Opinion

Bimpe Archer: Sorry Belfast, the 'burbs are closer to Tesco

`I could practically see myself having to take jive lessons and backdate my record collection by half a century'
`I could practically see myself having to take jive lessons and backdate my record collection by half a century' `I could practically see myself having to take jive lessons and backdate my record collection by half a century'

SO, big news. The Belfast Archers have moved to the 'Burbs. Needless to say I had to be prised out of the city limits with a pitchfork.

"But I'm from Belfast," I wailed plaintively.

Like the poet and fellow `Born in Belfast’ John Hewitt, `I cling to the inflexions of my origins'.

"I never pictured my children growing up culchies," I wept.

I could practically see myself having to take jive lessons and backdate my record collection by half a century.

My Tyrone husband was predictably unimpressed. He's been "roughing it" with McCooeys long enough to have grown used to our ways.

We love the countryside, heading off there happily along motorways every time the sun shoves a rain cloud out of the way and enthusing about how "we really have the most beautiful scenery in the world, why would anybody ever go anywhere else if only we had the weather, etc, etc…"

We just don't want to MOVE there.

Granny had made that mistake during the war when Granda (a Down man who was no stranger to the aroma of silage) got a "good job" in County Antrim.

After a couple of years of being referred to as "the B'l Fast Woman", she dragged the family back home, despite the fact that it meant giving up a house of their own to move back in with her parents and Granda returning to his old job.

In her later years she would looked pained and talk about “nothing but hedges” when that dark period was mentioned.

My husband tactfully refrained from pointing out that `the country' in our case is still squarely within the 30mph zone and just 10 minutes from our old home.

Not that that makes any difference to a true city slicker. My sister-in-law asked my mother in horror how I was going to cope "all the way over at the other end of town" when we first moved to our marital home.

But even I could see the need to up sticks. With one active toddler and another child on the way we had clearly outgrown our two-bedroom city apartment and the new place ticks all kind of boxes in terms of space.

Also, heavily pregnant and with the aforementioned toddler, we're not exactly taking full advantage of the city night life in the way we once did.

And I was immensely cheered by the discovery during the recent election campaign that it was still technically within a Belfast constituency.

"But what council area is it in?" a colleague inquired innocently.

"Stop splitting hairs,"I snapped.

Of course, my mother remembers when the area was "all fields", but I’m determinedly taking that as proof that Belfast has grown rather than this actually still being `the country' per se.

After all, as my husband is always quick to point out, his hometown existed "long before Belfast did". Hence, if it’s new it must be part of Belfast. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

But I'd be lying if I said that, despite my fears, moving those few miles up the road haven't changed me.

We'd only been there two days when I proved I’d gone full-on suburban by ringing home to exclaim excitedly: "I've found a shortcut to the big Tesco." The response at the other end of the phone was equally enthusiastic - proof, if proof were needed, that we'd both gone native.

Indeed we've only been moved in for three weeks and Babydaddy has already mastered lawn-mowing to such an extent he's done the front and garden twice (albeit the first time under the watchful eye of his father).

I find myself ridiculously content gazing out of the window at that freshly-mown grass and our cars parked behind a closed gate in our very own driveway. After years of fighting with neighbours over space in a cramped car park, it's these little things that matter.

My father is still not fully reconciled, occasionally still muttering darkly about "snow in winter" and offering bags of salt to help us fight our way back to civilisation when the worst happens.

Not me. I'm delightedly picturing myself making snowmen on my suburban lawn. The only thing needed to make my rural idyll complete would be a decent takeaway.

Although, if I start humming `Wagon Wheel', send an extraction team for me…

b.archer@irishnews.com

@BimpeIN