6

Josh

SON JOHN AND girlfriend Joanna seemed at last to be settling into the life on Papavray. It was not easy for them as they were young and had lived in the centre of London with all its traffic and noise, excitement and interests. London was a very ‘now’ place, Joanna said. Places such as Papavray had appealed to John from childhood as holiday or camping destinations, so he appreciated the quietness, the empty roads of the island and the freedom to roam anywhere the fancy took him. But he missed the ‘buzz’ of city life: the nights out, the pop concerts, the bright lights and his many friends. Joanna missed all these things too and added to that list was – shopping. ‘Proper’ shopping – as in Oxford Street or the Portobello Road. Papavray was a decided shock to a shopaholic, as we were more than one hundred road miles and two sea crossings from shops (other than the small island ones). Even in Inverness, the range of goods and the styles of clothing were very limited, running to good tweeds, woolly jumpers and sturdy footwear. None of these things were to Joanna’s liking as she favoured flowing skirts, colourful beads and bandana-type headgear: all very attractive on such a lovely young girl. John could not get enthusiastic about shops, as he hated shopping with a passion. He still does!

I think we did not fully understand the difficulties of the transition for them and should have expected a more prolonged settling-in period. We had made the move for very different reasons and were now becoming established in the community.

But, gradually, they made friends: some being incomers like themselves. They revised their ideas of what constituted a good night out and got used to at least some of the island limitations. They went to ceilidhs, met friends in the pub and walked a lot. An added change for Joanna was being without a job: she had always worked in a variety of retail-related jobs and now she found time hanging on her hands. She eventually made friends with a girl who started a business making heavy jumpers, so was able to work with her and enjoy her company.

At about this time, they went off to London and were married there. At least that is what they said they had done. Who were we to argue?

Meantime, Joanna’s pregnancy was progressing. She kept very well and the usual arrangements were made for her to go to the mainland hospital about two weeks before her due date. All island births were expected to take place there. But, in this case, the baby seemed to have a sense of humour. Joanna would have pains off and on from seven months onwards. Everybody would be mobilised, John’s rather elderly car being kept filled and ready, bags packed, phone calls made… and then the pains would subside and the little joker would settle down again in the warmth of the womb. Well, it was cold outside!

Eventually, the inevitable happened and no-one really believed that the pains, on that dark, windy night, were the real thing. But, of course, this time the labour progressed far more quickly than is normal for a first baby and we had to rush Joanna to the island hospital, as there was no time for the long journey to the mainland. We used my car as John’s was not over reliable and we completed the twenty-two tortuous miles in twenty minutes and arrived with only minutes to spare.

A bonny boy entered the world at two in the morning, weighing eight pounds. My first grandchild! Mother and baby were well. Joanna gazed at the child as though surprised that he was there (which she might well have been after all the false alarms) and she seemed rather scared at the thought of being responsible for this vocal, but helpless, scrap of humanity. She had beautiful, blue eyes which were now wide with apprehension.

A few days later, George and I brought her and the baby home – to our home, so that I could look after them. They stayed for a week, while Joanna got used to the baby’s demands; and John, looking slightly dazed, immediately became the proud father and took to the many baby chores with a will, appearing to enjoy every aspect of parenthood.

Many names had been bandied about, predictably none of them were traditional, but the little chap was eventually called ‘Josiah’, or ‘Josh’ for short. I liked the diminutive more than the full name.

None of our crofter friends could understand why they should have chosen this name, as they all named their children after a relative – or, as they said, for a relative. The result of this habit was the degree of confusion which so often reigned when several people had the same name within the same family. I was frequently asked if we had a Josiah in our family. Sometimes, it was assumed that the baby was named after the biblical character, and this seemed to these Free Kirk stalwarts to smack of Papism. Josh himself, however, was goo-ed over and admired: all crofter women seem to adore babies.

John was now working for the Laird, restoring old estate buildings for holiday accommodation or for agricultural use. He enjoyed the outdoor life and the regular hours, while Joanna was happy to have him at home at night to help with the new baby.

Nick was delighted with the little chap and often nursed him to sleep, while Andy was rather overwhelmed at the idea that he was an uncle at eight or nine years old, but was happy to boast about this amazing fact to the children at school. I think he was probably disappointed in their reactions for they would be completely unimpressed. The generations among the crofters often overlapped, as couples married at a very young age and had babies almost immediately, while many a forty-year-old grandma was astonished to find that she was pregnant, long after she thought her family to be complete. Apart from the financial aspect (which did not seem to bother anyone) this rather haphazard attitude towards family planning made little difference to the fairly modest expectations of most islanders.

Very few young people had ‘careers’ on the island. Careers were only achieved by leaving Papavray for university or other training, and then the resulting employment, for which so much time had been invested, would almost always be in a mainland town; perhaps even overseas. The ordinary island jobs in hotels, at the harbour or on the croft could be managed easily with babies or young children in the family, because there was always a mother, aunt, sister or cousin who would be delighted to take a turn at ‘minding’ the child. So children grew up surrounded by members of the extended family and were usually well-adjusted and relaxed. This is something which has almost been lost in the busier South and I wonder how long the islands will be able to hold on to this culture of close-knit family care and loyalty?

Josh grew into a sturdy, chubby baby and Joanna’s circle of friends grew to include many young mums and their children. They were fascinated by her clothes and the fact that she had lived and worked in London. Most of them had never been farther than Inverness. So Joanna, if not exactly a celebrity, was certainly ‘different’.

Although everything seemed fine on the surface, I could not rid myself of the feeling that Papavray, to John and Joanna, was only a short-term stepping stone to something else. What that was, I had no idea and did not wish to ask, because I liked having them on the island and was a little afraid of what they might tell me. But before anything could be decided, an opportunity to make a lot of money presented itself.

Another oil rig was to be built in one of the sea lochs. Workers of all sorts were needed, from highly trained engineers to totally untrained construction crews. John decided that this was an opportunity not to be missed. Being a young, strong, willing lad, he was taken on immediately and, within a few short weeks was commuting by helicopter from the island to the mainland camp, which had been hastily built on the coast near the rig, to house the workers who came in from all over the UK. The men (and they were all men) worked three weeks on the rig (being ferried the short distance to and from the camp each day) and two weeks off, when they were airlifted to their homes; or in the case of island dwellers, the nearest island with an airstrip or landing place for the helicopter. 

Although this was a huge boost to their security, it meant that John would be away again for some of the time and Joanna would be by herself. She spent quite a lot of time at our house for baths, washing and drying of baby things and clothes, and some meals, but lived most of her time in their caravan, which was now quite homely with a little wood-burning stove and bright walls. John’s absences were a disappointment, but she now had plenty of friends who often kept her company.

For the young men who were prepared to work on the rig, there were undreamed-of wage packets. But, strangely, many able-bodied men, who probably needed a boost to their income, were not willing to stay away from home to ‘be stuck in the middle of the sea’ as they put it, and have to sleep in a camp. The whole idea of leaving home and croft seemed abhorrent to these men and they were loud in their condemnation of the youngsters who were so happy to do just that. Was this a fear of new technology? Of change, in such a dynamic way? Or was it an unwillingness to forsake, for even a short time, the culture of crofting and fishing, on which the islands had relied for generations? Whatever their reasons, they were adamant that nothing was going to persuade them to leave home and hearth. I could not make sense of this attitude because there were no contracts or agreements and these men could have tried the life for a week or two, and left whenever they wished, if it did not suit them. But that was the ‘way of it’ as they said.

There were certainly dangers as the whole operation was new and untried. Hard hats were supplied but many would not wear them. There were no life jackets or steel toe-capped boots and the only protective clothing was a waterproof jacket. The seas were rough and the work involved huge pieces of heavy equipment, which had to be winched hither and yon with cold, wet hands and stiff muscles on a heaving, plunging platform. It was not surprising that there were far more accidents than there would have been in a properly run enterprise.

John and Joanna quickly accrued some considerable savings. The only place on Papavray to spend money was the pub, and with a new baby to look after, their visits to the hostelry were few and far between. They now lived some ten or eleven steep and tortuous miles from us, so babysitting for an evening was rarely an option, particularly if I was ‘on call’. But occasionally, with a lot of organisation, I would look after Josh while they went to the mainland for shopping. Even this was awkward because Joanna was breastfeeding him. And very successfully. He gained weight at a prodigious rate, slept well and was bright and alert.

But, as I suspected, the money was being saved to fund an ‘escape’, as Joanna deemed their plans. They were going to move back to the south for John to find work and for a lifestyle more familiar to them both.

So one bright day, when Josh was about eight months old, they packed everything they possessed into John’s new (well, newish) van and set off on the long journey south. John looked slightly wistful as he stood in front of our house, saying his ‘goodbyes’ and gazing at the blue, sun-soaked mountains, the white, fluffy clouds dancing in a turquoise sky and the green patchwork of crofts scattered throughout the valley below us.

I was dejected: downcast to be saying goodbye to our first grandchild after knowing and loving him for so short a time, but I supposed they were doing the right thing. John’s work on the rig was coming to an end as the structure entered another phase and Joanna certainly found life on Papavray very dull. We were all miserable while waving to the retreating van as, with a cheery ‘toot-toot’, they rounded the bend on the road above our house and disappeared.