Part B. SophiePart B. Sophie
Sunday August 21st 2011.
Sophie was trying to sell the flat. Apparently, there was a studio in Chelsea, NY that she had had her heart set on, but her husband, Paulo, had refused to let her keep the flat and have the studio. Sophie had definitely met her match in Paulo. Latin and straightforward. They had met during a documentary that Paulo was producing on Female Artists. Apparently, he had been rather obliging and she had gotten her way on most things, until they had married, she’d said with a smile.
We had just reached ‘Luigi’s place’ a little Italian around the corner from the flat when Paulo had called. He had left a bag of lenses in the boot of the hire car they were sharing, “sharing” in that Sophie drove it and Paulo used the Tube, she had admitted laughing. We had gone to drop the lenses off. We’d missed the lunchtime sitting by the time we had returned. She had then suggested we go back to the flat and she’d cook. In fact she didn’t even attempt any cooking but she had instead produced two tubs of an Italian ice-cream and yogurt combination she had on standing order from Nigel, and this with such triumph that she obviously felt this was an even better option. It probably was.
She had a shoe collection that she had promised Paulo she would have cleared by the time he returned on Tuesday. Most of them were of course going to be shipped back to their apartment in the States though she had apparently faithfully promised Paulo she’d give as much as possible to Charity. I would, apparently, if I got married, learn in time that there were things that were said to ‘keep the Peace – not lies’, she stated her eyes twinkling, ‘just things that one said’.
OMG Sophie had shoes! Nice shoes, wacky shoes and quite frankly some of the ugliest shoes I had ever seen. We laughed over some of the most spectacular of the last category. The 90s were apparently not the best time to invest in a significant shoe collection. I could see that.
Then she had begun. When she had turned 27, she was the only one of the group of girls who had grown up in their Church, who was still unmarried. This had apparently not been that much of a surprise to anybody including herself. She had been tall, gangly throughout her teens and unreasonably bookish. The oldest of three children she had not had a benefit of older brothers and their friends, in fact rather the opposite. She had two younger brothers. There were eight years between her and Pastor Jose and twelve ears between her and Jonas their youngest brother. Her brothers were inconveniently aged so as to ensure that she was either taking care of them or they were driving her crazy. When she was 17 her brothers were 9 and 5. She had gone to an all-Girls secondary school in Hampstead. Given her experience consisted largely of the amusement and entertainment of the overactive and hyper Jose and Jonas ,she could not fully understand the massive obsession with ‘boys’ her school friends had demonstrated.
Church also had not provided more exposure. She had grown up in one of those oestrogen fuelled Churches and unlike most of her friends had stayed after 18. Most of the men were over 50 and Deacons and leaders. For most of her early 20’s, only two ‘brothers’ were considered eligible bachelors. The first was her best friend’s younger brother. Three years her junior they had all grown up as siblings and extended family; he had been completely out of the question. The second, Bro Yemi, held and openly shared (in her opinion) overly traditional views of the role of a woman in marriage. His mother had always struck her as an independent woman. Educated, open minded. It had always puzzled her how she could have produced such a child. Her parents had also been very laid back and not forced that or any other issue with her or her brothers.
At University she had opted for a double Honours degree. Art and History. Art had been her choice, History her father’s . He had paid her fees as long as she somehow demonstrated his wishes were being ‘considered’. Considered and duly rejected had apparently not been good enough. It had been easy for her to devote herself without ‘distraction’ to her Course. Apparently, (though she’d never have admitted this to her father), she had actually preferred History (his choice) to hers. Her Art classes she had found contrived and a little superficial. History had been more open. More about discourse, less conceited.
On the ‘man’ front( because by now these were supposedly what they were), apparently there had been somebody at University. She didn’t go into details. He wasn’t very serious apparently ‘as an entity’. She had laughed. Though he was ‘saved’, of course, her parents had been horrified. After University she had been encouraged by so many people and had done all manners of crazy things, in a bid to find ‘that special somebody ’. We laughed as she told me of the Blind date with the guy (unknown to her at the time she had agreed - six years her junior, and still in his teens) who had produced ineligible Evening Standard vouchers at the end of the meal and had looked mortified when he found out that they wouldn’t be accepted. She had had to pay. But by 27 she had had enough and decided her time and attention was most beneficially invested quite frankly in herself.
She had resigned very promptly and much to her parents horror from her responsibilities in the choir and in the Children’s Church. She had been told by her Pastor at the time, these were the two best places for women in Church looking for husbands to get ultimate ‘exposure’. As she no longer sought this exposure she decided to join the prayer ministry. The prayer ministry was fervently avoided by anybody her age and was essentially full of matrons and men her grandfather’s age but these people did two things: they prayed and they knew the Bible. These were men and women fervent for God like no other she had seen. In fact it was because of one of the matrons there, a fifty something year old grandmother of 7, who really should have known better, that she had discovered shoes.
Lady Ayo Oke, despite her amazing devotion to God, had apparently, even at the best of times, been the fount of somewhat dubious advice. For her 27th Birthday, Ayo had given Sophie the most amazing pair of Vintage Biba blacklace stilettos stressing that any young lady who wanted to work for Jesus must do so with the most beautiful footwear she could afford. Basically from then onwards she had developed a marked devotion to beautiful, delicate and typically unpractical shoes.
Ayo and the Greys (as Sophie affectionately referred to them) had demonstrated so completely and utterly the most awesome casualness about life yet seriousness about God. It was so different from other areas of the Church. Everybody was so busy trying to get results and here were these people who held on to God as their help. They had had the most basic advice to dealing with the ‘major’ issues that seemed to consume her so often: -
Stay calm.
- Ask yourself are you wrong?
- If you are, apologise.
- If you’re not, be gracious, but focused.
- If all fails, move on.
Apparently, they had assured her that there comes a point when you realise that always being right really is not that important. The wars you fight should be picked carefully and should be strategically important. The quicker you ensure ego does not drive key decisions, the better. There were very few deal breakers and if you really lived your life with God in context, even fewer. God in context meant that often you just bypassed people and physical infractions and hit your knees to obtain a more favourable solution.
They had encouraged her to seek God and look to live her life on His terms and no one else’s. She had failed so many times, but as she had kept trying she had learnt that there was so much truth in what they said. So much truth in living a simpler life. In hindsight maybe keeping company with older people had worked against marriage earlier on in her life. But it had meant that she had very early begun to know and appreciate herself. And, as she had added very modestly, she had realised she really wasn’t too bad!
‘Church’. Then there had been a long silence. Theoretically, if soundly based on the Biblical principles of love, grace and mercy, it should be a low stress environment. However in practice, a group of flawed individuals often lookin
g for more love, grace and mercy than they are able or willing to give is often a recipe for stress, trauma and anxiety. However, she had found the principles of less stressful living were of general application and could (thankfully) be applied to Church situations to produce a better outcome than would otherwise have been the case. .
Sundays with Sophie Page 3
