Today
Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. As the decades go by this becomes more and more important as fewer and fewer people are alive to remember it directly, and there are those who say that it never happened.
In My Day
I don't suppose that when my Grandfather Paul Bondy married Eva Freitag in the early part of the 20th century, they had any idea of the shape of their future. I guess there might have been a few family questions asked about his Jewishness and her Christian faith, but I assume they just built the difference into their life. They were both Germans, weren't they?
My Grandfather was a reasonably well-off man - a corn broker, my mother used to tell me. Well-off enough to bring up four children in a handsome house not far from Hamburg.
The children were brought up as Lutherans and celebrated all the traditional Christian Festivals. I think that Paul Bondy absented himself on these occasions and I also think that there was an estrangement which meant that in later years he didn't live with the family.
I don't know what he must have thought when Hitler came to power; certainly Mamma was well aware of the implications, insisting on her right to a private ballot. And she immediately, as a half-Jew, lost her right to a formal education or well-paid jobs.
What I have seen is the paperwork that assigned Paul Bondy to Auschwitz. How he responded to the summons I don't know, but history tells us that most Jews were pretty obedient, not realising or fooling themselves about the implications. Family opinion is divided about whether he went to the gas chambers or was shot or died on the journey there. I do know that he died as part of the "Final Solution" and that this had a lifelong effect on his family.
I don't think genocide is a thing of the past; it is going on somewhere in the world as I write. But, remembering our own recent history may help us to be generous to peoples of differing faiths or outlooks on life and to understand that tolerating intolerance debases us all.
We must never forget our common humanity.
Today
This morning my great niece, having gone out on a girlie night for the first time since her baby was was born, complained about her hangover. She blamed the Sambucas, as well she might.
In My Day
Not so long ago this one, but relevant. It was Becky's 30th birthday and we decided to hold a party in Brighton. We started the evening with champagne in the Kemptown Enclosures, then went up to the Kemptown Brasserie which provided a marvellous buffet and a band to dance to. Various relations and friends of Becky's appeared and the wine flowed freely.
The more sober members of the family peeled off at various times, leaving the hardcore party-lovers still dancing and drinking.
I'm not sure now what prompted Nick, the owner, to offer Lizzie a flaming Sambuca. Maybe he thought she wasn't drinking hard enough and he wanted to see her dance. Anyway, one Sambuca led to more and soon others were clamouring for them. This even included Paul who hates Aniseed drinks in any form.
I didn't join in, preferring to stick to Prosecco. This is just as well, otherwise we might never have been able to find our way home. Becky had rashly offered sofa space to cousin George and her university friend, Andrew.
Arms linked, we gaily set off back to the flat. We needed to link arms to stay upright. As Andrew told me repeatedly and tearfully how much he loved me, no, really, really loved me, I reminded him of the art of walking: "First the right foot; no forward, then the left......." and steered him up the steps into the flat where he collapsed onto the breakfast room sofa. George collapsed somewhere else and was that the night that Becky sprained her ankle getting down the three steps into the breakfast room and nobody heard her shouting?
They were a sorry bunch the next day, especially Paul who, as well as having the usual symptoms, was puzzling as to why he'd drunk the Sambucas at all, given his dislike of aniseed.
Ah well, plus ca change, and all that. There's nothing like a baby needing her morning bottle to help you get over a hangover.....
Today
During my singing weekend at Halsway, we sang a few sections of Guillaume de Machaut's Messe de Notre Dame which made me very happy.
For many this was dipping a toe into the uncharted waters of the 14th century but I was greeting an old friend.
In My Day
I was interested in early music from my teens and, probably bought my first recording of the Machaut about forty-five years ago.
However I didn't sing it until Cantilena performed it in December 1994. Tony, our music director, had coupled it with Palestrina's Missa Papa Marcelli, making this a most challenging concert for choir and audience alike.
During the term we learnt how to sustain a single vowel sound through several pages; we learnt how to hocket; passing the melody from one line to another.
While we were struggling with this, Tony's wife, Alice, struggled with what was, I think. her fourth or fifth pregnancy. She gamely turned up each week to rehearsals.The baby was due in late December and we all watched anxiously as Alice's girth grew.
On the night of the concert we were all well into some wonderful hocketting when Alice simply turned and walked out into the vestry. Tony continued to wave his baton about but completely lost eye contact with the choir, looking uncertainly after Alice. Was she having the baby all alone in the vestry? Should he simply stop the concert and go after her? Or should the show go on, regardless? While Tony vacillated and we gamely sang on, another soprano followed Alice, and he relaxed and we finished the concert.
In fact, it was simply a case of too much standing and David wasn't born until Christmas Eve. But listening to the Music inevitably conjures up that uncertain, tense moment.
I wouldn't mind a proper chance to sing it again, preferably without a pregnant dramatic interlude.
Today
Anxious about whether my throat would be equal to the demands of the weekend at Halsway, I tried a few notes out this morning in bed. "You've made me lose my place!" complained Paul. "What?" I demanded "You were only saying "doo-be-doo"." "I was singing Saint-Seans Symphony number 3", he replied with dignity "didn't you recognise it?"
"Well, I know that we can all expect there to be similarities between our husband and our father," I said "but a tendency to drone classical symphonies tunelessly wasn't wasn't on the list."
In My Day
Given Daddy's rocky start in life, it's amazing that he had such developed tastes in classical music. He always said that he learnt about music in the evening classes given by the Society of Friends which is where he spent his evenings during his late teens.
But a general liking for popular classics is one thing and not uncommon, but Daddy knew enough to start up and run the Henry Wood Gramophone Circle, preparing, with Mamma's help, challenging and interesting programmes. He loved opera and we had many opportunities to see them.
His love for music ran very deep and I think that he always went about with a tune in his head. Sometimes he just had to share. "This has been in my head all morning!" he's say, excitedly "Guess what it is?" He would launch into a tuneless mixture of las, doo-be-doos and other noises. "Hmm," we'd say, trying to take him seriously "a bit more? Nope! We give up!" "It's the Beethoven 6th, second movement," he'd cry triumphantly, as though he'd caught us out in a gross piece of musical ignorance. I'm not sure if any of us had the courage to tell him how different the tune in his head was from the tune on his lips.
Sometimes he loved the music so much that his droning was accompanied with a gush of tears, which didn't help us to recognise Scheherazade....
When he sang music hall songs to us, the tunes were much more recognisable, maybe because they were simpler.
On reflection, I think it's better to go about with a beautiful tune in your head and heart, even if you can't sing, than to have no music in your spirit. I just wish the Society of Friends had taught him to sing!
Today
In time-honoured fashion we hailed the new year by walking up the lane in hazy sunshine. I felt very warm in my duffle coat. I bought this one at Quill's in Glengarriff and it's made of Donegal tweed.
In My Day
I was never a fan of school uniforms and hated my c-cup bosoms being stuffed into a shapeless gymslip when I was thirteen and having to wear a crazy velour or straw hat. Pile on top of the gymslip a cardigan and gaberdine raincoat and you have a walking fashion disaster.
I managed to damage my gymslip sufficiently while in a chemistry class to gain permission to go straight to the (slightly) more acceptable middle and senior school blouse and skirt option.
By the time I was in the lower sixth I wished to align myself with artists everywhere. And that meant wearing a duffle coat, as all the Beatniks did (or so I imagined). It was hard enough persuading Daddy to spend money on clothes at all without expecting him to fork out on what must have seemed to him a frivolous fashion item. However, Mamma worked her magic and we sallied out to buy me this essential garment.
I was so pleased to have it; now I would be really hip when cruising around Upper Norwood and Croydon. What I had failed to mention to Mamma that there was an outright ban on wearing these items with ones school uniform. There was no way Mamma and Daddy could afford two coats. In the end I confessed and Mamma wrote a crawling (and lying) letter to the Headmistress Miss Harley-Mason, saying that she had bought the coat before the ban.
Miss H-M grumpily agreed; she already thought that I was a lost cause, destined for arty rebellion and this was just one more manifestation. I was jubilant and, I must say, wore the garment to death.
While I really like my duffle coat because of its warmth and nice snuggly hood, I wouldn't say today that it's stylish at any level!
Today
As the family grows larger, it becomes more challenging to keep up with the demands of Christmas present giving. For some it's an expensive as well as time-consuming challenge. So nieces Helena and Ruth came up with the idea of a "Secret Santa" for this year where names were randomly allocated across the extended family. Paul and I received tickets to the theatre from James and Helena which is very exciting.
The event was deemed a success, worthy of a repeat, although we may change its name to "Surprise Santa" as secrecy didn't at any time seem to be the issue here.
In My Day
I first encountered the "Secret Santa" idea at Flare. A price limit (to begin with £5.00) was set and names were literally picked out of a hat.
I have a feeling that one of the points of the event was to mildly tease the recipient, making sure that their well-known personal foibles were reflected in the gift. I drew the name of very quiet member of my team who loved her herbal teas, I didn't just buy her teabags; I made an enormous teabag and filled it with a selection. Of course, you can't legislate for lack of judgement, sense of humour or imagination and I have received the full range in my time, from rude knickers (don't people just love it when the boss opens something like this in public!) to dull soap. And people vary very much in their ability to take being teased. There was a lot of guessing as to the identity of givers with some people obviously longing to tell while others kept tightly buttoned.
We did start circulating a list on which people described their own foibles which was illuminating, although staff always knew they couldn't go wrong if they gave me wine. Eventually these events died out because they became so unwieldy and because of their high embarrassment potential or were limited to teams within the company.
Do you know, I just Googled "Secret Santa and found that you can download a secret Santa generator!
Today
While browsing round the local toy shop, wondering if I needed to buy any more activities for the visiting children at yesterday's party, I noticed some "Knitting Dolly" kits hanging up.
That was what we used to call French Knitting.
In My Day
To start French knitting you first needed a large used cotton reel. Cotton reels were made of wood, not plastic as they are today.
You then drove four strong nails into the top. evenly spaced around the hole in the reel. About one and a half inches remained exposed.
Next you needed some wool and something like a crochet hook or knitting needle. You tied the wool in loops to each nail and then, using the crochet hook, you hooked one loop over another. Gradually. a long tubular snake of knitted wool emerged from the underside of the cotton reel. You could add other colours by simply knotting it to the leading end of wool. There were dramatic moments when you accidentally pulled a loop entirely off the reel and frantically tried to re-hook it without the whole construction becoming unravelled.
Eventually you ran out of wool or out of interest and unhooked each loop, carefully tying it all off.
Then there arose the question of what to do with the snake. Children's magazines were full of suggestions; there most common being that you coiled up the snake and stitched it across to make a placemat or coaster. Because of the snake's tendency to be a bit lumpy and one's own equally lumpy stitching techniques, these coasters tended to upset any cups that were placed upon them.
Actually, it looks quite like fun; maybe I'll teach Carmen how to do it in a few years' time. I don't know where I'll find wooden cotton reels, tho'.
Today
Christmas is almost here again and I'm looking forward to seeing my niece from Stowmarket who is joining us for the celebrations.
It's lovely to feel that I have the space to welcome her and I wonder whether she remembers early Christmases spent with us.
In My Day
When we lived at Rowan Avenue, back in 1975, we didn't care so much about having space. For several years we shared Christmas with my brother Keir and his family of four children without even a blush for the lack of room. The children were "top and tailed" in the bunk beds and Lizzie had the tiny room. Keir and Jenny slept in the sitting room on a double airbed which had to be heaved upstairs each morning so that we could use the dining table.
On Christmas Eve the children would hang stockings on the banisters (there being not even a pretence of a chimney at Rowan Avenue) and we'd tuck them in bed. They'd settle down pretty quickly and Jenny and I would check food preparations, touch up the tree and dance to Christmas music while the men would put the world to rights over a few pints.
Actually, not all the children settled. Little Chris, at that time aged about five, would come out of his room again and again. "Can I have a glass of water, Auntie Julia?" "My tummy hurts, Auntie Julia" "When's Father Christmas coming, Auntie Julie?" - "Not until after you're asleep!!" I fervently hoped that would occur sometime before four a.m. as I struggled to keep awake until each child was properly asleep before I did stocking duty.
I vividly remember the first time they came. Lizzie was three and had never had a stocking before and was very excited. In the morning I groaned into wakefulness to hear all the children chattering and laughing together. I went onto the landing. There were all the stockings, untouched. "Happy Christmas, darlings!" I said brightly going into their room. "Merry Christmas, Auntie Julia!" they replied "May we open our stocking now, please?" "Of course you may!" I was touched by their patience, manners and discipline and ever since we have waited until we can all open our stockings together.
We had huge fun; everything was appreciated, despite our having no money and being crammed into the house, sardine-style.
While I don't think that this Christmas will be a replica of 1975, I hope that we will all share the same fun, laughter and feeling of privilege that we are able to celebrate together. Merry Christmas, Claire!
Today
On Facebook today, my friend Cath told of her 92 year old mother, who can barely talk these days, joining in lustily with carols at the local service. "The Power of Music!" she proclaimed. .
In My Day
Paul's Mum always liked to sing, although I would never have described her as a "singer". When Christmas approached it was my job to drive, usually alone, to Eastbourne to pick her up. The weather was often dreadful. I'd arrive at her flat, make sure she'd packed essentials. Then we'd whisk around to relatives and friends to say "Happy Christmas" and drop off pressies.
So, by the time we got going again, it was often past 8.00 pm. I used to dread the long drive home in the murky, mizzley weather, wondering how I was going to keep my eyes open.
I had a tape of Christmas carols sung by the London Bach Choir with full orchestral backing. It had cost me all of a fiver and there were about forty carols on this glorious recording. I'd whack this into the player, hoping that it would keep me alert for the next three hours. As it launched into "Once in Royal", Mum would lift up her voice, quavery at first, then getting stronger. I'd join in as well, giving the descants, and we would sing our way home, hearts full of joy and cheer.
The journey seemed so much shorter and we would arrive home to a fire, wine, tea, looking forward to the next few days together.
The power of music indeed; long may we feel it.
Today
Today my nephew reported a contretemps involving some cows that had wandered into his back garden. He described them as very large, although admitted that that might be because they were in his garden and he had to deal with them. This he did, by constructing movable barriers consisting of his kitchen furniture, to herd them out. Beatrice commented that cows are scary things.
In My Day
This is one of those stories, often told, that loses nothing in the re-telling.
The year is 1984 and we were living at Westham. near Eastbourne. We had just acquired Caspian the dog and were novices in the management of dogs generally, let alone this feisty animal. One day I decided that nice walk to Pevensey Bay would be just the ticket. Becky was six and Lizzie eleven.
We walked through the churchyard and castle grounds sedately enough. Now, the way to get to beach was over the railway line. Not just any railway line but the main London-Hasting line with electrified third rail. There was a little pedestrian level crossing over this line, accessed at each end via a stile.
No sign or sound of trains. I got everyone over the stile, including Caspian. We went to the beach and had a lovely romp.
On the way back, when we got into the field that adjoined the line, I noticed a herd of bullocks at the far end. "They're very far away," I reasoned "no need to put the dog on the lead." Big mistake. Caspian tore off in the direction of the bullocks, ignoring my shouts. The bullocks, far from being scared by Cas, turned to chase him.
Cas raced towards me. This wasn't what he'd intended; there was no fun in this! He looked very scared with his ears streaming out behind him as he raced towards his protector (me). Twenty-five or so Bullocks charged after him.
I was pretty scared too and, grabbing Becky's hand, rushed towards the stile. Stopping only to fasten the dog's lead, I scrambled over the stile with the dog and Becky, just as the bullocks cantered up to the fence and stood glowering at us all. Lizzie, however, had not kept up and was now separated from me by twenty five irritable bovines. "What do I do, Mummy? What do I do?" she called frantically.
I was standing on the wooden level crossing with a six year old and an ill-controlled dog; with express trains and the electric rail behind me I couldn't leave them to get Lizzie. I crossed my fingers. "Just walk through them, Lizzie" I said in as reassuring a voice as I could muster. "They're used to moving aside for humans."
Liz stopped panicking and did as she was told. The bullocks parted like the Red Sea and Liz (like the old woman in the story) got over the stile and we got home that night.
The only benefit (apart from having a very funny story to tell) was that Caspian never again attempted to chase livestock of any kind.
But scary? Well, Beatrice, that depends on where you happen to be standing.
Today
Carmen is eleven weeks old and today Becky went off to work for a refresher day which her firm organises for staff on maternity leave so that they are not too far behind when they go back.
Becky emailed me "I haven't reached the station yet - I'm finding this very hard..." I advised her to try and put Carmen-thoughts into a box for the day. "It's what I had to do when I went back to work so early".
In My Day
With Lizzie's birth date being so far beyond the expected date, I had to return to work when she was barely seven weeks old. Without my earnings we couldn't even pay the rent as there was no maternity pay beyond the Civil Service's two months and a lump sum maternity allowance (which I'd spent on a spin dryer).
So I deposited her with a child-minder whom I hardly knew and caught the train from Brighton into work at Worthing. My work was in the Enforcement Office of the Inland Revenue and I didn't need a refresher day; nothing had changed, except maybe the files had accumulated a little more dust.
How strange it all felt. I was still partly breast-feeding Lizzie and at intervals throughout the day I trotted off to the ladies with my pump and bottles all full of sterilising solution. I don't think I told anyone what I was doing and didn't think to ask whether I could use the rather more salubrious and private sick room. I did learn to put Lizzie-thoughts aside during the day and work-thoughts aside at evenings and weekends; if I hadn't I'd have gone potty.
What fascinates me when I look back at that time was the almost total lack of support. I know that going back to work for me had a great deal of the "needs must where the devil drives" about it, although I also felt it was right on principle. I think I knew that support might be lacking because of the level of criticism I received. "I can't see why you have a baby if you're going to farm her out!" said one woman tartly to me. I was ill-equipped to explain my situation or the fact that I wasn't "Farming" her out; I was merely finding someone to care for her while I earned enough money to keep a roof over our heads.
I think I kept my head down and ploughed on, hoping for the best. And I suppose the best was what I got, with a child-minder who turned out to be a treasure, an ability to maintain my financial independence throughout my life, and beautiful, loving daughters who have brought me much joy.
I have confidence in Becky's ability to manage all these things with a great deal more aplomb than I did, although I bet she's enjoying being reunited with Carmen right now!
Today
Last night my poor rotator cuff was complaining and felt very cold. The night was mild - not a nightie-wearing night, but I made a hotwater bottle and hugged it to my shoulder to try to warm it up.
"I remember that Mamma used to have a bed jacket to keep her shoulders warm," I remarked to Paul
In My Day
Mamma did indeed have a bed jacket, to be worn when sitting up in bed to keep the shoulders warm. They seemed to come either in pink or blue and were fluffy & frilly.
Thinking about this I realised that there are a number of clothing items that were commonplace when I was a child that are never seen today, or only rarely or for recreational purposes.
Boned corsets, normal wear in the '50's, are mainly used for recreational purposes these days, (athough I suspect that quite a few stars on the red carpet are boned into place) and the main remnant in everyday use is in bra underwiring. Their place has been mainly superseded by Spandex.
We females almost always all wore dresses or skirts in those days and not to wear a petticoat was rather vulgar. They were either full-length or waist "slips". They were made in silk or nylon or cotton and were de rigeur. Of course you can buy them today in M&S and many women will have one tucked away to wear with some dress that is see-through or sticks to their tights, but that's a far cry from the everyday lace-trimmed range that would have been a substantial part of every woman's wardrobe.
My father used to wear shirts that had detachable collars. The collars were changed daily, starched to death and held onto the shirt with collar studs, which could be found anywhere in the house. Pictures of working men from the time often show them with shirts without collars; presumably they only added collars for high days and holidays.
As children we wore the Liberty Bodice (mentioned in my blog dated May 9 2009) which certainly kept out the cold, while restricting movement. Did I wear it while attempting to do sports and gym? No wonder I wasn't very good at it! It had suspenders which attached to very scratchy stockings.
Then there were pinafores - we didn't wear them very much as children but they still existed; their function being to save the dress underneath from dirt. The pinafore would be made in a lightweight fabric that could wash and dry easily.
Hats! In the '50s everybody wore hats. Not beanies or baseball caps, but proper hats. My father always wore either a Trilby or a flat cap (for high days and holidays) and Mamma wore a hat on all formal occasions. I remember her mortification when I went to church bare-headed. Daddy would raise his hat to a lady (where did that little piece of manners come from?) and Mamma commented in one of her diaries the pleasure of looking at all the hats on the delegates to the Townswomen's Guild AGM at the Albert Hall.
Of course this is balanced by clothes that we wear today that were unknown 60 years ago. Trainers, Birkenstocks and flip-flops, Spandex, baseball caps, fleeces, jogging bottoms, anoraks, T-shirts and the rise of jersey fabrics and stretch denim.
And who's to say whether we are better or worse for that?
Today
Last Sunday my siblings and I celebrated the date of my mother's 100th birthday. We flossied ourselves up and went along to the Homewood Park Hotel & Restaurant and spent a happy few hours with champagne, food. reminiscences and friendly chat. I wore Mamma's favourite silver violet necklace, David brought a tablecloth that Mamma had embroidered and persuaded the waiting staff to put it on the table, and Beatrice read from Mamma's diary.
It didn't resemble much the birthday parties Mamma used to give but we felt it was important to mark the occasion.
In My Day
Mamma, as has been said elsewhere, loved to party. This is a description of her last birthday party in 1981. By this time Mamma was very ill with lung cancer and had been receiving chemotherapy at the hospital in Dorking. As her birthday approached I called the hospital and asked if we could take Mamma out for a day in order to celebrate.. The hospital ummed and ahhed and said they'd have to ask higher authorities.
I conferred with my siblings. "Don't tell Mamma what we're planning just yet", I said "It'll be so much better when the whole arrangements are made." So I didn't write to Mamma as I usually would, waiting to tell her the good news and I believe that my siblings kept quiet too.
One morning a letter from Mamma dropped on my doormat. "I always said that I didn't want to be a burden on my children," she wrote "but I never thought that I'd be eating my words." Mamma, not having heard from us, thought she had been abandoned to die alone. I called the hospital. "Look, " I said forcefully "you're not going to be able to cure her. Anyway the best medicine right now would be to see her family." They agreed that we could borrow a wheelchair for the afternoon and all was set. I wrote to Mamma, explaining my silence and told her the plan.
On her 68th birthday we gathered at the house in Dorking. All the siblings with their children were there. I found a half cake in the freezer and dolled it up with frills and candles. Chris and Paul went to collect Mamma and she sat facing the window overlooking the garden and pond at Ribblesdale and opened her cards and presents. I can't remember a great deal more about the event, although I do remember Mamma commenting on demure and patient 4-year old Becky waiting to see the gifts opened.
Mamma died a couple of weeks later and was certainly not abandoned to die alone, I am very glad that we were able to show her our love and care in that way, and I'm also glad that we felt that her part in our lives was important enough for last Sunday's celebration.
What I do hope is that I will be able to go in person to my own 100th birthday.
Today
This morning Becky mentioned that she was taking Carmen to an osteopath. I asked her if this was cranial osteopathy, but she said no.
"In my experience", I said "osteopaths are charlatans".
In My Day
So where did this sweeping opinion come from? When I worked for the Inland Revenue, much of my day was spent sitting at a desk and I found that my neck and upper back could become very stiff and sore. Somebody told me that the Civil Service encouraged staff to use osteopaths by having some on an approved list who carried out the treatment at reduced rates for civil servants
I found one in Eastbourne and trotted along. The therapist was a dour middle-aged man who said hardly anything during the sessions, didn't describe what he was doing and gave me no advice as to follow-up, posture, exercise and so on.
My sessions were twice-weekly and consisted of what appeared as brutal attacks on my skeleton. One of the few things he said, after an especially bone-crunching moment was that he had re-aligned some vertebrae.
I left his sessions in considerable pain which would take a couple of days to clear up. Eventually, when the pain hadn't ceased by the time I went to the next session, I stopped going. This was worse than the stiffness!
A couple of weeks later I did what I should have done in the first place: I went to see my doctor. I confessed to what I'd been doing and he wasn't particularly complimentary. He told me to strip my top half and he examined my back. "Well", he said "I can see that there are a couple of misaligned vertebrae....." He gave me some advice about posture and the best sleeping positions and packed me off to a physiotherapist who was very helpful indeed.
I found some facts about osteopaths which suggest that what they offer is rooted in philosophy, not science.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osteopathy
But many people swear by their osteopaths, claiming that it's only through their help that they can stand upright, and whom am I to say they're wrong?
Today
Following the birth of Carmen, Becky has been watching her own weight decrease. Many of her clothes are now much too large and we were talking about the need for some interim clothing.
"I remember the excitement of buying normal-sized clothes when you were about 6 months old" I said.
In My Day
When I had Becky, back in 1977, I was working at the Inland Revenue. The Civil Service maternity arrangements were far ahead of their time and the deal was that I could have three months fully paid maternity leave, but they withheld the third months' pay until I had been back full time for at least three months.
The effect of this was that I received a whole extra month's pay just when Becky and I needed a new set of clothes - hers larger, mine a lot smaller.
I popped to the shops, very happy with my new size 14 figure, and bought skinny tops, dresses and fabric to make hip-hugging skirts. I was so glad to ditch those maternity and baggy clothes and waltzed into work in tight jeans and t-shirts. My anorexic friend Hazel rather tactlessly said to people (in my hearing) "you remember my fat friend Julia? Well, this is my slim friend Julia!" I guess she meant well.
Shortly afterwards, Paul and I were invited to a party. I enjoyed dancing and a good deal of male attention. This was a massive boost to my sense of personal attractiveness and I remember lapping it up!
Birth and early motherhood are very physical experiences with the emphasis on bodily functions. Getting ones figure back, however partially, is a wonderful way of reclaiming ones balance. It also makes you feel less, well, waddly which has to be a good thing.
Today
My nephew Jacob posted a picture on Facebook today showing a supermarket offer on faggots. He seemed to be very cheerful about this which I thought surprising, in view of the following story.
In My Day
It must have been late 1984 or early 1985 and Beatrice and Jacob (who was then about three) were coming to lunch. Knowing that they ate meat I'd bought some faggots.
I served these up all hot with gravy and vegetables. Jacob took one look and refused to eat them, throwing a fairly huge tantrum to make his point clear. "Well, " I said, when I could make myself heard, "I haven't anything else, but if you don't want them I'll give them to the dog." Caspian the dog was cruising hopefully around the table in case anything fell on the floor.
Jacob screamed a bit more to ensure that we hadn't misunderstood him first time around. "OK" I put the plate on the floor and called Cas, who clearly thought that Christmas had come early, since he was never fed from the table. The faggots disappeared without touching the sides and Jacob watched his dinner vanish.
Now it was pudding time, Jacob would eat any pud, so long as it was oranges and I'd laid in a stock of really nice, juicy ones. "No dinner, no pudding," said Beatrice firmly, so Jacob had to watch while we all tucked in to his favourite dessert. He tried sucking up to me with poorly disguised attempts to wheedle a orange - even a segment of orange out of me, but I was obdurate and he had to go hungry.
I have no idea whether this made any improvement in his manners, eating habits or moral understanding (I seem to remember a later episode over some fish & chips, so maybe not) nor whether Jacob now has a rooted aversion to or passionate liking for faggots. But he doesn't seem to bear me any sort of a grudge, for which I'm grateful.
Today
I have just returned from a few days spent with Becky in London. On the last day we met at The Crusting Pipe in Covent Garden for lunch. There was a charming Cypriot waitress and we chatted about this and that. I told her that I was a Londoner by birth and she asked me whether I missed London.
Well, there's a question; I do and I don't.
In My Day
Being brought up in London would be meaningless if all it meant was knowing the few streets around your home and I suspect that has always been the case for many people. But, even as children, our London life included many of the amazing cultural, educational and entertainment opportunities.
We went to London Zoo, Battersea Park and Funfair. We visited all the museums in the Brompton Road many times (my especial favourite was the natural history museum) as well as the British Museum, Horniman's and, once, the National Maritime Museum. We had tea on the roof garden at Derry and Toms and at Lyon's Corner House on the Strand.
We were taken to shows, films, the theatre, operas and concerts. We went to Madame Tussaud's, the Planetarium, The Tower of London, the Monument, Trafalgar Square. I remember once going on an open-topped tour bus where a genial Cockney guide sent Daddy into uncontrollable guffaws with his commentary about St Martin-in-the Fields - "Coming up in the middle of the road..." as though the church were a giant Wurlitzer. We visited the parks, commons and gardens. St Paul's Cathedral and the Houses of Parliament were almost natural habitats.
This ease and familiarity with London spilled over into adulthood. By the age of twelve I was a regular Promenader and was spending my Saturdays and paper round money going to West End matinees. I used to visit all the art galleries., both public, such as the Tate, and private ones in Bond Street with my friend Lynda. With a youthful certainty about our cultural superiority we used to call such excursions "gallery crawls". David and I bought "Red Rover" tickets and travelled randomly on buses to more obscure corners of the city.
I bought student standing-room only tickets for the Old Vic and joined the Aldwych student group, going to see all that the Royal Shakespeare company could offer as well as the astonishing World Theatre seasons. I saw Shakespeare in the open at Regent's Park and at the George in Southwark. I haunted the V&A and grew fond of the Science Museum where I would draw the great Victorian beam engines and other machinery.
This was in addition to familiarity with all the great stores and the amazing specialist shops. There was less of a cafe and club culture than there is today, so there wasn't much of that and, anyway, we probably couldn't afford it.
So, do I miss it? Clearly, even with all of that, there was much I didn't experience. But you could live all your life in London and not see it all. And there are many other aspects to life. I have lived in the suburbs, by the sea and in a small country village and have learnt about what drives life in these places.
When I am in London, I feel energised by the bustle and the sheer variety of the place, but I think that a rounded life is one where there has been a breadth of experience and, right now, I love my wooded garden in a quiet village with woodland walks on my doorstep.
So the answer is, not really, not now.
Today
Yesterday I received a somewhat peremptory text from Beatrice, "when and for how long did you live in Crowborough? I told her and promised to remind her of the full story later. So here goes.
In My Day
It was late 1985 and we were in a muddle. Paul's "Barretronics" business venture had failed and he was finding it hard to get a job in Eastbourne. I was away in Southampton doing the computerisation of PAYE training. I had an inspiration. "Why don't we move to Southampton? Unemployment is low and there are plenty of properties for sale."
Selling 10 Montfort Close was easy, we found a charming house in Swaythling in Southampton, enrolled the girls in schools and were all set.
Then came the bombshell. The vendors pulled out, blandly saying that they had just wanted to find what they could get for the house and had no intention of selling. By this time we had a completion date for the sale of no 10 so we felt some panic.
At the last minute some friends came to the rescue. "Our parents live and work in Malawi", they told us "but they have an English pied a terre in Crowborough. You're welcome to live there rent-free - just pay for your utility bills." We jumped at the chance, put our furniture in store, packed up the girls, cats, dog and tortoises and moved in to what was a perfectly acceptable three-bed semi.
How unhappy we were! I was away much of the time and Paul was left alone with the girls to care for and without knowing a soul. The town seemed to exist in the cloud layer and a damp, foggy gloom settled over everything. Paul felt so lonely that he sometimes walked up to the shop to buy a packet of biscuits just so that he could talk to a friendly face. Initially we thought we would only be there a matter of three or four weeks so didn't enrol the girls in schools. But as time dragged on we had to find them some schooling. Rebecca, especially, felt victimised and unhappy at her new school.
The experience nearly broke us apart as I desperately tried to do my job in Southampton, keep house-hunting and give attention to my floundering family.
There were some lighter moments. Caspian, feeling aggrieved one day about some lack of attention, ripped open his foam-filled cushion. and was found by us, standing ear-deep in foam chippings, looking very foolish. Chippings popped up all over the house for weeks afterwards. Another time he escaped and spent the night feasting at the local chippy, arriving home dirty, fat and smelling of salt and vinegar. Paul took the girls to see "Back to the Future" and Lizzie spent many hours producing a detailed biog of Michael J Fox - it was a work of hight calibre.
With relief we moved to Southampton in February 1986, only to find that we didn't fare much better. One tortoise came off worst as the temperature at the Crowborough house was too high for him to hibernate properly and he then died when frosts came to Southampton. It took the move to Somerset to enable us to start rebuilding ourselves effectively.
We made so many false starts that I feel especially fortunate to have arrived where I am today, in a beautiful place with my family intact.
Today
There seem to be a large number of babies arriving among family and friends right now and I notice that some people have even adopted the American custom of "baby showers". In some ways it's a lovely idea with the baby being celebrated even before birth and the parents receiving some delightful and useful items.
In My Day
I have already said in another blog how little I bought before Lizzie was born. This was partly down to poverty and a general tendency to leave things till the last minute, but I have to admit to a superstitious feeling about too much preparation.
My logical side tells me that whether the contents of Mothercare have been been bought or whether you have nothing this will not affect the outcome. I suppose I felt, and still feel a little bit, how sad it must be to have a fully-kitted out nursery if something then goes wrong.
I think that this is the real reason why I started out life with Lizzie with half-a-dozen nappies and a single babygro.
I still don't start on making my famous Baby ball and I don't buy or make a congratulations card until I hear of the safe arrival .
Of course, scan technology has taken a good deal of uncertainty out of this particular event, and anyway, I have already made two Moses basket linings and cut out a babygro in "Happy Houses" print. And in Ireland last week Wesz said that if I bought any more stuff Baby Donnelly would only get to wear each item once!
So much for superstition!
Today
Last Saturday, after a long and hot day we relaxed over a meal at Cafe Piano in Wells. Among the vegetables served with our dinner were some tasty little mini sweet corns. "I remember when I first ate mini sweet corn," I said to Paul "Do you?"
In My Day
In 1980 we took up a kind invitation to visit Canada to stay with my sister Carol.
One memorable day we visited Ohsweken, an Indian reservation dedicated to the Canadian Six Indian nations. There was a festival of dance, drama and song and we took our places to watch the description of Indian life.
Later we joined the Indians in dances to celebrate rain and friendship. As the skies darkened to evening we linked arms and chugged sweatily around the stadium just celebrating being there.
This was hard work and when all was over we were ready for some refreshments. There were many stalls, manned by Six Nations people. One of these simply offered sweet corn. Succulent mini corns were bubbling in a cauldron and they were just ladled into cardboard containers and offered to us. Delicious! I thought so then and think so still and am very glad they they are now readily available in our supermarkets.
I don't know how staged this event was or how much it was a representation of the reality of Canadian Indian life, but I've always relished the memory of that joyous evening and the ways in which it enriched my life.
Today
One of the pleasures of the hot weather is the abundance of fresh fruit. This morning I enjoyed a salad of banana and Cantaloupe melon.
In My Day
On our great hitch-hiking tour of 1969 my friend Angela and I decided to take in a few days at Avignon in France. The weather was glorious and the youth hostel overlooked the Rhone.
We made friends with other hostellers and one day went for a drive into the parched countryside with two French boys.
Late in the afternoon one of them said "I'm thirsty - I need melon!" When we asked where he was going to get it he declared that we had just passed a farm "They will have melons!" he asserted and walked down the track to the farmhouse.
After a little while he staggered back to the car, arms full of Cantaloupe melons. Roaring with laughter he went back to the farm, re-appearing with more - and more.
Apparently the canny farmer didn't do retail, only wholesale, and had insisted that he buy a minimum order of two dozen. We took them back to the hostel where we discovered that they are very nice sliced crossways and filled with red wine.
The following day we were setting off for Italy, so we packed our share of melons into our backpacks, so as not to waste them. After a difficult and long day getting to Grenoble we feasted on more melon, but eventually the smell of over-ripe melon and their weight in the backpacks was too much for us and we ditched the remaining few somewhere by the Autoroute.
I'd forgotten until this morning that they are the kings of melons, in terms of flavour and sweetness.
Today
At last, after many months of anxiety, I can enjoy my beautiful pond and stream. All kinds of life leap and lurk within it: toads, frogs, newts, caddis flies, dragonflies, water beetles and heaps more.
We've added to the variety with about fifty fish - grass carp, shubunkin, rudd, orfe and golden tench. The tench stay firmly on the bottom, but the others swim around in various groupings, clearly loving the sun-warmed water. Some people ask me if I feed the fish to make them tame, but I say "no", because there's plenty of food and I like them to be shy so that they dash for cover at the smallest noise or sign of a bird overhead. That way they have a better chance of avoiding any herons that pass by.
When we were in Kilcrohane last week we visited a local shop which had a large goldfish bowl in which were a goldfish and a very large shubunkin which swam in a perpetual circular motion, practically meeting its own tail, having no choice. Not a patch on my lovely "posse" of darting and diving free fish.
In My Day
It took a single visit to the circus when I was about eight to convince me that to coerce, restrain and encage animals purely for our enjoyment is wrong. At the circus, I didn't mind the clowns and was suitably impressed by the high-wire artistes. But to make horses gallop around on their hind legs (sometimes ridden by dogs also on their hind legs), beat and terrify lions and tigers into submission and persuade that most noble of creatures, the elephant, to stand on its back legs and catch balls, was ridiculous and humiliating to all concerned.
Add the fact that they spent the rest of their time in cramped cages that were driven all over the country and I lost all interest in circuses that use animals.
My favourite zoo as a child was Whipsnade in which at least some of animals roamed freely. It was a precursor of safari parks, which I very much enjoy visiting. London Zoo with its smelly, endlessly pacing big cats in tiny cages and other locked-up animals I always visited with mixed feelings. Only the penguins on their outdoor Mappin Terraces seemed have any sort of space in which to be comfortable.
I don't think its wrong to own animals and to have the pleasure of watching their antics, but this should be on their terms, not purely ours.
Today
The broken slabs on the patio and steps at Spencer House have now been repaired. The builder left strict instructions about which ones we can walk on for the next twenty-fours hours.
"Like playing Hopscotch" we said.
In My Day
In 1955, as has been previously blogged, Daddy took us on our near-disastrous caravan journey to North Wales. As the car had broken its silencer on a slate quarry railway line, we couldn't go on any trips anywhere until it was repaired. We were parked up in the tiny village of Talysarn, in the heart of Snowdonia.
That first morning we children peeked out the of the caravan to find that a bunch of local children were peeking at us. In 1955 Snowdonia wasn't so developed for tourism and these children must have been surprised by the sight of a caravan with its ancient car.
We stepped out to greet them and discovered, a little to our consternation, that they spoke foreign. They did also speak some English, but continued to speak Welsh amongst themselves which I, for one, found rather intimidating.
But they were children and we played together as the week progressed. And they taught us their version of Hopscotch. They used slate (there was plenty of that lying around) to mark out the pavement thus:
You threw another piece of slate onto the diagram and had to hop and jump to pick it up, moving up the pattern. Where there was only one square you had to stand on one leg; where there were two you could use both legs. This made the final three fiendishly hard for seven-year old me. although Chris quickly mastered the game, as he mastered everything. The Welsh kids were all experts.
We took this version home with us, marking the back garden paths with chalk and practising over and over again.
It was only much later that I discovered that there are other, easier forms of Hopscotch, but we clung tenaciously to our version, pouring scorn on all others.
I'm less confident about my abilities to hop these days, but have managed to traverse the steps so far without incident.
Today
I was reading an article which talked about the lazy work culture of Britain today and how much harder immigrant employees often work and how much "lazy" Brits resent this.
While I think that this view is exaggerated, I do think that there are many British people who are reluctant to put in the hours and cavil at the success of those who do.
In My Day
I never really imagined that I would be a stay-at-home wife and mother. When we wanted to start a family, I said to Paul "If we wait until we can afford it we'll wait the rest of our lives". So we went ahead and had Lizzie, followed five years later by Becky, at a time when having children seemed right for us.
There was no reasonable choice, so it seemed to me, but to continue working. We found a child minder we could trust and learnt how to balance tiredness, work demands and family life.
Many people simply didn't understand or accept that it was OK for both me and Paul to work hard and threatened the collapse of family life and predicted estrangement from and dire ends for the girls.
When I joined Flare in 1986, the grumbles got worse in proportion to how well the company was doing. The fact that I drove thousands of miles every year flogging the product, set up effective support and training operations and was instrumental in growing the company to over ninety staff, was no justification.
When I eventually sold the company people's attitude to me was often grudging. Someone even said to Paul "Now that Julia's come into all that money..." "She didn't come into it," replied Paul with some heat "She earned every penny."
Now, I understand that many people work hard all their lives and end up with barely a pension and others really, really try and can't get work. But to treat me as though I have had some outlandish luck which will surely spell disaster is mean-minded to say the least. What's more, I don't think that this attitude is prevalent in other countries. And my family is just fine with two daughters who work hard and love and support each other and their parents.
People would generally, I think, be less outraged if I won the lottery, because it's a level playing field and doesn't involve taking risks, missing out on leisure and pleasure. If immigrants do a better job than we do, good luck to them, I say, and shame on us for not following the example.
Today
This morning a shared Facebook video came my way showing people trying to heave other people out of bed using mousetraps on the ears (honestly), upending beds into baths and setting Chinese cracker booby-traps,
Pretty nasty, really.
In My Day
Any mother knows the difficulties involved in trying to get their family out of bed in the morning, but I do think that, at some point, responsibility has to be passed on.
In 1983 when we lived at Montfort Close this was the set-up: Paul was working for himself as "Barretronics", I was working full-time and both girls went to the local school.
One morning I heaved myself out of bed and went to wake up my family. Without exception they were grumpy, bad-tempered and even gave me some verbal abuse.
I thought about this during the day. When I got home I summoned a council meeting. "Listen up," I said with some force, "I don't have to get you guys up in the morning; you're quite capable of getting yourselves up and you all have alarm clocks. If you can't treat me with some manners in future I shall get myself up and off to work in the morning and you can sort yourselves out." There was a shuffling silence.
The following morning when I got up, ready to carry out my threat, I was greeted by a chorus most mannerly: "Good morning, Darling", "Hello, Mummy" etc, etc , delivered with delightful smiles. I even think there was a cup of tea. And they've never given me a bad tempered word on waking since.
As Lizzie likes to point out, it didn't make her any better at getting out of bed, but at least she smiled when refusing to get up.
