The fug or malaise or whatever it was that was afflicting me hadn’t disappeared the next morning. I’d lost count of the number of times I picked up my phone to call Carla and had chickened out each and every time.

My impression of being a wimp only added to my growing depression.

I managed to get Roxy going north once again and for a while, things seemed better.

When I reached the start of the Ribble Link waterway the few rays of sunshine that had managed to break through the grey clouds were extinguished in a flash. The rain came down in sheets. Wave after wave came in from the Irish Sea. The temperature dropped by at least 5C in a few minutes. Luckily, my waterproofs were on a hook just inside the cabin.

At the lock that marks the end of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and the start of the Ribble Link, there was a Canal Inspector. I knew that my waterways permit was in order so I was slightly mystified when he stopped me from proceeding along with the 'Link'. Luckily, the rain had moved off to the east and while still damp at least it wasn’t chucking it down.

“What seems to be the problem?”

“We don’t appear to have a booking for your passage.”

“Oh! I’m sure that I made the booking over a week ago. Let me get my laptop to check.”

I dashed down into the cabin banging my head on the door for my troubles.

I shrugged off the ache and grabbed my laptop.

“Let me see. I’m sure that I filled it all out,” I said to the inspector.

Then I saw the problem. I saw the problem.

“It looks like I forgot to submit it.”

I turned the screen so that he could see it.

"That's all right. Why not submit it now and I'll record your passage as starting in… say twenty minutes.”

A few minutes later, I was on my way again. I'd thanked the inspector for his courtesy and for giving me a copy of the tide-tables for the next week. I’d have to navigate the tidal part of River Ribble, in order to reach Preston and the rest of the Lancaster Canal.

I cursed that malaise for making me do something so stupid.

---

The information in the tide tables told me that high-water slack would be in two hours. I had that long to get down the tidal inlet that I was now on to the main channel. I then had an hour to get upriver to the sea lock that marked the end of the tidal section of the canal.

I managed to put my distractions to one side and navigate the river successfully. I was surprised at how well Roxy responded to my commands on the throttle. The old Roxy would have taken a lot longer before anything started to happen. Now, it was almost instantaneous thanks to the extra power that was now available.

Now that I was back in the calm of the canal, I tied up Roxy and had something to eat. I double-checked that I booked my passage onto the Lancaster Canal and a mooring for the night. I was determined not to get caught out again as I had been earlier. That was an unforgivable rookie mistake. What rankled, even more, was that I'd never missed sending a booking off before.

That evening, my malaise had caught up with me again when my phone rang. It wasn’t a number I recognised so I almost didn’t answer it but I did.

“Hello?”

“Oh, hello Heidi. I hope you are fine?”

“Good. What can I do for you?”

“You are? Well, congratulations. When and where? Don’t tell me, just email or text them to me then I won’t get them wrong.”

“Yes, but forgive me for asking, is there anything wrong? Why didn’t Melody call me?”

“Ah yes PAYG credits. I remember them well.”

“No, I won’t be coming with anyone. Clara and I are no longer together. It is a long story and not for telling over the phone.”

"No, tell me what you'd want as a present. I mean really, really want and I'll get it for you both. A big sister has to look after her family you know.”

“I mean it. I am so happy for you both.”

“Thanks, and I’ll look forward to getting the details.”

“Bye and give my best to little sister.”

I hung up the call and actually smiled. That had been the first bit of good news I’d received in a while. Then I realised that I’d been an idiot.

I picked up the phone and called Heidi.

“It is me. I forgot to ask, who is giving you away and who is Melody’s best person?”

“I’d love to do that for Melody. Her side of the party will be a little thin on the ground.”

“Who will be wearing white and what colour do you want me to wear.”

“Yes, things like that do matter. You can’t have the best lady showing up the two brides now can you eh?”

“Yes, there is a lot to do and not much time to do it in. I’m around 160 miles away from you but I’ll come south well before the big day.”

"Thanks again, Heidi."

This time I felt a lot happier with myself. I'd begun to start thinking about things other than my sorry self for the first time in days.

My endorphin induced euphoria didn’t last long. Being the de-facto Best Man meant that I needed something to wear and my hair was a total mess.

Then I burst out laughing. I was certainly being a silly woman over this. At least it got my mind working on things other than the disaster that was my love life.

My hair was an immediate problem. Being a stranger in the area, I had no idea about which Hairdressers were good, which were bad and which were indifferent. At the moment, Roxy was near Preston but not in the centre. Getting into the City-Centre would have to be my top priority. The chances of finding an appointment at very short notice in many places are next to impossible. All I could do would be to try a few and see what transpires.

I spent some time the next morning with my maps, laptop and phone working out what to do next.

As Melody and Heidi’s wedding was due to take place in ten days, I needed to get something to wear, get my hair done and travel south. At the moment, every mile I travelled in Roxy was taking me farther and farther away from Oxford which is where I needed to be in nine days.

Reluctantly, I decided that Roxy was going to stay put until I'd solved the problem of what to wear on the day of their marriage. Being the de-facto 'best woman' was perplexing. I'd never been to a wedding where there was a 'best woman'. In my former life, I would have simply rented a suit of the required type for the day. That was not possible now.

Then there was the issue of should I dress as 'Mother of the Bride' or just as if I was attending the wedding as a guest. Having to make decisions like this was a very alien experience to me. I feared that it would be so very easy to mess things up. It was then that I recalled that the last wedding I'd been to had been in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. There, the heat demanded casual clothes and pretty well anything was acceptable. I was sure that this would not be the case here.

I tried to as they say, ‘sleep on it’ but I was no closer to a decision by the next morning. More out of desperation than anything, I decided to take the train into Manchester and do a spot of people watching at the Registry Office. I hoped that doing that might inspire me.

Although there was a railway station less than a ten-minute walk from where Roxy was moored it seemed from the timetable that about one train a day that stopped there going towards Preston. I could return to Preston which meant turning Roxy around. A narrowboat is not like a car where you can simply do a 'U' turn. The canal isn't wide enough for one thing. There are places called 'winding holes' that allow this to happen.

There was one a few hundred yards back the way I'd come but I'd have to reverse Roxy along the canal which is very much frowned upon. The next one ahead of her was halfway to Lancaster. In the end, I decided to book a mooring in Lancaster and take the train to Manchester from there. There was a good service from there to Manchester with many trains going directly to Oxford Road or Piccadilly.

With something of a plan in the bag, I left the mooring and steered Roxy north along the Lancaster Canal. There were no locks to go through so the day was very much one of the easier ones from a work point of view.

The mooring that I’d booked was around 1km from the station. I decided to make a day of it and go reasonably early. The 08:29 train was pretty busy but it would take me to Manchester with only three stops along the way.

As we came into the city, we were held at some signals just before Oxford Road. I could see glimpses of the canal where Roxy and I had been the previous week. Then I saw a sign for an Art Gallery on a side street. From the sign on the front, it also had a restaurant. That might be a nice place to check out for lunch. I checked the place using the maps app on my phone. I saw that there was a Tram stop just on the other side of the canal from the gallery. Even better.

My people watching as wedding parties arrived and departed from the Registry Office proved fairly fruitful. I was warming to the opinion that I should just play the role of the slightly bohemian artist. That wasn’t far from the truth at all and I could wear the clothes again rather than languish in my wardrobe waiting for another wedding or a funeral.

I was feeling a lot better with myself as I took the tram towards the gallery and lunch.

The lunch was enjoyable even if it was rabbit food. Salads are ok but some effort has to be put into making them. Still, it allowed me to sit down for half an hour before I took a wander around the gallery.

Most of the work was dull and uninteresting. Modern abstract art had never been my thing and their main exhibition was devoted to that. Warhol has a lot to answer for in my opinion but that is not shared by many. Don’t get me wrong, some of his early work including his Marylin Munroe pictures were innovative but far too many people had tried to copy his style and had not got even close.

I soon passed through the modern stuff in search of something different. It was then that I saw it. I knew what it was in an instant. I should have because I’d painted it.

I was torn between pleasure and sadness as I stood looking at the picture. It was of the Grand Union Canal at the point where the West Coast Railway line and the M1 run alongside each other. I'd painted it more as a protest piece. I'd even put some jet contrails in the shape of a cross in the sky to emphasise my point. I was protesting about how fast life was today. The inspiration for the jet contrails was a photo that had been taken by O. Winston Link. I had a print of the one that had inspired me on the wall onboard Roxy.[1]

The label said that it was on a permanent loan from a company. When I saw the name, my heart sank to the floor and beyond. The company was one of my Fathers. All I could think about was wanting to take the picture and destroy it there and then.

One of the security guards noticed my anger.

“I hope you aren’t thinking of doing anything silly miss?” he said quietly from behind me.

His words startled me for a second or so.

“No. I’m not. I’m just surprised and angry as seeing this here. Is there someone in charge that I can speak to about the display of this picture?”

“Why would you want to do that?”

“Because I’m the artist. I painted that almost three years ago.”

He got on his radio and a few minutes later, a woman appeared. She had an air of authority about her.

“Hello,” she said.

“I’m Joyce Young, I’m an assistant curator here. What can I do to help you?”

“My name is Lauren Savannah Hall. I’m the artist of that picture. I’d like it removed from display right away.”

"I'm sorry? We normally get artists asking for us to display their work. Why would you want us to remove it? The feedback we have had since it went on display has been excellent."

“Why? Because the label shows that it is owned by my father’s company. He and I are estranged. He has never once shown any interest in supporting my work. Far from it. He has always told me to get a real job.”

“I’m not sure we can do that. How do I know who you are who you say you are?”

I rummaged in my bag and pulled out my purse.

“Here is my driving license.”

She only glanced at it so I had to do something else. Then I had an idea.

I opened my phone and pulled up a series of emails that Jonathan and I had exchanged relating to my last show in London.

“Here are some emails that I had with the owner of the gallery in London where I had a show not that long ago. If you go on their website, I’m sure that you will find a picture of me with some of my more recent work that was sold at the show.”

Ms Young still didn’t take my word for it. She opened her mega-sized phone and checked for herself.

"I see that you are indeed the artist. I can't remove the picture today. I'd have to consider what we'd replace it with. As you can see, this section of the gallery is devoted to how we moved from rural life to a mostly urban one. Your work shows how life has speeded up since the Eighteenth Century perfectly."

“Please try to replace it. I will have to try to reason with my father about removing it from the gallery. I’d rather destroy it than have him get the pleasure from owning something of mine. He tried almost all my life until I left home to get me to be just like him. I’m not and was never a son of his.”

I’d outed myself and only realised it after I’d said it.

"Sorry? Did you say, son?"

“I did. I’m sorry for that outburst. I was born his son but I knew that I should have been his daughter. I am that now and he has not shown any signs of accepting the fact.”

Then I added,
"If you could, please forget what I've just said. I am quite a private person and I hope that you can understand why this is.”

Slowly a smile appeared on the previously stony face of Ms Young.

“I think that there is someone you should meet. They work in our conservation department.”

I was a bit surprised by her reaction.

“If you don’t have a train to catch that is?” she added.

I smiled.

“Actually, I do but there are plenty so I can catch another one.”

“You aren’t from up here, are you?”

“No. I’m travelling around looking for inspiration for my next work. I spent last winter in London and I’ve been on the move since late February.”

“Have you found any? Inspiration, that is?”

I sighed before replying.
“So far nothing has said ‘paint me’.”

“Perhaps you should think about a slightly different subject.”

Her words made me laugh.

“Someone else said that to me only a week or so ago.”

She smiled.

“I think I’ll pass on meeting this person you mentioned. I need to get back to Lancaster before the shops close,” I replied.

I’d met a few other trans people in one-on-one situations before and had found then decidedly uncomfortable if there was any sort of pressure on the meeting. This other person was doing her job so would only be able to spend a short while with me.

“Ok but if you are ever back in the city then please come to the gallery.”

“What about my picture?”

"Do you still want me to consider removing it from the display?"

I thought for a second. It was an honour to have one of my pieces on display even if it was owned by my father.

"I think I might have overreacted before. It was a total surprise to see one of my dabbles on show like this."

“It is hardly a dabble. It makes a bold statement.”

“Which was not on my mind at all when I painted it.”

Ms Young smiled.

“That’s what makes it so good.”

---

As soon as I stepped onto the train to Lancaster, I began to feel bad for wimping out on the meeting with the other trans person at the gallery but wasn’t in the right frame of mind for such a meeting.

I tried to put it out of my mind and think about what I should do next. The day hadn’t been totally wasted but not as productive as it might have been.

One thing that stood out from my trip was the colourful clothes of a Sikh couple who were at the registry office to perform the civil part of their wedding. They then headed off for a big celebration in traditional Sikh style. The bride wore vibrant red and gold clothes. That would do perfectly or at least something similar and possibly a little toned down but the more I thought about it, the more I warmed to that would be the right outfit for the wedding. My problem was where to get such an outfit from.

I was looking out of the train window as it slowed to a stop at Bolton. I saw a street market just packing up for the day. What caught my eye was a clothes stall and some brightly coloured garments. I had no idea if they were what I wanted and the stall would be long gone by the time I got there even if I got off the train right then.

A couple of minutes of searching on the phone told me that the covered market in Preston might well be the place to go. That sorted out what I’d be doing the next day.

It seemed that all roads led to Preston. As I waited for the train south the next morning, I regretted not turning Roxy around when I had the opportunity. Then again, I would not have discovered that one of my pictures was on display at a gallery in Manchester. That both pleased and worried me. Pleased that as an artist, I was deemed good enough to feature my work but worried that my father owned one of my pieces. The upside of that was that at least it wasn’t owned by my brother. You win some and you lose some.

A brief tour of the market gave me a lot of hope for finding an outfit for the wedding. There were plenty of tops but very little in the way of skirts. None of the stallholders had anything that as they say, ‘tickled my fancy’. One of them did suggest a shop a few streets away so I left the market and went in search of the shop.

I found not only a skirt but a top to go with it. My bohemian look was nearly complete. All I needed were some appropriate shoes. A pair of sandals would do fine and I knew exactly where to get them from. I returned to the market and found exactly what I was looking for.

This time, when I took the train back to Lancaster, I was in a much happier mood than that of the previous day.

I still had to decide what to do next. Should I carry on north to the end of the canal or should I stay put and head south to Oxford sooner rather than later. I couldn’t make up my mind so I headed for the shower only to find that I was out of water. I cursed myself for not stopping on the way up to give Roxy a pit-stop. That and the fact that the toilet was starting to smell, forced my hand.

It was too late to get Roxy turned and back down the canal so I left it until tomorrow. The absence of even enough water for my morning coffee forced my hand even further. I got dressed and headed for the nearest convenience store and bought an expensive bottle of water. It galled me to have to pay nearly £1.00 for a litre of water but there was little I could do at that moment.

---

The next morning, I turned Roxy and went the half-mile or so back down the canal to the Waterwitch Footbridge where I filled Roxy’s water tank, emptied the toilet which can be a smelly job. With Roxy all ready to go, I used the shower on the wharf to clean off any residue from the Elsan system.

It was almost lunchtime before I cast off and headed south. As I did so, I wondered if I’d ever get to the far end of the canal of would this be it?

Only time would tell on that one.

I called it a day when I reached Salwick. I tied up Roxy in the same spot as she’d been in just a few days before. This time she was staying until after the wedding. Trains or rather the lack of them would not stop me this time.

That evening my mind returned to thinking about Carla. The issue of what to wear for the wedding had temporarily pushed the not so little matter of my faltering relationship with her to the back of my mind.

There was no doubt that I missed her dearly. Was I in love with her? I didn’t know but I did know that I had experienced feelings for her that I’d never felt for anyone before. But the wimp that I am could not bring myself to pick up the phone and call her.

Slowly, a plan began to form in my mind. Once the wedding was over, I’d take the opportunity to go and see her and talk about it face to face. Phones and especially texts are so impersonal that if we were going to carry or end it, I would rather it was resolved once and for all.

[to be continued]

[1] The photo in question is Hotshot Eastbound (1956) and is shown on the Wikipedia page for the Photographer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O._Winston_Link