Wonderful life

I first saw her at Strawberry Fair, on one of the little stages, a mid-afternoon slot, couple of dozen watching. It was just her and an acoustic guitar, playing a song I remember from some distant summer in my childhood: ‘Wonderful Life’. She was no musician, strumming her way through simple chords, but her voice had a rich lived-in quality that belied her youth.

A litter later I saw her wandering around with her guitar case. I told her I enjoyed her set and offered her a drink. She consented, I could tell she needed one and she looked like she didn’t have the money. Any money – it was written all over her unfed face. She had a double girl’s drink with ice and drank it greedily.

We talked about the song. “It was Colin Vearncombe that wrote it,” she said, “or Black as he was known. He wrote it on the back of a really shit year - his wife had left him, he lost his job and he had a serious car crash, wrote off the car and was laid up in hospital for months, nearly died.”

“That’s a pretty shit year,” I agreed.

“And in the midst of that low,” she said, “he wrote that song. It was number one in 82 countries – that’s more countries than fought in the world war. One of the biggest hits there has ever been.”

“I saw him play,” I said. She looked up at me, suddenly interested again. “It was in Southampton a few years ago, some pub near the station. There were less than 20 people there. Less people than there were watching you just now. He was cool about it, signed CDs at the end, but you’d never think he’d written the biggest selling record ever.”

“Well, I guess he just ran out of bad luck,” she said, “never had any more car-crash relationships, job catastrophes and broken-boned boracicness to spur him to greatness. Sometimes it’s when you’re at your lowest you’re at your best.”

You could tell she was placing great faith in her own low-ness to spur her to greatness.

“What I love about the song, is that he just sails off into the ocean, into a new life, knowing nothing could be worse than his current life, just making the most of wherever the fuck he ends up.”

I bought her another drink and we talked some more. I’m pretty sure I could have taken her home with me if I wanted to. In fact I wanted to, she was young, attractive, full of life, but there was something just too desperate about her, something too alone.

A few years later I read about her in the newspaper. She’d left her clothes on a beach, had walked into the sea and never been seen again.

The papers said she was assumed dead, but maybe, just maybe, she drifted ashore somewhere and is making the most of her wonderful new life, wherever the fuck she ended up.