M. mentioned Palm Sunday when I went in to draw her last week. She couldn’t remember what they gave you at the end. Palm crosses, we reminded her. Oh, yes, she said, I used to have loads of them. She also recounted how they used to bring the donkeys from Borth and lead them through the streets of the town. We keep trying to remember the exact word she used for the unholiness of the fact that the beasts shat as they processed. Someone followed behind, she said, collecting the detritus. It made us laugh. It still does. Her turn of phrase is delightful and so brusque, so unsentimental.
We walked together just before lunch on Sunday, as is our wont. Turning up the little hill beside the town’s library we saw a woman carrying a large palm frond in against her chest. There was a toy donkey under her other arm. It was a stiff, rigid, stuffed little thing. It was all most incongruous. I got the connection straight away. He didn’t and must’ve stared. She noticed him looking. It’s for Palm Sunday, she said, I’m taking them to church. I did wonder, he said. She laughed, then and so did he.
