Lady Marcia of the committee
Thinking of how the supposed ‘other half’ lives - or in some cases the other third might be more in keeping if their antics are anything to go by - I was reminded of recently when a certain person was brought up in conversation.
Yonks ago, I had somehow got involved (lumbered) with people who were organising an event for the (then) local church by way of a fete (fate would indeed be a better description) as the new vicar had not been installed all that long and so this was a sort of ‘breaking him in’ sort of event where the local supposed ‘great and good’ introduced themselves or were just plain busybodies to put it nicely.
Stalls and sideshows were the order of the day - or if wet, just the afternoon.
I was but a minor part (thankfully) of an invited group to ‘add something’ to the event based on our collective fund-raising activities/ability, as opposed to the cosmetic lot just turning up and smiling a lot within the area or in real terms it also meant folk like us were under the supposed ‘wing’ of the overpowering and dominating force that was Marcia (not her real name as her real name gave up on her years ago in disgust) who was ‘organising’, so meant she would be not doing much but with her specialised talent being smiling at will (not sure if Will liked it or not as he never said) and hand shaking - a lot if it ruled out physical effort otherwise on her part.
It was said that a mere bead of her sweat could possibly cure countless diseases, aliments and suchlike, but nobody had so far devised a method for extracting or gathering a sample, as the only time she was recorded as near breaking into any was when the photographer from the local paper said he might not make it to one of her shindigs - she had brought a new dress plus carefully paint-rollered her make-up on in readiness - but he did make it and so the anticipated sweat sample was never seen.
Her husband had taken up golf (gulf, in their tongue) to get away from her ‘social activities’ as perhaps joining a monastery might have been pushing it a bit.
The actual ‘event’ passed reasonably well or as could be expected under the guiding finger of Marcia - ‘hover thar with that’ or ‘are you sure what you are dhooing?... ummm?’ - ‘ohhhh, dhoo be carefuel, please dhear!’ were but a few of the inspirational snippets of guidance she uttered to mere toiling mortals while at the same time not flinching from her bolt-on smile in case the ‘right people’ where there and chanced (?) by her but as most of the supposed ‘right people’ were more than aware of her motives, they were well and truly mostly conspicuous by their absence as they didn’t get where ‘they were’ by being ambushed by the likes of Marcia.
I found time to chat to the said vicar of whom all this ‘meet n greet’ malarkey was being staged, as he had briefly escaped the tentacles of said Marcia, who was acting as some sort of hostess/referee/wrangler in guiding him to assorted folk whom she thought their supposed goodness, real or otherwise, would reflect on her too in translation, but I got the impression that the vic was streets ahead of the game and why he had ‘slipped his leash’, so to speak, to get to meet real people.
As such occasions rely on the very element that makes them events as in people, you get a fair cross selection attending with some curious, some out to enjoy themselves, plus the vain lot that are motivated along the lines of Marcia.
So it was inevitable that those of not a very high standing in the community (or perhaps considered ‘riff-raff’ in Lady M’s mind) would also be there or, more to the point, the very ones who actually spent money as opposed to those who basically grinned, made small talk (‘I say - these mobile phone things are quite tiny nowadays') but suffered from ‘long pocket, short arm’ syndrome but if the ‘right’ people were about they would be seen to be giving of course.
I suppose all this malarkey must be a part of British culture and will continue to be so until it’s announced that we have run out of Marcias - hopefully.
During my conversation with [the] Vic[-ar], you could sense he was keeping an eye out for the return of Lady M as I got the impression he was already aware of her ‘ladyship’s’ motives, but as we were discussing assorted bits in idle chit-chat, someone came over and greeted Vic with a vigorous handshake that no doubt her ‘ladyship’ would write them off as ‘unwelcome riff-raff’ but appearances can be deceiving as didn’t some, OK, a small few, regard Marcia as the best thing since bubbles in lemonade?
He introduced himself as Dave and was there with his family. After a bit of this ‘n that, Vic enquired as to if he was religious, to which he replied that yes, from an early age, as his mother had ‘put the fear of God into him’ (!) regarding such things to which Vic kept his composure but inquired a bit deeper as to what effect this had had on his life so far.
Dave said he now had a family of his own but still kept to the rules as set out by his mother; every Friday night it was bath night and - quote: ‘we never miss that as we bath religiously (!) but we do change the water more often than mother used to in between each of us diving in’ and just after Vic was getting over that little confession of sorts, Dave then added that: ‘we don’t have a dog like mother used to have, so we can pull the plug once we are done with the water as there is no dog to splash about in it afterwards’.
So honest regardless of the background or merits of the actions, Vic said after we moved on as just then, the imaginary shutters slammed down on us as Marcia had found us or rather Vic as possibly I was also considered part of the ‘local riff-raff’ but if this had upset her, then my life’s work had not been in vain.
I wondered what it must be like for folk like her in a self induced ‘high position’ of supposed grandeur to stare into the shaving mirror in the morning and wonder just why they were not born of royal parentage - it must be a hard life.
Betty, who owned a local shop, was of the opinion, like many others as the signs were so evident, she was ‘another on the gong trail’ who was desperate to get either a New Year's Honour or the Queen’s Birthday Honours thingamajig in whatever form it might take and she surmised the citation would read along the lines of ‘..and for services to herself gained by years of crawling and back stabbing’ plus Betty said she had perhaps already written her umpteen pages of her acceptance speech thanking herself for all her hard work and efforts.
It was this very point the reason I had recently heard about her as there was alas no mention in the Queen's Birthday Honours this year, so the slog continues unabated.
British culture at its best - top end, elite bracket, of course.