Many of my friends have children finishing school and there is much talk of what they might do.
My friend overheard this conversation between two of her daughters.
Older daughter: Do you know what you want to do in college?
Younger daughter: I’m kind of interested in psychology but you know what she [my friend, her beloved mother] would say – navel gazing!
Truly being a mother is it’s own particular kind of exhausting.
I was at a barbecue over the summer (lashing rain) and over a burnt sausage the conversation turned to the word char. Some of the group had never heard of the word as referring to a char lady (etymology is from chore in case you’re curious).
By way of providing some background one friend told us that when she was a little girl in the 1970s she was sent to the Protestant brownies as her mother (a family planning doctor) had fallen out with the Catholic hierarchy. I know it’s different in other countries and even Northern Ireland but in the south Protestants are firmly upper middle class.* My friend was talking about the woman who minded them when her mother went out to work and one of the other 6 year olds said, “You have a maid?” Before she could answer a third six year old cut in and said witheringly “She has a char.”
When told this anecdote another friend explained to me that her grandmother had a maid and a “woman for the rough” the latter being a daily visitor but the former live in and above cleaning floors and the like.
A man about ten years older than me who I met at a party told me that when he went to visit his cousins in Cork, they left their shoes outside the door overnight to be polished.
Due to my father’s job, until I was 12 or so we lived in a large house with lovely Cissie who lived in and whom I adored (though I do remember my mother saying that you could always tell when she was in a bad mood as she you would hear her throwing the cutlery into the drawer with force something I may have brought with me into adult life). She did lots of things but she certainly didn’t polish our shoes every day. Among her many virtues was that she always bought me a comic when she came back from her day off (I think my parents thought comics were slightly pernicious so they never got me any). I digress.
It all seems from a very, very different world but still lots of people have help at home it just looks a bit different, more diffuse and generally more dependent on immigrant labour. I suppose things are better?
*When I was an apprentice solicitor in the early 90s, I had quite an annoying though sometimes charming fellow apprentice who used to say wistfully, that if he had any children he would perhaps bring them up Protestant. He would, at the drop of a hat, tell anyone who cared to listen that he had three Protestant grandparents; however due to the operation of ne temere (there’s a lot on Wikipedia at the link but basically it meant in an Irish context that the children of a mixed marriage – i.e. one between a Catholic and a Protestant- should be brought up Catholic), he was a Catholic. Now, who among us can say what is in another’s heart but I would be pretty surprised if his desire to convert was related to a full assessment of the theological merits of the question.
Updated to add: Good podcast on detectives and “the servant problem, if you are so inclined: https://www.shedunnitshow.com/theservantproblem/
I have previously written about my electric toothbrush. It has decided that it needs a new toothbrush head and nothing will stop it beeping pathetically and flashing at me. I have looked at several very dull internet videos in an effort to make it stop (if it beeps high-medium-low it’s enabled but low-medium-high means turned off, this is ridiculous) but clearly they don’t want you to make it stop (those toothbrush heads cost a fortune) so I yielded to the inevitable and put on a new head and it’s now purring away happily. This is today’s achievement if it can be called such.
*Thank you for sticking with it. Surely, things can only improve.
The priest appeared on the altar today resplendent in gold. “What feast is it?” I wondered to myself. All souls, of course. We prayed for all the dead relatives of whom, at my age, I now have more than enough. And I thought about our gardener when I was a child, Michael Lyons, who didn’t have any family of his own (in retrospect, surely he must have had but he was unmarried and lived in quite spartan conditions in a small cottage with a Jack Russell) and was one of the kindest people I have ever known, very gentle and infinitely patient with young children running in the vegetable garden. As Terry Pratchett once put it succinctly doubtless inspired by others “Do you not know that a man is not dead as long as his name is still spoken?” This is a lovely piece from the Irish Times on that very subject by the theatre director Garry Hynes which I first read when it was published in 2017 and which has really stayed with me.
Is it November? It is.
Am I going to post every day? Yes, I am.
Is NaBloPoMo still a thing? Who can say – but it will be here.
While gearing yourself up for a month of fascinating content, do please admire my festive Halloween decor.
By night:
By day:
And will we have a close up of the autumn wreath that I made myself using a hanger, ribbons, leaves and cuttings from the garden? Yes, yes, I think we will. To be honest, it made for a stressful week as it had to be regularly refreshed with leaves from the garden as the old ones wilted or blew away but I felt very crafty, as is seasonally appropriate.
I had cute little pumpkin nightlights and my entire decorative gourd collection on the mantelpiece last night and I was extremely pleased. Sadly it did not photograph well due to glare from 12 nightlights (judge away) so you will just have to imagine gourd perfection. May I yet again refer you to this article which is now an essential element of the season and describes my sentiments admirably.
Regular readers will be aware that I am committed to the bicycle. However, over the summer I saw an older gentleman cycling with golf clubs on his back. It just goes to show, it can be done. Though, I have to say, I would definitely hesitate.