As a child I had a real aversion to grey stone walls and what might lie behind them. I was always looking out for despair rather like some sniper on loan to a maniac.. Nowadays I can admit to my need to banish any shred of quietly heroic misery. in fact, Mother seemed to know several very stoical people and somehow this didn’t seem, correction, never seemed- healthy. I wanted to run away from their thrift and modest endurance. Yorkshire seemed a particularly grim pool of heroism. I can even remember feeling revolted in the middle of a walk on a Sunday and sensing utter relief when I climbed in the back of my dad’s cortina and started home for Chapel leaving selfless heroism at a short, gate, bordered by a light grey wall. But this was before Gertie as most things turned out to be…