Seagulls in the Attic Read Online Free Page A

have to spend a penny on food.
    Or so I dream. But why not? I’ve already learned how to nose around junk stores and charity shops, picking up wonderful bargains for less than a pound or two. Luckily vintage clothes are very trendy now and I’ve been able to find some amazing clothes. The library is great for renting DVDs at cheap prices. I not only save money but I’m feeling good about it, recycling not just paper or bottles but clothing, books and other household items. It gives me a kind of contentment that all my previous spending on designer shoes or meals out in trendy restaurants never did – a contentment that isn’t just a fleeting buzz but something deeper and more lasting.
    I’m also determined to forage for edible food in the wonderfully lush Cornish countryside. I went on a day’s outing last summer to learn about food foraging. A few of us spent a couple of hours on the cliffs above Morranport, one of my favourite seaside villages. An amazingly knowledgeable woman from Truro taught us all the tricks about foraging, how to find edible plants such as hawthorn, ‘fat hen’ or muckweed as it’s commonly called. I learned that the old English for fat hen is melde , and that the ‘fat’ in the other name comes from the greasiness of the seeds. Then there is the horseradish plant and of course nettles, sorrel, chickweed, dandelion and wild mustard – I’m getting excited all over again, thinking about all the food lying about the countryside just waiting to be eaten.
    What with the extra load at work, the rain, and Minger inconveniently being mended, the next few days are hectic, sothere’s a great sense of relief when Eddie finally comes back to work, the rain stops, and I get my car back. The warm Cornish sun drying out the landscape even makes me forget the bill from the garage and the worry about how we’re going to pay it. I’ve got a walking round today and it’s idyllic, the local folk out and about, friendly and chatty, all of us happy as larks in the sunshine.
    By early afternoon I’m on my way back to my garden, once again chanting softly to myself, ‘Postie, postie, dry as toastie, how does your garden grow?’ Naturally I’m not that much of a townie that I expect any obvious growth, but it’s lovely just to be able to look and imagine all the vegetables that will be grown there. And I’ve got some lovely little cauliflower plants to put out, grown in a customer’s greenhouse. She assured me they were ‘sturdy as a baby oak, my handsome’, and that it was safe to plant them out now in the early south Cornish warmth.
    Edna and Hector are both outside ‘Poet’s Tenement’ looking like meditating monks as they walk up and down on the uneven stone path through their front garden. I can never get over how that wild and unkempt garden always manages to look charming, rather like the couple themselves. Edna has on her royal blue velvet cape and Hector wears something that looks like a cardinal’s cloak – it’s deep red, hooded, long and flowing. Perhaps one of his ancestors was the Pope’s right-hand man; with those two you never know. I find it interesting how, despite their oddity, their eccentricities and their reticence, they are still embraced by the local community. I think they’ve already become legends in their own lifetimes, the villagers being proud of having something to add to the mystery, myth and folklore which is rampant in this county.
    I stand for a moment and watch them walking back and forth on the rough path then around and around the insidepath along the stone wall. They walk slowly, contemplatively. I’ve seen them do this before; it’s their form of exercise. Apparently they’ve done it for years, ever since they got too old to ramble over seaside cliffs.
    The first thing I see when I get to my garden are my onion sets, which instead of being planted firmly under the earth as I left them, are scattered randomly on top of the ground. I’m both