The Coven

Six years ago some university friends and flatmates of mine reconnected.

Ever since we’d left university one or two of us had kept in touch with another one or two of us, and then it somehow gelled that we could arrange to all be in the same place at the same time.

Twice a year since since six or seven of us have met up for a weekend away. 

At first we got together in each other’s home towns:  Warwick, Milton Keynes, Newcastle, Dudley, Durham, Kew/Richmond.  Then as Paula’s cancer became more disabling we had our Covens in Richmond “while she’s still with us.”  Paula left us not long after our February 2019 Coven, much of which was spent around her hospital bed before our last goodbyes.  Most of us made it to her funeral, but we didn’t count that as one.

Last Autumn we had a weekend of gossip, gin and charity shop exploration in Oxford and we had planned to do Bath in April, then last weekend and now next Summer 

(God and Covid willing).

This little Facebook memory gives some idea of the flavour of how we comport ourselves.

Dr E had too many jam pans and Bess Cavalier offered to give one a good home.

So as not to forget to give it to her Dr E took it down to the dining room …

 

at Premier Inn London Richmond. 7 October 2017 .  

As we went into dinner Joe, a young little waiter, said “Excuse me asking, but why have you got a bucket?”

“It’s a jam pan” replied Dr E; who he’d already encountered checking in.

I said “It’s a cauldron”.

“A cauldron I’d believe” said Joe.

He had a little more trouble believing that people make their own jam.