Cuddle Therapy

We’re not long back from an extended Easter break over the water that was full of good things. We started in the New Forest and then drove a couple of hours along the coast to Brighton for a wedding. I hadn’t visited Brighton for ages and T had never been there. It certainly seemed to have become a very alternative town. The groom was the only son of my best friend, Phil, who I’d first met at secondary school. The groom, Nathan, and bride, Laurie-Ann, had been going out for a decade and living together for six years. They very generously had arranged for us to stay in their home over the weekend.

On the first evening we walked into town with Phil’s brother Terry and had an amazing meal at a vegetarian restaurant called Terre a Terre; a cornucopia of flavours put together most attractively. On the way back we paused at an alternative therapy centre and marvelled at the range of treatments and therapists on offer. The most intriguing was Cuddle Therapy, where you could spend your time with the therapist either talking about obstacles to physical contact or actually having cuddles.

I wondered how long it would take for Cuddle Therapy to become established in NI. We agreed that who you were actually cuddling was the most important consideration. T and I cuddled regularly everyday and always before going to sleep. It was a crucial part of our life together. We had both lived on our own and understood how lonely that can be. On the other hand, there were plenty of people I would pay good money not to be cuddled by; Boris Johnson, for example.

The wedding took place in the village of Firle in the midst of the attractive South Downs. It is an estate village and looks little changed from centuries before. Virginia Woolf once lived there and it became a hangout for the Bloomsbury Group. The ceremony was humanist in style; I gave one of the readings, ‘The Summer Day’ by Mary Oliver. The vicar was Peter Owen-Jones, who is also a poet and broadcaster. We walked from the Norman Church past banks of primroses to the lawn of the Manor House for champagne. The weather was cool, so after photos we went into the stables which had been converted into a large hall complete with oak beams.

After the speeches we had an enjoyable Mediterranean meal of kebabs, falafel, salads and flatbreads. I tried a glass of wine; the first since Xmas when my stomach, after all the cocodamol drugs, had a bad reaction to it. I was delighted to find no painful reaction, so I tried a couple more. Unlike many of the guests, I didn’t indulge in the free bar. But T and I danced happily with them to the live soul band. It was a lovely day. And a poignant one. Phil’s wife Jean had died of cancer almost five years previously. Her absence was keenly felt by all those who knew her.

The next morning we wandered down by the Pavilion and along the pier. We saw several groups of elderly Mods in parkas with roundels, but no Rockers. Perhaps they now only clashed for the overseas tourists in a sham-fight, like at Scarva. Then it was back in the car to the New Forest. And the very next morning we drove through heavy traffic to Hungerford for a family lunch that I’d arranged. Meeting up at the excellent Mediterranean restaurant Eliane were my brother, sister and several cousins. All in all we made a table of eleven. I hadn’t seen some of them for four years or more. We had a great catch up, took photos of each other and hugged before going our respective ways.

The purpose of our time away was to meet up with close friends and family and be part of a happy celebration. I guess the whole trip had been a type of Cuddle Therapy. So especially we’d like to wish Nathan and Laurie-Ann many happy years of cuddling together.