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PuntBy John Graham
So, what more perfect way to spend an afternoon, after a relaxed lunch of warm quiche and cold wine, could there be than to idle on the river Thames or one of its contributing streams? … and the Oxford way is to take a punt, to allow the lady to recline and to look beautiful, while the man does the manly thing and guides the craft to a tree-shaded bower where love may rule the hours.
Presumably some of the college’s alumni like John Betjeman, Edward VIII of England, Stephen Bryer of the US Supreme Court, Dudley Moore, Oscar Wilde, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, and John Paul Getty, knew something about the art. So how difficult could it be? Just past the college a cobbled street led down to the river and to the boathouse. Along the banks of the narrow stream lie the punts: flat-bottomed wooden boats. They lie in ranks looking rich brown in the afternoon sun. Afterwards I find that they are 24 feet long and lack a keel. This makes them very stable but also difficult to direct but we don’t know that yet. The boatsman’s lad selected a suitable punt, swung it deftly around, and helped us to board very shakily. This flat boat may be stable but it certainly doesn’t feel it and I had an expensive camera that should remain dry. My wife, despite trying to take the upper hand is relegated to sit where beautiful companions recline … on cushions in the bow. She doesn’t seem very much at ease as I take hold of the pole, especially as the water immediately drags it away from me and the punt floats across the stream and hits the wall on the other side. I fight off her help and wobbling a little, I take command, point the bow towards one through passage of the bridge, and push a little. OK, the punt moves forward and I wave confidently at the lad as we clear the span. Eventually, however the momentum dies and I have to do something else. I do exactly the same thing, but this time, instead of moving forward this cumbersome and wayward craft slews across the stream towards the far bank. I have no idea what to do so the punt rams the stream bank thereby burying my wife under the overhanging prickly bushes. She is not happy. I take the pole again trying to remember what the lad said but the punt rams forward again into the bushes. My wife is now really not pleased and anyway I realize that all this maneuvering has turned us around. We are now headed back. My wife, stands up and firmly takes over. “I’ll do it, sit there.” I am relegated to the reclining cushions. Now I know my wife. She is an ex-gymnast, she is a runner, and she is fit. She could do it but she is Flemish and I am not sure than they have punts in Flanders. Still, she grasps the pole, lets it slip through her hands and the punt moves forward, So far so good, but now the pole is firmly entrenched in mud and doesn’t want to follow the punt. My wife’s legs start shaking and it is very clear that she believes, hanging onto the poll, she’s about to leave the punt. Memory is confused at this point but we both remember watching strollers on the bank suddenly take interest. In fact they start taking photographs of us.
Now, if we had read the instructions before starting this afternoon escapade we might have fared better … or not. The instructions say:
The last instruction was the only one that really mattered although the idea of twisting the pole out of the mud might have helped too. By this time, we had spent at least 30 minutes of our designated hour. We had not managed to reach the main stream of the Cherwell but we judged that we had experienced one aspect of Oxford life reasonably completely. We even felt it might take us another thirty minutes to return the two hundred yards we had traveled, so since the punt happened to pointing in the right direction, I took over again and gave another shove. That shove was enough eventually for us to reach the bridge and we would have glided comfortably and expertly into the boatsman’s yard if my wife had not grasped a chain hanging from the bridge. This slewed us around and we entered backwards in a fitting climax to our excursion. We shakily disembarked, paid off the lad, and strode up to the highway gaining confidence at every step. We had, without doubt, followed the instruction exactly: Keep a sense of humour! More such pieces in the book "Snapshots of the Mind,” John
Graham, 2005 available at the site:
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TM
Oxford,
a city of dreaming spires, of tightly cloistered colleges, and of leisure, never
seems to hurry. Perhaps the Professor and the student might think differently as
they go from one appointment to the next, but to an outsider, time seems to
stand still as it has done here for a thousand years … after all no one in these
days would ride a bike if they were in a hurry.
Hey,
that seems a good idea! … so we strode on down to the Magdalen College on
the River Cherwell. Since the college had been endowed, first as Magdalen Hall
in 1448, presumably they had gained some insight into the fine art of punting.
Meanwhile,
my wife has gone past concern to desperate action. She wrenches the pole from
its muddy grave and we somehow turn again, first forward and then in reverse. I
do manage to get a couple of good shots showing that she was in charge just
before any impending calamity. Evidential photographs are good in court.