A picture paints a thousand words

Jacqui Wiley

‘If a picture paints a thousand words, then why can’t I paint you? The words will never show the you I’ve come to know.’

Looking at your picture, I am reminded of the song ‘If’. If I had to write about you and what you mean to me, I wouldn’t be able to stop at a thousand words. An infinity of words would not be enough to express the ‘you’ I’ve come to know.

Endless days spent together, evoked suggestions that we were partners; we were more than that. There is no one word that describes what we were to each other. Our relationship was endless and fulfilling. There is emptiness in your absence but you are never not here.

The picture shows you at your best: relaxed, calm and poised. I remember when it was taken. We’d just sat down after dancing our version of the classic waltz. We flowed, gliding across the floor for several tunes, keeping in time to the beat of the music. I can hear you whisper in my ear, ‘Feel the beat, let yourself go, the steps will come and we will glide’. That we did, only taking breaks for refreshments.

Refreshments on your part that others glared at back then for they were of the non-alcoholic variety.

‘Not a real man,’ I’d hear them say; what would they know?

These days real men drink 0% beer, crafted designer beer, it’s the ‘in’ thing. What an improvement! Men who can enjoy themselves and hold a proper conversation without the crutch of alcohol. You had nothing against alcohol and neither did I, a little of what you like never hurt anyone. A lot, though, has consequences; it brings laughs, worries and above all hangovers.

Dark grey suit starched white shirt and the tie, tied with a Windsor knot, cheerily covered in an abundance of colourful squiggles. Black polished shoes completed the attire, though not visible in the picture. Sharp as a pin: ‘you’ in four words.

Endearing dimples show as your smile highlights straight white teeth slightly apart and if I were to look closely, I can almost see the tip of your tongue as it lies in the base of your mouth. The curve of your lips spreading happiness, I feel the positive energy.

Staring at the picture, your eyes stare back and you are here with me holding me. Those blue piercing eyes, they were the fishing rods that reeled me in, both of them working in unison. They smile in harmony with your mouth as they sparkle peering into my very soul. Delicate lines surround them, proof of a happy life, a life well lived making many memories. So much love in one picture held in place by a black wooden 8x10 frame, boxed in.

The words of the song return; ‘If the world should stop revolving, spinning slowly down to die, I’d spend the end with you, and when the world was through. Then one by one the stars would all go out. Then you and I would simply fly away.’

Picking up the picture with my frail, aged spotted hands, I hold it close to my chest and look around the empty house before closing the front door softly behind me. I’m on my way to join you to paint more pictures together because words are never enough. We will be together again until all the stars go out and we shall fly away.

• Jacqui Wiley is a member of Inklings Writing Group, who meet on Tuesdays at 11am in the Annebrook House Hotel.