The last time my family, by which I mean my parents, my sister and me, were living in a house together, Tony Blair was prime minister and my most pressing concern was the efficacy of dry shampoo. As time has passed we have picked up family members – two new men, four new children, some light trauma – and it was decided that we should all go away somewhere to celebrate, in part, our survival. “Two weeks?” suggested my mum. “A nice day trip?” I replied. “One week?” she attempted, an entire WhatsApp group littered with debate, “In France?” Finally we agreed on a long weekend, in Portishead.
It isn’t the town of Portishead exactly that lures us up the M4 towards Bristol, instead it is a house. Court House Farm is a Grade II-listed Tudor manor house recently renovated by its new owners, who have added a decorative garden and flower farm and, in an elegant barn, a jazzy little hot tub. It sleeps up to 14 – sometimes they host art retreats, other times they hire the space out for weddings, and the rest of the time they rent it to groups like us, a motley family already bickering over what to have for tea.
We drive up beside the flower field, sweet peas and dahlias and roses, and as we enter the house through the back door it opens up like a book before us. There’s the kitchen to the right, with internal windows looking down from the bedroom hallway above and beside it a grand double-height sitting room hung with textiles, and a woodburning stove and music and books. Behind the kitchen, a den for the children and their colouring and telly, and then a wide staircase that leads up to five bedrooms, one hidden up in a tower, another with a dainty little en suite bathroom made out of pale wood. Everywhere is velvet and light, with antique kitsch, and artful little touches that my mother appreciates and we tell the kids not to break.
You imagine, when planning a holiday like this, it will be a time of revelations and deep conversation. Perhaps some warm tears. Instead, I am obsessed with my right foot. I have a splinter and for all the intelligent debate about the news and the noisy appreciation of the children (the youngest three, the oldest 10), I divert most discussions to the black dot in the centre of my sole. My family continue – they coo at the garden, its luxurious fig tree, its wide, perfect lawn surrounded by tall grasses and blooms – but I interject with reminders of my pain. I limp along gamely, however.
The high street is at the bottom of the drive and my mum and I merrily clear out their very good charity shops, and visit the butcher and (my favourite) the middle aisle of Aldi for supplies. The meal we cook here is different from home only in the luxury and performance, the thrill at a strange kitchen and children’s delight at each other’s company. They share beds, waking up rumpled and tangled, and keen to try the hot tub and whether sweetpeas are edible.
There are good walks nearby, hills, woodlands, nature reserves and coast paths, some with views over to the Welsh hills, but we’re outvoted by the children, who lead us to the marina. That’s the thing about a three-generational holiday, I quickly realise – it’s ruled entirely by the whims and appetites of its youngest guests. We eat fish and chips and look for the purpose-built crabbing pontoon before heading back to the house and setting the long table outside for tea. Some of us nap on the lawn, others read by the fire, the children bicker, but wholesomely, like out of old novels. We congratulate ourselves hourly on how well we’re getting on.
It’s not that my family don’t see much of each other – in adulthood my sister and I have both migrated back to the almost-suburb where we grew up – but it’s for an hour or two at a time, never these long, workless, time-bleached days, where the cousins can share bedrooms and the adults can share breakfast. We line up for family portraits beside an extravagant silvered mirror, and eat chocolate and play CDs. We all then take our various familiar roles – my mum and partner do the cooking, my sister and her husband corral the kids, my dad snoozes over a book, and me, I talk about my sore foot. It is one of those disturbing pains that you forget about entirely until you take a step, and then the ache swells hotly through your body and you wince noisily at whoever is nearby, and then forget about it completely again.
And so the weekend passes, three generations of Wisemen, mingling like pals in a house large enough to contain all our love and irritation, and flowers that smell like honey. It is not a holiday of activity, of exploration, more of experimental timekeeping and wine… but for all the laughter and small pleasures, the best moment I think is when we are about to leave.
My mum has a memory – not of us when we were young, our squeals mirroring those of our children out in the barn playing table tennis, not of my sister’s miniature wedding (which would, we agree, have been lovely here) or holidays gone, but of how to remove a splinter. She makes a tiny bath in a piece of Tupperware – hot water, salt – and I lower my foot into it with cynicism. We recline in the den. Around us the children tidy their pens away and the men heave rucksacks into the car. My foot feels vaguely pampered by the attention and I enjoy having an excuse not to stack the dishwasher. “Just a minute more,” my mum says, every time I start to sit up. “One more second.” The water cools just as the children are being strapped into their car seats, and I gingerly raise my foot into the air. With two thumbs, I gently press on the swelling, the lightest touch and the splinter – 2cm of pale floorboard, rises elegantly from the skin. The adults run into the den at our ecstatic screams. It is incredible. I mean, it’s an incredible holiday.
Court House Farm’s Tudor Manor sleeps up to 14, from £321 per night; kiphideaways.com
