Aline’s Story – A Poet’s Journey – 1
Regular readers of Pembrokeshire.Online will be familiar with the passionate poetry of Aline Page. But who is the woman behind the concise, incisive lines and carefully chosen words?
PART ONE
Aline had an idyllic rural childhood which came to something of an abrupt end when her parents moved to dull and claustrophobic suburbia. Her early attraction to writing poetry was stifled and, as an adult, she went through many life changes before eventually rediscovering the ability to express her innermost feelings through her poems.
“I grew up in Kent – in a proper little farming community village,” she says. “It felt like being in a time warp – which was wonderful. As a child I was a free spirit, and loved wandering off to explore.
“In my teens we moved to the edges of south-east London. I remember the first thing I saw were two ladies waiting at a bus stop – one looked like she had pink candy floss on her head and the other had a blue rinse. I’d never seen anything like that before! It was such a different place. I adapted to suburbia but did not feel that I belonged.
“I worked hard and got a good education. My mother struggled with reading and writing, having missed much of her education during the war – I used to write my own sick notes for school – but she was a very intelligent and creative woman. She was skilled at flower arranging, baking, making soft furnishings and our clothes, and she taught fashion design at evening classes.
“I was quite shy about speaking and may have been dyslexic. My father taught me the start of the alphabet using notes on the piano.
“It was hard work learning to write letters and numbers the ‘right’ way round and sometimes words and phrases got transposed. I had hearing difficulties – having grommets put in my ears when I was five which added to my difficulties with written or spoken words – I was a poor mimic and incredibly shy.”
Life in suburbia proved to be traumatic: “My parents split up just after we moved, in my early teens. That was a massive, massive loss. Mum was devastated but reluctantly agreed to divorce. Dad was rushed into hospital and died the same day the decree nisi arrived, leaving mum in shock, mid-divorce and struggling to provide for her children.”
Aline had younger sisters and a brother. “There was an awful lot of disruption – and it was very challenging. My mum was overwhelmed by grief, trying to cope with complicated forms and procedures. She wanted to be independent and was a talented dress designer so she made ends meet by going back into fashion design.”
Drawn to extremes, Aline had loved the rural bliss but also enjoyed the full-on metropolitan buzz beyond the suburbs. “In my early twenties my boyfriend and I rented a flat close to the heart of London which was much more multicultural,” she says.
Later the couple moved to the green edge of suburbia where they bought a small house. This was a fabulous retreat, a safe bolt hole but there was a part of Aline trapped inside the net curtains and four walls wanting to explode out into new experiences, new horizons. London commuting was fascinating; new sights, sounds, smells, contrasts, contradictions, constant change… but was it enough?
Tomorrow in Part Two, find out how Aline came to live in Pembrokeshire and discovered her voice as a poet.
