He had begun to recognise when he was dreaming, whist he was asleep.
Tonight, was no different. He was in the doorway of her bedroom asking if she fancied an adventure.
Silly question, she always longed for the times when he’d suddenly have hair-brain ideas that often ended in either mild disaster at the very least, or a brush with the law, an ambulance or on rare occasions the fire brigade. Sometimes though they were just harmless escapades.
“Wet or dry?” she called from somewhere under her bed as she retrieved her walking boots.
“Looks fine, but better take a coat as you never know,” he yelled.
Grabbing her phone, she checked the weather forecast. Bright and sunny. She chucked suncream in her bag, along with some boiled sweets and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge as she passed.
They had now been on this route march since first light.
“Where are we going?” She asked trying to keep up.
“Somewhere!” He replied.
Why are we doing this?” She asked as she slumped down onto a convenient rock now completely out of breath.
“I was reading the dictionary.” He said it as if it was the most logical answer.
She stared at him.
Her grandfather was then and always had been the proverbial naughty schoolboy. An excellent raconteur, family and friend spent many a happy hour engrossed as he regaled them with stories from his past. Most stemmed from reality but over the years of telling, sometimes the embellishments had gotten a little out of hand, but no one cared.
“Explain!” She prompted.
“Most of the time young people just dawdle their way through life … DAW-dle.” He said again slowly to emphasise the word. “Found that in the dictionary.” He said triumphantly.
“To waste time slowly,” she offered.
He nodded. “But it’s more than that.”
He undid the top of the flask and spilled the coffee on his knee.
“Coup,” he said doing the action again and spilling some more.
He laughed.
“That’s an old word, Scottish. A proper kind of word.”
I’d not heard it before, but he looked so earnest that I didn’t argue.
He held a steaming plastic mug out in my direction. I shook my head rummaging for the bottle of water, but I took the offered chocolate bar. Usually we shared one, but I’d missed breakfast.
We sat in silence content to just watch the landscape, munching away, happy in each other’s company.
“I feel sick now.” I said shoving the empty wrapper in my pocket.
“Crapulous.” He said triumphantly. I cocked my head to one side.
“What?”
“Crapulous, the feeling of being stuffed to the gills.” He explained.
I laughed.
“Exactly, you jollux,” he said punching me on the shoulder just a little too hard.
“Hey, I’m not fat!” I protested.
We packed everything away and continued.
It was almost lunchtime when we spotted the coast.
“Chips or ice cream?” He asked.
“Both.” He nodded solemnly. “Race you for them.”
We found ourselves two deckchairs.
“Why do chips always smell and taste better in the open air, eaten at the seaside,” he mused.
I didn’t know but totally agreed.
“Buzz off,” he shouted, flapping his free arms about at the gulls, which to be honest had no effect at all.
“How am I supposed to enjoy my fish while those guys are groaking me.”
I got the gist, but as we were not alone on the prom, I inwardly hoped it didn’t mean anything rude.
After lunch Granddad had a bit of a doze, while I read my book.
It was too late to paddle by the time he woke.
“I’m all of a zwodder,” he announced rubbing his eyes and sighed.
“Best we head back before twitter-light,” he continued. “Your mother will worry.”
I knew she wouldn’t, she would have rung if she was. How we can end up spending the best part of the day doing absolutely nothing always amazes me, but we can, and we do regularly.
By the time we hit home it was lumming it down, good job we took coats.
“Where have you too been?” Mum asked as we kicked off our boots and shook water all over the hall. Granddad gave me that special smile, the one which conveys everything without saying a word.
“On a tour of ye olde-worlde dictionary apparently,” I offered. Granddad nodded seriously.
“We’ve had a colliwomple kind of a day, spent dawdling along, just lollygagging,” he said.
We both broke down into fits of laughter.
His daughter shook her head. Sometimes it just wasn’t worth the effort of asking.
Word Definitions
- Coddiwomple – to travel in a purposeful manner towards a vague destination
- Lollygag – spend time aimlessly – idle
- Dawdle – lollygagging along
- Jollux – a fat person
- Groaking – begging to be invited to eat
- Twitter-light – twilight.
- Lumming – raining hard.
- Zwodder – drowsy state of mind