disapproving of me since I had my ears pierced, said on our WhatsApp group “Games were surprisingly enjoyable”. Gerald replied to say he agreed.
Well there you are, I am so chuffed I got away with it.