Soaked at the fete — and loving it

AS AUGUST ends we’re already lighting the woodstove, buying oil and thinking about sealing up the draughty windows of the old house before it’s rattled by winter storms.

I’m getting out the warm clothes and treating myself to a couple of new sweaters. In a previous old house I used to tell my children briskly to put another jumper on and not moan — which actually seems pretty good advice for life in general, don’t you think?

It was useful on Bank Holiday Monday, when we braved atrocious weather to support the annual Kelston village fete, two miles outside Bath.

Oh the sad, dripping bunting, the rain-swept field, the rhythm- and- blues band giving it all they had under a gazebo, the hopeful people manning the stalls: smash the egg, hit the coconut, skittles.

There weren’t many takers for the poor dog show, nor the ice creams, and not even for delicious organic burgers. You could have called it a washout. But the point is, people did turn up. Like us, they’d said to each other: ‘There’s no way we’re not going!’

There was something so magnificently, proudly British about the sight of families huddled under umbrellas as the rain almost became horizontal, determined to spend a little money in aid of the village hall. Something amusingly glorious about the determined good cheer of the people manning the entrance and the stalls.

Rain ran down my neck, but I challenged my husband to skittles and won. I felt equally triumphant winning a toy ‘kung fu’ hamster, although no skill was involved.

We sought refuge in the produce tent, admired plants and displays, bought raffle tickets and debated (at length) which cake to buy. Then we visited the beautiful church, before heading home — soaked.

And I recalled a beautiful Philip Larkin poem called Show Saturday. It celebrates these shared British institutions like horse shows and fetes, which ‘stay hidden there like strength . . . something people do’. Nothing so warmly uniting could be called a wash-out. As Larkin says: ‘Let it always be there.’

Bel answers readers’ questions on emotional and relationship problems each week. Write to Bel Mooney, Daily Mail, 2 Derry Street, london W8 5TT, or e-mail bel. mooney@dailymail.co.uk. A pseudonym will be used if you wish. Bel reads all letters but regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence.