And I do, I can’t resist the shiny jewels that are strewn
along my path. They gleam in autumn sun, old friends from playground days. They
feel like they have been designed to fit in my palm, slippery smooth and
sculpted for comfort. At once a precious stone and perfect missile. I have
never been hit on the head by a falling conker but I imagine it would be like
the sky falling down. I may have
inherited my habit from my mother, who I remember used to bring them back from
her shopping -trolley trips to town. The excitement of one still in its case of
angry prickles and the delight of stamping on it to unwrap the special present.
Will it be a round one, to drill and win competitions with, or two cheese
cutters? These half-moons were a disappointment in days gone by but I have a
new regard for them as the contrast between flat and round is a further tactile
pleasure. Spider scarers, but they smell of nothing, taste of nothing, tongue
slides on veneer. ‘Get that out of your mouth, you might choke!’
Not so many years ago, (11, 12, 13?) we held three annual
world conker championships. We sprayed a conker gold, tied its gold cord into a
medallion, and bought a yellow jersey in a charity shop. Then we had a night of
nostalgia, wine and fighting. 11, 12, 13 (?) years ago we didn’t care that our
kitchen became a place of pale yellow conker inners, we were children again! Invariably
the champion was the person with the weakest strike. I remembered ancient
strategies, baking, grilling, vinegar soaking. These techniques would beat the
pants off those passive combatants, but of course I never practised them; we
had rules, no cheating now allowed. Alas, we moved away and didn’t meet potential
conker players in our new town and cared more about our kitchen. So the golden
conker probably lies dusty and discarded at the back of a drawer of the last
winner, or binned entirely, released from its aura.
Horse chestnuts (why horse?) are like speeded up us, going
from pretty and perfect but in hours losing their sheen and within a week
wrinkled and cracked and as light as corpses. Then, I throw them in the bin.
They travel in the rubbish-munching lorry to the dump and if they’re lucky and
if there is any magic in them maybe they grow into trees, fed on banana skins
and cellophane.
But the trees are sick. Their withered leaves
surround their perfect children, hopes for future generations. I don’t know if
illness is already written into these round nuts or if I should be planting my pocketfuls
to replace their diseased parents. Or will they all die and I’ll be dribbling
in a home telling random electronic children about the joys of conker
competitions and the magic of horse chestnut trees that used whisper silent
promises in the wind.
