Special Days Don't Come Too Often

But One Came In March 1971

Unusually written in the first person!

It may have begun in he building above where my chum David and I had gone for a Leadership Training Weekend. As Leader and potential leader of Sheffield West Crusader Bible Class, we were encouraged to attend these weekends to help improve our leadership skills. This one was something akin to a disaster.

The Conference Centre was struggling financially and everything (including the bedding) was damp. The number of attendees was small, less than 20 including leaders. I and David arrived late on the Friday night because David had a season ticket for the concerts in Sheffield's City Hall.

He had the right priorities, as it happened. It was Mahler's Resurrection Symphony!

So we missed the first exciting and stimulating session.

Upon arrival we were escorted into the lounge where the attendees were sitting round the edge of the room exuding utter misery and total boredom.

One young lady present, Sheila Stewart by name, spoke with a mild Scottish accent, so chum David told a mildly racial joke about a Scotsman. It wasn't very funny. The girl feigned mock objection and I then asked her which part of Scotland she came from.

"Golders Green" was her unequivocal reply.  Later she claimed that she had misunderstood the question. She was in training for Golders Green Crusaders.

A very unlikely beginning; even more unlikely as the rest of the training weekend was thoroughly forgettable. Actually, it was grim. The only light relief was this wee lassie, actually from Bearsden Glasgow, who seemed to enjoy the company of David and me.

I enjoyed hers - she was the only one there who could not be described as boring.

But during the course of the weekend Sheila agreed to come and help me by cooking for a Summer Crusader Holiday of 128 on the Isle of Wight.

After we parted at the end of the hard-working kids holiday, we agreed to meet sometime.

Then I did the weirdest thing i have ever don in my life, before or since.

I asked he for her photograph and we began exchanging occasional letters.

In one I enclosed a passionate poem referring back to some catering errors on the holiday. This paeon of passionate poetic praise read ...

Roses are blue, violets are red

You burnt the sausages;

I'll have custard instead.

It was very lumpy (the custard, not the poem)!

In fact Sheila was a fully trained caterer, a product of Glasgow Domestic Science College and absolutely brilliant at feeding 128 hungry teenagers and their leaders! The minor probles with sausages and custard were trivial and unnoticed by the clientele.

She invited me to visit her parents' home  in Bearsden and, astoundingly, she sent me some pictures of London Transport Routemasters with all over advertising livery - including the best of them all, the one for Youngers Tartan Bitter.

She had gone out from her office (she worked for the National Society for Mentally Handicapped Children) and taken them herself on her Kodak Instamatic camera. The pictures "lacked photographic skill" but the gesture was very special.

Things Move On

A series of visits to Glasgow began and, again, Sheila was more than anxious to help me explore the public transport infrastructure. There was the seedy delight of Kelvinbridge Subway Station ...

... with the entrance next to the bins in someone's basement. The Glasgow Underground (a k a The Subway) was equally seedy ...

... dark, gloomy and often with the whiff of unmentionables. It was like entering the doom-laden underworld.

It wasn't as bright as that when I first descended. Lifts? Escalators? What are they?

There was the grimy decay of St Enoch Hotel, the faded magnificence of the Underground HQ and station ...

... and the depressing use of the former station as a car park.

Killermont Street bus station whence ran buses back to Sheila's home ...

... was cramped, lethal for passengers with inadequate room for queues and a depressing frontage.

But if you wanted Stygian gloom, the best place was the Clyde foot tunnel running from the Finnieston Crane ...

... under the Clyde ...

... to nowhere very beautiful. Sheila did not accompany me on what was perceived as an expedition fraught with health and safety considerations.

But, at the bottom of Sheila's road was ...

... Alexander Midland's Milngavie bus depot. Deep joy.

I fell in love with Glasgow and may, quite possibly, have been falling in love with Sheila. 

On one visit I walked down to the bus depot and wept copiously. I did not want "it" to end but feared it might. The "relationship" seemed so unlikely.

"It" didn't end.

The God Of The Impossible

Or, in our case, the very improbable!

But there was something VERY special about "Och Aye" as she was soon known by the Crusaders in Sheffield of which I had become a leader, despite that awful training weekend.

I had expected to remain in contented bachelorhood. Indeed, Sheila's mother advised her daughter that "he is not of the marrying kind" and he probably wasn't ...

But God had other ideas.

Oh yes, it is all down to God!

The wedding was at New Kilpatrick Parish Church in Bearsden ...

... the reception was at nearby Kilmardinny House, chum David was best man  ...

... and the brief honeymoon (very expensive) was at the Old Course Hotel, St Andrews ...

... once a British Railways Hotel - what else?

That was 50 years ago today!

Chat shows often ask their guests what the "secret of a good marriage" is.

Sheila and I can tell you - and we will! Well, actually, we won't. 

We will leave that to Gospel Writer Matthew reporting the actual words of Jesus.

“So do not start worrying: ‘Where will my food come from? or my drink? or my clothes?’ Your Father in heaven knows that you need all these things. Instead, be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he requires of you, and he will provide you with all these other things." (Matthew Chapter 3 verses 31 to 33)

The ancient twosome cannot, with confidence, say that they have always got this principle right, but with God's help they have done their best to put Him first and to share together In His service.

The poet William Cowper (that is Coo as in doves, not Cow as in milk) suffered from depression and attempted suicide several times. He spent time in the Asylum that stood (and still stands, although not called that anymore) next door to my Grammar School in Northampton. He lived part of his life at Olney, where he was good friends with Rev John Newton (of Amazing Grace fame).

He wrote poems and a few hymns, one of which, although rather old fashioned in its language, seems appropriate.

God moves in a mysterious way

His wonders to perform.

He plants his footsteps in the sea

And rides upon the storm.

You fearful saints, fresh courage take;

The clouds you so much dread

Are big with mercy and shall break

In blessings on your head.

His purposes will ripen fast,

Unfolding ev'ry hour.

The bud may have a bitter taste,

But sweet will be the flow'r.

Blind unbelief is sure to err

And scan his work in vain.

God is his own interpreter,

And he will make it plain.

There certainly won't be another 50 - we are both well past our Biblical sell-by date - but we have that utter confidence in our Eternal Future that comes from a true understanding of "The Good News".

Try it and see!

Sermon over - back to more recent buses and trains tomorrow. And the answers to the Bank Holiday Quiz.

P.S. One of the first outings in our married life was on the 0430 service 287 from Central Bus Station Sheffield to Tinsley Marshalling Yard ...

... and back.

Mysterious ways - too right! But thanks, God, for 50 very special years.

 Next Variety blog : Saturday 15th April