Stubborn mung beans

Friday, August 22 08

Mrs Bennet’s mung beans refused to sprout. They were huddled together like frogspawn in a glass jar frightened to do anything other than cling to each other. Although a few individuals had managed to produce a minute white tail, the results were disappointing. Mrs Bennet liked a challenge and thought it would be fun to see if camping and caravanning made any impact on her sprouting beans. They clearly had. Not one sprout appeared during the Dartmouth wash-out. The beans, like the Bennets had been victims of too close confinement – without the sun and freedom to grow, the sprouting tails had refused to come out to play.
Now, in Weymouth on the penultimate day of caravanning, the sun had finally broken through the clouds at 7am and transformed mood and caravan site alike. Mrs Bennet, having taken the older three Miss Bennets and her athletic parents for a ramble over hill to the beach for a pebble treasure hunt, was enjoying a moment’s peace, sitting in the sun with her mung bean jar by her side, now happily sweating in the heat.

Seagulls chattered overhead, dog walkers desperately prized their precious pets away from over-friendly canine neighbours and playful children were far enough away not to remind Mrs Bennet she was a responsible mother. She thought back on the week’s events which had included another opticians to mend Miss Megan Bennet’s glasses; several trips to the beach in the freezing cold, where fellow Brits sat huddled up in blankets and anoraks, clutched ice-cream cones and wore that “we are on holiday so we will sit on the beach” mentality and a few plunges in the indoor pool, where children splashed and jumped around while parents bobbed like plastic ducks in a bath far too small for them. Their purpose only to clutch non-swimmers and catch cold.

Rain tried to stop play, but the Bennet’s creativity prevented it winning. Armed in warm clothes and determination, the Bennets deprived the beach of its flat pebbles to use as blank canvasses for felt-tip decorating. On another occasion Mrs Bennet challenged them to find two pebbles which they believed stood out from the rest. Mrs Bennet found one engraved with a glistening swirl and another resembling an owl. Her mother, Jannie, found a cat face and an etched heart. The girls saw pictures in their pebbles, Mrs Bennet couldn’t quite see, but admired their imagination all the same. There were strops of course and Oscar-winning drama performances. Each of the Miss Bennets played lead character, while the other two made a sterling supporting actress. Mrs Bennet wanted to join them especially when the rain seemed relentless and sleep deprivation due to a teething twin started to wear her down. But Mrs Bennet was happy, she had drunk in the beach’s heavy seaweed aroma, she had skimmed stones across the water’s surface, she had seen her children laugh and she had managed to wear her shorts on the last day.
Her mung beans too had finally found a comfortable spot too. Happy at last with a feast of sun rays, their white tails were beginning to curl in tadpole-like fashion. It had taken two weeks, but they had found their place – and so had Mrs Bennet. But she was ready to go home.