Salt and Sadness

Yesterday THE OBSERVER ran an investigation into the bestselling THE SALT PATH memoir. Like many, I had read and loved the book and was sad. I live in Cornwall and the coast features in my own work. The invesitgartive piece made me reflect on when I met Raynor Winn/Sally Walker at a literary event. I had kept notes on this (I keep a daily diary - I am that sad) and yesterday I wrote this up. It was a reflection for me and a way to process the expose through writing - always my solace and go to. I am posting it here. 11^th July 2019

Truro

It was hot in Truro. Too hot to be wearing a long dress made of viscose which stuck to bare legs, and definitely too hot to be scurrying through the city in wedge heels with my best handbag swinging wag style from the crook of a sweat slippy arm. Although it was seven in the evening, the sinking sun held warmth as it slid down the cathedral roof. The dusty cobbles radiated heat. People lolled on benches outside the wine bar and flowers wilted in hanging baskets.

If I was hot in this flowing tea dress and sandals, my partner was surely melting in his suit and brogues? Lurching at his side as though I’d taken full advantage of the sun being over the yard arm, I couldn’t understand how he appeared so cool. It must be nerves making me sweat if it wasn’t the warmth of this golden evening, an ill-chosen outfit of man fibres or the dash from the riverside carpark across town to the museum. I was nervous.

Really nervous.

My partner and I were on our way to an awards evening hosted at The Royal Cornwall Museum on behalf of the Gorsedh Kernow, the association of Cornish bards who take a keen interest in, and responsibility for, promoting and protecting Cornish heritage. It was a rare occasion for me to exchange my habitual jeans and a hoody for a dress and wear glittery clips in my hair rather that hay. This was an important evening in Cornwall’s cultural calendar and across the city I imagined other authors trying frantically to navigate narrow streets to find parking.

In my bag was an invitation to this gathering in my capacity as an author short-listed for the Gorsedh’s fiction award. I’d been to ceremonies in London in my early days as an author, star studded events designed for making deals and pressing the flesh, and had been nominated for awards in the past. I’d made small talk with J K Rowling’s agent, discussed Pinter with Lady Antonia Fraser and lierally been swept off my feet by the Hairy Bikers. This was a relatively small gathering in Cornwall, where I knew  many of the authors and the local radio personality who was hosting. Why was I so nervous?

The answer to this was because this event mattered. It’s hard to articulate why, but it really did matter to have been nominated and shortlisted for a Holyer an Gof award. It meant the Cornish Bards believed my writing honoured Cornwall, was authentic and and promoted Cornish heritage. Tonight was serious in a way that networking in glitzy London hotels or the V&A isn’t, because this gathering was about celebrating authentic Cornish based work. It was about collating a canon for the future. My appearance on the short-list was recognition that I was a part of fostering and promoting Cornish heritage and culture for posterity. It was an acknowledgent that my respect for this land and for my craft had been recognised. I was no longer an emmit or an incomer, but a part of this special kingdom within a kingdom. This award ceremony was the acknowledgement I hadn’t known I longed for, or even needed, until the invitation to this event dropped onto the welcome mat.

I’m not Cornish, but I have lived in the Duchy since the mid-nineties and it’s home now. I am steeped in the magic of the place and my writing infused with the aching beauty of ancient  stones circles, solitary engine houses and scoured light. I taught English in Cornish schools, bought a house here, made a life here and I had woven Cornwall through my own novels. This was what the bards recognised and the novel nominated tonight, one so close to my heart and written just after I lost my father to cancer, was especially dear to me now.

So yes. I was nervous and excited.

The museum was as tightly packed as a pilchard barrel and with the press of bodies felt almost warmer that the street. I sipped tepid white wine and chatted with booksellers and authors before we took our seats. One author was dressed as a pirate and full of energy, zooming up and down the aisle and onto the raised platform to chat with the bards before proceedings began. I made a mental note not to wear wedge heels again to an event and try pirate boots instead. What if I tripped on my way to the stage? Or fell over as I climbed up? I sweated some more.

These worries soon slipped away as the ceremony began. I fanned myself with my invitation and listened to speeches. There were many categories from children’s fiction to Cornish language books, and as I scanned the list my eye was drawn to one of the books nominated in the memoir category.

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn.

This book was huge in 2019. A moving and inspirational non-fiction book, it was the story of a couple who, having had been dealt the double blow of being made homeless and the husband then receiving a diagnosis of a Parkinsonians, walked the South West Coast Path. The gruelling walk seemed to cure the author’s husband’s illness, or certainly lesson the symptoms, and this alone was wonderful and uplifting, never mind the rags to riches element of this memoir being published by Penguin and subsequently becoming an international best seller.

 I hadn’t read the memoir, but I knew Raynor Winn lived not far from me in Polruan. It was a claim to fame of a sort..

By July 2019 many of my friends had read The Salt Path. Most loved it. One, an ex-journalist, hated it with a passion and had been the book club pariah for a few meetings after wards. The message of hope, and the way the Winns triumphed against all the odds, was inspirational and the book was on my own to be read pile. The memoir was a feel-good rags to riches story; no wonder that it had caught the national imagination. I knew it would win the memoir category this evening. It deserved to.

Raynor deserved to.

I found myself craning my neck to see if I could spot Raynor Winn. Would her husband be with her? Or was he poorly again and unable to accompany her? The room was crowded, and it was only when the winner of the memoir category was announced that I glimpsed the author for the first time. A slight figure with a soft voice and shy demeanour, she accepted the award and was moved and sweetly surprised. There was a big round of applause and a general sense of agreement that she and her book were utterly deserving of the prize.

I didn’t win my category. but whether the wine eased any disappointment or I truly was sanguine, I wasn’t too disappointed. It had been a fun evening with Cornish singing, good company and the museum was a beautiful setting. When the formalities were over, I managed to make my way through the throng to Raynor in order to congratulate her. Understandably, she was the centre of attention, and I’m sure she barely even noticed me or heard much of what I said. She appeared overwhelmed. Her success had come so fast and with such force I imagined her head must have been spinning.

Goodbyes said, my partner and I stole away into the last golden rays of the evening. Truro was bathed in gold, the sky blue and stitched with rose and peach ribbons. We bought chips, salty and mouth burny, and ate them by the river as the sun slithered behind the hills. The excitement of the night had passed and my skin cooled. My partner leant me his jacket when I started to shiver.

The excitement was over. Very soon this evening would be just another faded memory, and I wouldn’t think about it much at all except perhaps the odd fleeting mind snapshot of pirate hats, bards in blue robes and this quiet moment eating by the river as the stars come out.

It’s true to say that I didn’t think of this evening, or Raynor Winn again, until much later.

And when I did, everything looked very different and I was filled with melancholy.