Pipe dreams

BACK home in Albert Street, the closest thing to a Shrine of St Bruno was probably the netty, first on the left down the back yard. (The second was the coal house.) It was there that my dear old dad would endlessly live in peace with his pipe, always St Bruno Flake, the intense incense also serving as a sort of antediluvian Airwick.

The Reverend David Grieve, priest and poet, has freshened things up still further. Not only is he the selfstyled administrator of the Shrine of St Bruno – a holy of holies which bears a marked resemblance to a B&Q summerhouse – but he’s built a website, complete with pilgrims’ gallery, around it.

The administrator may be contacted by smoke signals, it says, but in the event of wet blankets there’s an email address as well. The page of the saint’s “relics” appears to include a box of Cook’s matches and a Ronson service kit, though this may not be “service” as in holy communion.

David retired early as vicar of Pelton, near Chester-le-Street. His wife, Canon Jane Grieve, is the energetic priest-in-charge of the parishes of Cockfield, Evenwood and Lynesack in west Durham. The shrine’s out the back of the vicarage.

If it’s flaky it’s entirely Brunoeque; if it’s wacky baccy – and there was a pouch sent by friends in Canada, rich with the aroma of brandy and nougat – it’s strictly legal, nonetheless.

On the wall are religious icons, a picture of Durham Cathedral and a carving with the Latin words “De profundis clamavi” – “Out of the depths have I cried, O Lord,” the opening words of Psalm 130. Above the door is a carved pipe.

Though David and friends regularly gather to smoke their pipes and cigars, he prays and writes poetry there, too.

The website includes a 17th Century poem in praise of tobacco’s wondrous medicinal powers – times change – and another, more recent, written by the administrator.

I watch and wait beside The relics of St Bruno.

My hands are ready rubbed Fighting off the chill of early morning, But I feel inwardly warmed And glad to savour the incense Which wafts around in smog-like clouds.

Piped music reaches the inner ear (Or it may be tinnitus.) Jane visits but occasionally – “I have a bad throat, I can’t be doing with too much smoke” – the administrator pays daily homage there.

Still a voluntary chaplain at Durham Cathedral, writing a book called Confessions of a Cathedral Chaplain, he says the shrine is simply a slow burner.

“It really is a place of peace, a little haven,” he adds. Besides, they don’t have an outside netty.

BRUNO was an 11th Century monk from Cologne – the name’s from the German for Brown, there were an awful lot of them about – who lived an ascetic, single-cell life and founded the Carthusian order.

Among many paintings of him is one by Zurbaran – of whom readers may latterly have heard – said to be “in ecstasy”.

There is no evidence that the Carthusians got their pipe.

St Bruno Flake has been made by Ogden’s in Liverpool since 1896. The name, it’s somewhat fancifully supposed, may have come about because Oggie and his boys could look across the Wirral peninsula and see Birkenhead Priory. It’s probably just a smoke screen.

A DANGER, too, that the real reason for spending a sunny Saturday morning in Cockfield vicarage garden may also be obscured.

It was an open day at the Glebe Garden, created out of land next to the vicarage that hitherto had been a 6ft wilderness.

Now it’s transformed – inspired by Canon Grieve, backed by the Lottery Community Spaces fund and by Groundwork West Durham, embraced enthusiastically by the community and particularly the village school children.

There’ll be a monument to the miners, a raised platform from which better to gaze across the ancient fell, paths laid with railway sleepers, big flower tubs like those which once carried coal.

It’s wonderful, a symbol of regeneration.

“Everyone has been very supportive of it,” said Jane. “A few think some of the youngsters will do dreadful things to it, but I very much hope we’ve turned the corner in that respect.

“It’s for everybody in the village and everybody’s entitled to be very proud of it.”

A fund-raiser, no doubt, there was also an invitation to spend 10p to dig the vicar’s burial plot – “That’s David being mischievous,” she said – and a “guardian owl” being sculpted with a chainsaw by Stuart Iredale from Staithes, near Whitby.

Stuart recently made a whole parliament of owls – it’s the collective noun, presumably as in wisdom – for a project in Whitby.

He’s a former tree surgeon, always fancied using his artistic side, started the chain reaction eight years ago.

“It’s not for amateurs. You certainly have to know what you’re doing because they can catch you unawares,” he said.

He’s never been hurt. “If I had an accident, I think I’d stop. It just isn’t worth it, is it?”

THERE, too, was Motselisi Kokota, from Durham’s link-diocese of Lesotho, nearing the end of a 364- day visa and a youth work placement with Jane Grieve. “She’s been a terrific help, particularly in the schools,” said Jane. Motselisi returns on May 1 – just time enough to catch the royal wedding. “She’s really excited about that,” said Jane.

A FINAL note from smokers’ corner. The Cuban Cigar Club – and this may almost be considered a free puff – has just opened in Grainger Street, Newcastle.

The owners have had a similar place in Carlisle for more than a century.

The stag weekend trade, apparently, was among the reasons why they were keen to come to the North-East.

The shop will stock up to 200 varieties of cigar, plus pipes and whatnot, promising a “gentlemen’s club”

atmosphere with leather armchairs, personal humidors and monthly club evenings in which the cigar boys can band together.

Whether they know about all this at the Shrine of St Bruno is uncertain, but it may just be the answer to a prayer.