When you’re stuck, why not tell a story

WHEN things get complicated people often make up stories to help them understand what is going on. Parables, allegories, tall stories… they all help us understand. And in a world where decisions about our lives are made remotely by people we will never meet, it sometimes seems the only way we can get our head around things way beyond our control.

Some newspaper columnists know what is going on. Or claim they do – although when it comes to Brexit, even the experts are stumped. But after politicians have been making such a mess of things this week, we are all clueless – whether we’re in Westminster or out in the sticks.

So let’s make up a story and see where it takes us…

Let’s imagine we’re living in one of those model garden suburbs or villages that materialised in the mid20th century. Members of our family helped set up the community and we live in one of the biggest and best houses on the western edge of the development.

It’s such a pretty, well-designed community, it has become the envy of the county. We have the best facilities for a village our size anywhere. The community hall never ceases to win awards. The cricket club is always top of the league, as is the youth football team. We’ve got the biggest and best WI and countless other clubs and organisations. Even the roads and other municipal elements are better than anywhere else. And all this is thanks to one thing…

When it was formed, our community set up a residents’ association that became the most powerful and efficient of its kind in the country. There’s a reason for that: in this welloff place every householder pays a hefty annual sum into the kitty.

Hence the splendid hall. It is why we have no potholes: the association has lawyers who harangue local authorities. It’s why our sports teams win: collective buying power pays for training and coaches. And so on…

It’s a tough world out there, but our association – representing our collective will – gives us this wonderful lifestyle. It costs, but everyone who lives here reckons it’s worth it.

However, because yours is one of the biggest houses, you pay one the highest annual subs. In recent times, though, you’ve been peeved about this because new homes built on the eastern side of the village have meant, for example, that you’ve had to queue for the tennis courts.

Worse, the newcomers have joined a growing movement in the association that has caused it to become too big for its boots. It recently voted to take over every front garden so that whole streets could be landscaped.

You stormed out of a meeting and called a family summit. You wanted to be the first household ever to leave the association. Your elderly father agreed, saying he’d wanted this for years. Mother-in-law shouted down from the granny flat saying she’d back the move.

The kids, though, protested. They’re members of lots of commu- nity clubs and they said the move would cause them social and other problems. It was only when your wife/husband reluctantly agreed to take your side that you won the vote and quit.

The association wasn’t designed to cope with leavers, so emergency meetings had to be staged. Would your family still be able to use the community hall? You helped pay for it, but you’d no longer be contributing towards maintenance.

Your son tells you he’s been dropped by the football team because the universal insurance cover, paid for under a cheap communal deal, will no longer apply to him. Daughter is in tears because her pony can no longer be kept at the livery since it’s all paid for under an advantageous deal put in place by the community.

You tell your son that, with the money you’ll be saving, you’ll be able to take him to some proper football matches. Your daughter can keep her pony in the garden and you know a bloke who sells horse-hay cheap. But they’ve seen through this. Son doesn’t want to watch matches, he wants to play. Daughter reckons your mate’s hay will make her pony sick.

So this week you went back to the association to ask a favour. You know you said you’d quit by March, but would they grant an extension so you can sort things out? They say they didn’t want you to leave in the first place. It’s been your choice. They’ve got elections coming up and your delay will make things messy.

Your old dad retorts: “To hell with ‘em! Think of the £1,000 a year we’re going to save! Anyway, we’ve made up our minds!”

M-I-L is so embarrassed she’s locked herself away in the granny flat. Wife/husband can’t make their mind up. The kids are angrily demanding a new vote.

If this was one of those computer games where you play God, it’d be fun. But it’s not. So you drop to your knees in the front garden you haven’t touched for months because it was going to be (and still might be) bulldozed, weeping bitter tears into a wasteland once filled with flowers.

Which is a poignant thing to do – but it gets you precisely nowhere.

Mother-in-law is so

embarrassed she’s locked herself away in

the granny flat