Grave Headstone. Magpie Tales# 38

In the days when girls were still little girls when they were 16 or more, a school friend and I used to visit local cemeteries and collect the verses written on gravestones. We set of mid Saturday morning with a paper bag each containing our picnics. Mine was always the same, a strawberry jam sandwich, a Wagon Wheel biscuit and a small bottle into which my gran had decanted some pop.
The one cemetery was right outside the town where we lived and we cycled side by side to it, along shady leafy lanes chatting  as we rode. We loved the big head stones and the ones with angel statues; the graves of babies who hardly lived before they were placed in their stone cold cots of earth. But one grave I wouldn’t go to see, although my friend used to have a quick look. It was almost that if I didn’t look at it, it wasn’t true and it hadn’t happened. Still they were happy days and I loved the friendship and the bike ride.

I go to the same cemetery now each year and leave flowers on that grave, the one I wouldn’t look at when I was young. The grave of the mother I never knew. She died when I was two, and I cry. Here I am a grown woman and I weep arranging flowers lovingly in the pot that bears her name;

Eunice Harris.

1916-1945

Wife of James

Mother of Christine.

That’s all it says...

The Mirror Magpie Tales# 37

The mirror had always been on the hall wall.


It was there so she could glance at herself.

A quick look before she answered the door.

Then one day it showed too much,

Too much, not how she thought she looked

But deep laughter lines, the turkey neck, rheumy eyes.

So she took it down, shoved it behind a book case

Immediately she was back to her youth

Firm neck, bright eyes and smooth cheeks.

Who needs the truth she thought,

As she hobbled to open the door.

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The Door Magpie Tales#36

‘Don’t you shout at me!’
‘Why not, you’re shouting at me?’
‘I want this room cleared up before tea time, do you hear me?
‘It doesn’t need it, I like it like this.’
‘How can your grandmother stay in all this mess?’
‘It not a mess, it’s how I want it and I didn’t ask Grandma to come, why does she have to anyway, she has her own place and likes it there.’ I could hear the frustration in my sister’s voice.
‘By tea time!’ I heard my mother say as she rattled down our stairs.

I looked at her red angry face and tried hard to remember how it was, how it used to be before Dad had been killed. Our lives had turned upside down that day and since then Mum wasn’t the same. She and my sister had these shouting matches and I just kept quiet and out of the way. Next week was Christmas day and once again we were having Gran to stay. I loved her and if I wasn’t in that tiny little box room she could have had my bed with all my love, but that room was so small even I had to duck under the sloping ceiling of the dorma roof and I was only nine. After the accident we had moved to this much smaller house, it was all we could afford and Mum had changed. Her way of smiling changed and the rows with my sister just got worse and worse.

‘I ‘m off out Mum,’ I called as I slipped out through the back doorway.
‘Where are you off to?’ she asked, ’Don’t forget I am doing a double shift and I want you back here by seven before I go.’
‘Just out’ I shouted as the door slammed behind me.
I tried not to look back at the sad door, paint cracked and worn, not how Dad would have had it, but he wasn’t here now and it was all Mum could do to feed us and pay the mortgage, whatever that was. She used to hunch her back over what she called her account book several evenings a week, trying to find the odd pound or two to make ends meet, as she said. I thought again about the job I had been promised, it would give us loads of money.

I had first met Stevie over the ’Banks.’ The ‘Banks’ was what the locals called the fields that ran alongside the old disused railways. Brambles and scrubby bushes filled it now and the very place us boys made our ‘dens.’ Stevie was older than the usual crowd that met up there and he used to pass around stub ends of fags. I never tried one, I knew if caught my Mum would kill me, so I always made an excuse that I had asthma and got out of it that way. Stevie made me feel grown up the way he talked about knowing people who could get you jobs that paid hundreds of pounds. Today he was going to give me all the ‘gen’ and he promised that I would be able to give my family the best Christmas ever with the money it would earn me.

We sat in a dip in the hillside shadowed now in the late afternoon. ‘It’s like this Morgan,’ he puffed, his cigarette hanging from his lip, ‘ I give you this parcel and you gotta take it to a house, and then I give you the money next time I see you’
‘Is that all?’ I asked, ‘there’s a catch somewhere isn’t there, I ‘ve got to get it to the other side of the city or even another town?.’
‘Nup, just a few streets away.’ he answered, ‘Nelson street.’
‘That’s near to where my Gran lives, I exclaimed, thinking when the job was done I could pop in and see her. ‘Right give me the parcel and I’ll be off.’
‘Oi, hang on a tick, you need to make sure it is well inside your pocket, you lose that and that’s the last job I get you mate.’ he smiled and the ash from his cigarette dropped onto his top. I hated the smell and hoped it would be gone off me before I got to Gran’s

The shadows had lengthened and I pulled up my hoody around my face to keep off the bitter wind. Gran lived in the close just off Nelson Street and this parcel had to go to 34 quite a way passed the turning into the close. I couldn’t wait to pop in to see her and get a hot drink.
I got to the turning in the road and suddenly heard someone.
‘Hey is that young Morgan?’ a voice called and I looked up at the beaming face of Greg He had been my Dad’s friend and at one time used to call round to see Mum but then suddenly he had stopped. I missed him, he was the link with my past before the accident and happier times.
‘Where are you off to in such a hurry?’ he asked.
Suddenly I knew I shouldn’t mention the parcel or where I was going.
‘Just to see Gran’ I lied.
‘I am going that way myself so come on, too cold to hang around.’ he said.
We stopped outside Gran’s and I stood by the gate and then dodged back into the front garden and watched as he walked off down the street. I waited till he had gone, feeling relieved that he had, but I felt as though I had betrayed my Dad lying to Greg,
I turned and was just about to rush off when my Gran’s door opened and she called out to me, ‘Come on in, I thought it was you, although with that hood pulled up, you could have been one of those horrors that live down Nelson Street. I am still cleaning the eggs off my top windows after the little buggars threw them at Halloween.’

‘Hi Gran,’ I called from the gate way, ‘ I ‘ve just got to see someone and then I ‘ll be there, have you got enough milk for hot chocolate, I am freezing.’
‘Don’t be too long, its dark and too many odd people around these days.’ she said.
I started to run, worried now by the threat of who knows, the weird and odd people that Gran was always talking about and I was cold.
Number 34 was dark, unlike the other houses that had Christmas lights or decorated trees in their windows and I hesitated at the end of the path and looked across at the corner shop, its lit windows radiating onto the pavement. It was then I saw Greg standing watching across the street, ‘Oh no,’ I thought.
He had his partner with him, a young WPC and they looked serious as they shuffled their feet trying to keep warm, but always keeping their eyes looking around.

I don’t know how I knew but I did, the parcel delivery was some sort of illegal thing, I was going to be caught passing drugs or something. I ducked into the shadows of the hedging that surrounded number 36 and looked back at 34. I was near to tears and I fingered the packet in my pocket. It would have been so easy to just sneak through the hedging to the house and not be seen by Greg. I knelt down and the rotten smell from under the hedge hit my nostrils, like a thousand cats had peed there and I wanted to pee as well now. I felt the tears start to roll and my knee snagged down on the soft earth. It was cold and I thought of my Dad lying in cold earth, shot by some lousy thief that night. My brave, happy Dad, downed by one bullet that day and I gulped as the tears flowed.
Suddenly Christmas lights from 36 lit up the garden and Greg was standing there in front of me, I collapsed down onto the sodden earth and all I wanted was to die like my Dad. I had let him down.

Later as I drank hot chocolate in my Gran’s front room bathed and wrapped in her old dressing gown, Greg explained that they were on the beat just doing their job. He had taken the packet from me and it wasn’t drugs but a love note from Stevie with a ring for Tracy. It seemed her Dad didn’t like Stevie but Stevie wouldn’t be deterred, he loved Tracy and so that’s why he had hatched up this plot. My payment would have been a couple of pounds, as Stevie didn’t have the hundreds of pounds he had promised me. Stevie had told all when Greg had texted him on my phone to say I had been taken ill, not that I had been delayed because I had peed my pants!
‘I want to give the ring to Tracy’, I said,’ I don’t want any money from Stevie, ‘I just want to do it.’ and I struggled into some old jeans left at Gran’s for emergencies and this was just that.
Greg watched me as I ran down Nelson Street at top speed and delivered the parcel. Tracy opened it right away and her face lit up brighter than any Christmas lights I had seen that night, ‘Dad, Dad’ she shouted excitedly … ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’
Gran and I pulled our crackers as Mum sat down, her face smiling and the roast chicken steaming in the middle of the table waiting for my sister to carve. At 17 she felt it was time Mum gave her more responsibility and carving the chicken was her first grown up job, Mum had said, and we all laughed and I laughed the loudest. My sister had her room tidy ready for Gran and we were happy.

Tracy had persuaded her Dad that Stevie was ok, and he was over the moon, so much so that Stevie had called round to see me a couple of days before Christmas and wanted to do something to pay me, but I said no. My Dad would have been proud of me, the way I had approached Greg that night and confessed to being a drug runner, well I thought I was! But Stevie did come up trumps as he worked for a builder and the next day he and a mate had called round with scrapers and paint and Mum had the shiniest yellow front door in our street. The best Christmas present I could have had she had told him, after the scent and soap I had given her, and the hair do my sister had paid for and of course tidying her room really tidy for Gran!

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Autumn Magpie Tales#35

She looked down at her wrinkled hands, the autumn years of her life had truly come. ‘So this is it,’ she thought, ‘I might as well give in and be my age.’ She put on her glasses, a real necessity these days. There were things to do and her household goods to pack up. The residential apartment she was moving to was on the ground floor, so she would still have garden to look out at and she had been assured that she could have some pots of plants just outside her door. It was with a heavy heart that she started sorting her nik-knacks, all collected over the years. Photographs of herself and her beloved Will went into the box labelled ‘To take’ and books and lots of other bits into the boxes labelled ‘Charity shop.’ It was hard to make the decisions of what to take, she knew there wasn’t a lot of room in the little apartment. ‘They’re only things,’ she kept telling herself, but they held so many happy memories. She was stirred from her thoughts by the shrill tone of her phone.

The voice at the other end filled her heart, so there was no room for those memorable items she thought she would miss.
‘Hello grandma, Mummy asks are you packed yet? I can’t wait till you are living just round the corner from us, can I really have tea with you some days after school?’
‘Yes love, I am nearly ready, tell Mummy that the van is here to pack the furniture that’s left for me to take to my new home. I am looking forward to having you near too, I won’t have to worry about driving on that motor way I can just walk a short way, meet you from school and have a lovely time with you.
I can teach you to knit and crochet and sew, just like I taught your Mum, these old hands can still do that. It is going to be just wonderful.'

The Oil Lamp. Magpie Tales #34

The bus seemed to take longer than usual and it was cold too. I kept thinking of Aunty’s casseroles and how she always made one for my first night there. She was such a dear and I loved going to her for some of my weekends from Uni, she made a fuss of me and since Mum and Dad had split up, I needed a fuss of me rather than listen to Mum moan about Dad and then when I was with Dad, he moan about her.

'Wouldn’t be long now, 'I thought. I had my overnight bag ready to hop off the bus, which stopped at the end of Aunty’s road. As you walked into Aunty’s road, which was a cul-de-sac, her house faced you and you could see her old oil lamp shining in the upstairs landing window. Tonight I suddenly realised it wasn’t there, I wondered what had happened to it. That had been there for as long as I could remember, and when I was little I remembered watching her clean and polish it till the brass shone so you could see your face in it. Then she would trim the wick and fill it with spirit. On winter nights there it was like a lighthouse beaming out to welcome Uncle home from work. Of course he had died years ago but she still put it in the window.

Before I could even ring the bell, the door opened.

‘Come in come in out of the cold, you look perished,’ she said

I could smell something delicious and my empty tum rumbled.
‘Hello Aunty, you look well, have you been away somewhere to catch the sun?’

‘No I haven’t,’ she said quite firmly. ‘I ‘ll make you a cuppa and tell you what happened.’

‘I’ll just pop to the bathroom first Aunty, I won’t be long.’

At the top of the stairs, I looked at old pine chest in front of the landing window covered with a large tablecloth, which I had never seen before. Aunty had always polished the top of that chest and the smell of the polish was all part of the memories of when I had visited through the years. And no lamp, ‘perhaps it was broken,’ I thought.

The cups and saucers were all laid out on the kitchen table. In the brighter light of the kitchen Aunty’s face looked as though she had been out in a very hot sun.

‘Your hair looks nice, have you had it cut Aunty?’

‘No I haven’t nor have I been out in the sun, I had a bit of an accident,’ and with that she started to chuckle. ‘I shouldn’t laugh it could have been really serious,’ she added. ‘I wanted to see that new man down the road, he moved in a couple of weeks ago so when I saw him going out when evening, as I was putting out my milk bottles, I went up stairs to have a peep at him out of the landing window. I was leaning into the window and my hand caught the lamp and it tipped over, and the spilt spirit flared up and singed my eye brows, burnt the front of my hair and this is what it did to my face. Then even worse the wooden chest with all that polish on it caught fire too and I started screaming.’

‘Oh no Aunty what happened then?’ Have you seen a Dr what about creams for your poor face.’ I said.

‘No nothing like that, Cliff, that’s his name, the new man I mean, anyway he heard me screaming and saw the flames in the window and arrived up stairs, as in my nosiness I had left the front door open, He rushed into my bathroom wet a towel and smothered the flames. Too late to save the top of the chest which is very badly burnt and you’ve seen my face and hair. And she started to laugh and so did I, it all seemed so funny.

‘So what about this Cliff, ‘ I asked, is he nice, have you seen him since?’

‘Can’t get rid of him, he’s a real pesk. He is coming round later with my lamp as he insisted taking it to repair it. She said, but she was smiling as she was telling me and I could see she was quite pleased.

With that the door bell rang and I heard a key turn in the lock.
‘Hello, are you there my lovely Jean? Its me---he your brave fire fighter’

‘Stop that silly talk Cliff, my niece Jenny is here, she doesn’t want to hear that sort of silliness.’

I looked at Aunty’s face as she spoke and she looked so happy I wanted to hug her.

‘You can come in the kitchen, its chicken casserole and there’s enough for three, but I don’t want any silly talk in front of Jenny.

She served up three plates full and we all three sat down after Cliff had shaken my hand and winked when Aunty wasn’t looking our way. So the lamp had led my Aunty to happiness after all those years when she had used it to lead people safely home to her . She smiled at Cliff as she passed the full plate to him and her reddened face looked even redder when  she served me and I winked at her.
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Perfume. Magpie Tales#33

‘Come on you,’ shouted Greg to his wife, as he bounded up the steps to the pretty, white painted clapperboard house, ‘you can see the lake from the top step, it’s glorious.’

‘I am nearly nine months pregnant you know, so running up steps to see the view is just about outside my capabilities,’ Clara replied. But she was smiling as she spoke so Mike knew she was happy.

‘It is lovely here,’ she said, ‘perfect for our new home and this little bundle of joy when he or she arrives. I love it already.’

Going into the house, she screamed with delight, ‘Oh look Greg, Aunty has arranged our throw over the settee that was with the rest of our bits and pieces delivered last week, so it looks like home already. I am so happy we decided to take up her offer of staying here.’ She sat down rubbing her extended tum and whispered, ‘We’re here little one, our new home.’

They unpacked the car, Greg now being careful of his very pregnant wife, carried their bags up the three steps and into the one big open plan room.

Later that evening they sat together with scented candles and just the glow of the sunset lighting the room.

Greg left the early next morning for the city, it was only an hour’s drive and before he left, he made sure Clara had her phone charged and there was a signal.
‘I’ll be fine, Aunty is only a short walk up the lane if I need anything. I am so looking forward to sitting outside on the veranda with my knitting and enjoying the view don’t worry about me I’ll see you later this evening.’ Said Clara.

‘Well take care and don’t do anything silly like unpacking the boxes, I ‘ll be back by six to do it all and you can sit and give the orders as to where you want things.’ Greg smiled and he leaned over to kiss his wife.
Clara dozed in the sunshine and feeling overly tired after getting herself a small snack for lunch went into the bedroom to lie down. Strangely the scent of the candles were still in the room and she soon was asleep. The room darkened as clouds scattered across the sky.

She was woken by a sharp pain and caught her breath, ‘it can’t be the baby there’s another three weeks to go,’ she thought. But, as the pains increased she knew she was indeed in labour. ‘Where is Greg?’ she thought, ‘he should here.’ A very sharp pain caused her to cry out and she struggled to get off the bed and find her phone. But another pain worse than before caused her to flop back on the bed. She closed her eyes and tears welled down her face. ‘Where are you Greg’ she cried out loud.
Through her half open eyes she could see that here was someone there beside her, wearing a delicious perfume that made Clara feel extra-ordinarily happy and she knew what ever happened she’d be fine. The quiet lady held her hand and bathed her head as the pains increased. The scent seemed to waft over her and gave her a feeling of complete calm. As the pains got to point where Clara was ready to push the lady murmured encouragement to Clara. ‘Push now Clara, your baby is coming, she wants to be born.’ With one last effort the baby slipped out and Clara now spent, lay back on the pillows.

‘Give her to me,’ she said and the lady carefully placed the baby in Clara’s arms. ‘Is it a girl?’

‘No, not just a girl she is a beautiful girl.’ Was the reply.

Clara closed her eyes, her arm tightly round her little one.

And then there was running footsteps and Greg’s urgent call.

Clara, Clara where are you? Your phone is off are you all right, Aunty has been trying to phone you for hours.’

The bedroom door flung open and there to Greg’s surprise was his wife and a baby.

‘I ‘m fine, someone was here and she helped me, can’t you smell her perfume?’ She was so kind and quiet and she had on this wonderful perfume. Is she there in the living room I want to thank her’

‘There’s no one here, who was she?

‘I don’t know, but she was so graceful and loving and kind and she helped me, look at your new daughter, I‘d like to call her Grace, is that all right?’

‘It’s perfect, you’re perfect, she’s perfect’ Greg almost shouted. There is no one else here now only us, only us and our perfect daughter Grace.’

Time Passing: Magpie#32

The sands of time slip away, I hate to be reminded of the fact that each and every day we get older. I hate that thought.  I look back when I was young and wonder why didn’t I notice that I was slim and pretty. Of course I am still pretty albeit older! Erum??

This picture prompt made me think of time passing, (too quickly these days.)

A very close friend died last February, very suddenly She was a christian, wife, mother, grandmother, friend, stitcher, quilter and crafter.  She was a faithful member of my online Ladies Group, 12Friends, that I run and have done for seven years.  She always mailed into the group at least once a day, sometimes twice or even more.  She was supportive, loving, kind and full of fun and brought a caring nature to the group.
Always there with good advice and prayers for any who needed it.
Her daughters and grand children miss her most dreadfully as we do, we were all still in shock weeks after, it was so sudden..
We miss you Mo and me especially, a good friend. Although I never met her, when someone writes to you every day for five years about their daily happenings, you know them and all their family.
Now, no doubt she is in God's arms and safe, but what a hole in our hearts she has left behind. Such a sad time.
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