Bid

“Dearest Yvonne” – as soon as I think these words, I start smiling. Then I remember the aching loss and the relentless tears begin to flow yet again.

 

I first met Yvonne in Newnham in 1952 and realised I was very lucky to be in the same hall as a fizzing group of people, who would become friends for life: Yvonne, Rachel and Verena – and, more distantly when she moved to Canada, Diana. The others were all scientists, whereas I was immersed in the utterly esoteric subject of Medieval Languages (in fact, I would still maintain that Dante’s Divine Comedy illumines the whole created order and helps me to glimpse life’s present state of joy, cradled in “the love that moves the sun and the other stars”).

 

Back to Newnham. We made many new friends and forays into other colleges. But the most important connections came from singing in the Pembroke College choir. Here, we met MEN after many years of cloistered life in single-sex boarding schools. Most of these new acquaintances were older and wiser than us, having survived two years of National Service. Unusually, Chris went up to Cambridge as a Commissioned Officer and the first two years of their committed relationship were spent with Chris serving, in utterly adverse conditions, in the Malaysian jungle. I seem to remember that, when Chris emerged after months of incommunicado in the jungle, their rapturous reunion was dominated by wedding plans – cutthroat slaughter by communist insurgents gave way to the exigent proprieties of middle England. The Humphrey’s certainly knew how to do things properly and the wedding was a glorious occasion (even if the ants got at the four-tiered wedding cake before the guests did!).

I (Bid), Yvonne and Rachel were married at fortnightly intervals in summer 1958. I was given preference because, whilst Yvonne and Rachel were having fun flat-sharing in London, I had survived two major brain operations (Yvonne, as a medical student, had pointed out the anomaly of chilblains down the left arm and leg, but not the right – no one realised then the sinister implications). Yvonne and Chris, Rachel and Theo visited faithfully for six months in the Maida Vale Hospital and supported me through a very difficult time – constant head shaving of that auburn hair and three further operations. Luckily, Jean Seberg was currently playing Joan of Arc with cropped hair, so my emerging sublime, masking fuzz was wildly fashionable! Back to Cambridge. We joined the Pembroke chapel choir in our first term and that is where Yvonne met Chris and Rachel met Theo. I went out with the organ scholar and declined a proposal of marriage and an invitation from Pembroke’s Richard Rutt to join him in Korea.

Singing was always important to Yvonne. She had a lovely voice – “Just like a choir boy’s” according to Meredith Dewey, the Dean of Pembroke. Music was an intrinsic part of her nature and she gave wholehearted support to young musicians, particularly my own young – Daniel and Emily. She regularly attended their Conchord concerts. We went, as groupies, every year to the St Endellion Festival and, in 2019, on a musical tour of the Gower Peninsula.

Our friendship was deepened by experiencing the agonies of widowhood. I was privileged to lead the prayers at Chris’s funeral. In those grieving years, Yvonne and I found great solace as travel companions. Despite shared sorrows, we often laughed ourselves into a state of total collapse. My quirky, disabled son, Ben, joined us in this hilarity: he had such enormous fun with Yvonne and Chris – a particular jape was seeing how many pepper pots he could balance on patient Chris’s head.

Wasn’t the 85th birthday a really amazing occasion? Yvonne spoke with such inclusive love for us all and Rachel and I felt so privileged to be part of such a very special gathering.

Emery Down missed their very dedicated church warden. But that loss was Downton’s gain as Yvonne became an active and integral member of the community. As did Richard, in his devoted care for his mother, ensuring that no medical structures prevented really close contact with her friends in the last painful months.

Oh, how we miss her! Dearest Yvonne, “Global Citizen” (The Times). I don’t doubt that heaven is the livelier for your life-enhancing presence …

I write this with heartfelt memories and VERY MUCH LOVE – Bid x