Glass half empty?

I always suspected I was by nature a pessimist but this was brought home to me on Saturday when we arrived home after a trip to get an old buggy new wheels (joys of grannydom) and saw a pair of black, be-plumed horses waiting patiently in the street. “Must be a funeral,” I said. Then I noticed that the black horses were wearing white plumes and were harnessed to a carriage not a hearse. “Ooh, no, it’s a wedding,” I corrected myself. And indeed it was.

We have lived here for nearly 27 years (we moved in two days after the daughter was born, which was interesting) and this is the first time I can recall a street wedding. My daughter had already moved away before she married, as had the girl next door, and so far none of the other youngsters who are now 20- or even 30-somethings have tied the knot. But the block of flats opposite is now full of young couples who – unlike us back in the early 80s – cannot afford to rent, let alone, buy a house in London.

Quite of few of the neighbours came out to watch and wish them well. We think it was the bride’s mum in the pale green outfit with matching shoes and hat. The bridesmaids looked lovely in strapless, full-length garnet dresses. But the bride was truly beautiful in pale gold, with little lace cap sleeves and a bouquet of deep red roses.

We all clapped as she climbed into the carriage and the horses clip-clopped off towards St Barnabas’ church which is just round the corner. And I wasn’t the neighbour who observed that if I’d been the bride I’d have got them to go the long way round to get the most for my money. She just said what I was thinking.