Mrs. Miniver

by Jan Struther

Words were the only net to catch a mood, the only sure weapon against oblivion.

This was perhaps just as well. For if they had both been equally explicit they might have been in danger of understanding each other completely; and a certain degree of un-understanding (not mis-, but un-) is the only possible sanctuary which one human being can offer to another in the midst of the devastating intimacy of a happy marriage.

turning into Siamese twins had been one of their private marriage vows.

you cannot successfully navigate the future unless you keep always framed beside it a small clear image of the past.

“it’s just as important to marry the right life as the right person.”

For you cannot make them understand the essential point, which is that when you went away you took the centre of the universe with you, so that the whole thing went on revolving, just as usual, round your own head. How could they, indeed, be expected to believe this, when they know quite well that all the time the centre of everything stayed at home with them? It is a day or two, as a rule, before your universe and theirs (like the two images in a photographic range-finder) merge and become concentric: and when what happens, you know you are really home.