http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/The past is another country. They do things differently there. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (LPHartley) If my memories spark off any of yours, I'd love to read about them, so please do comment.en-EUMokoFeed10http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/http://data5.blog.de/design/preview/72/9b626871c7cf4351bb221f239be5ab_160x200.jpghttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2009/08/02/very-few-regrets-6637815/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2009-08-02:/2009/08/02/very-few-regrets-6637815/Sun, 02 Aug 2009 20:30:45 +0200 <p>When I was eight years old, I read a story at school, the gist of which I present below. It had a profound effect on me and this, together with <em>America, With Love</em> by Kathleen Winsor, which had a similar message and which I read about ten years later, influenced my whole life.</p> <p> <span>Once upon a time there was a man who had the love of a beautiful young woman. He married her but, because of the way he treated her, he made her very unhappy and her love for him lessened until eventually she loved him no more. Being too sad to care what happened, she neglected herself, became ill and died.</p> <p> One day an old woman came to the man's door with a magic mirror to show him how his wife would have fared had he treated her as he should have done. He looked in the mirror and saw her holding a baby and smiling happily. He realised, too late, what he had done and what he had lost.</span></p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2009/08/02/very-few-regrets-6637815/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2009/08/02/very-few-regrets-6637815/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2007/07/14/does_the_pope_shit_in_the_woods~2631248/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2007-07-14:/2007/07/14/does_the_pope_shit_in_the_woods~2631248/Sat, 14 Jul 2007 09:10:30 +0200 <p>The chances are you've heard that phrase, probably even used it yourself. But you don't know where it came from. I do. Me. Sadly I can't remember when I first started using it, but my guess is between eight and ten or so years ago, maybe longer. Of course, my daughters don't believe (despite the fact that I don't lie) that I could have come up with such a popular saying. But someone had to be the first, and I tell you it was me. And it wasn't just a simple mindless mixing up of "Is the Pope Catholic?" and do "Bears shit in the woods?" (neither of which I made up, incidentally). But it is, or at least was, as true as both of those statements. I happened to know that the previous pope, John Paul II did actually shit in the woods, and this is why I said it. Naturally, he didn't do it all the time, but when he was hiking through forests for several days at a time, as was his wont, he would have no choice but to defacate there, probably more so before he was pope than after, but still. As far as I am aware this is not true of the present pope.</p> <p>The reason I said it in the first place was that I was telling my son something that he was not believing, and because it amused me to let him think that he had caught me out on a lie (which he hadn't), I said "Does the Pope shit in the woods?" because I knew that he would think that it confirmed his belief that I had lied, when in fact it confirmed that I was telling the truth. See, little things amuse me.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2007/07/14/does_the_pope_shit_in_the_woods~2631248/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>popeshitwoodshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2007/07/14/does_the_pope_shit_in_the_woods~2631248/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/22/winter_warming~1468519/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-12-22:/2006/12/22/winter_warming~1468519/Fri, 22 Dec 2006 16:23:58 +0100 <p>Just now I'm remembering perishingly cold winter evenings, Monday evenings, when this boy and I used to wander round a small deserted shopping centre. We would stop to kiss in the doorway of the chip shop, the frozen air holding us as our icy lips touched, then as we kissed our lips burning, radiating heat. The memory of the exquisite pleasure of the extreme temperatures. Those kisses so amazing that I feel my lips tingling as I recall them. </p> <p>This year I received Christmas greetings from two old boyfriends. The first to in the form of a long email (not heard from him for a couple of years), the second a short greeting (not heard from him for more than a couple of decades) - Best Wishes, M...... X. I like the X, the kiss. I take it as a testament to our long ago relationship. I think it means he has fond memories of it, as do I. I think it might mean he's not mad at me any more. That X, that kiss reminds me of the real kisses. The man, or teen-age boy as he was then, had a talent for kissing. He was the best. Really. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/22/winter_warming~1468519/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/22/winter_warming~1468519/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/13/don_t_talk_to_strangers~1424259/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-12-13:/2006/12/13/don_t_talk_to_strangers~1424259/Wed, 13 Dec 2006 16:21:20 +0100 <p>When I was about eight or nine and playing out in the street with my sister, a man stopped his car alongside us and asked if I could help him. He got out and opened the passenger door and asked me to kneel on the seat and reach something on the floor of the driver's side. As I bent down he touched me where he shouldn't through my knickers. I shot right up, got out of the car.<br> "I'm sorry, but I've got to go home now," I informed him.<br> I took hold of my sister's hand and hurried off up the street.</p> <p>I'd been told not to ever talk to, or go anywhere with strange men, but I was also brought up to be polite and respect my elders. I can't believe that after he felt me up I appologised. I never mentioned to anyone what happened. Even my sister didn't know, although she'd been there. I had some feeling that he did something he shouldn't but I wasn't in the least bothered or traumatised by it. Maybe if I'd been aware of what was going on I might have felt some great wrong had been done to me and been scared for life. But as it was, I knew nothing, so felt nothing. And even in retrospect I'm not angry or anything, just relieved that nothing worse happened. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/13/don_t_talk_to_strangers~1424259/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/13/don_t_talk_to_strangers~1424259/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/11/painted~1424158/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-12-11:/2006/12/11/painted~1424158/Mon, 11 Dec 2006 01:10:58 +0100 <p>When my youngest child was two years old, I took her with me on the bus into town. A negro woman got on the bus after us.<br> "Why has she painted she?" the little one asked.<br> All chatter on the bus ceased and everyone listened to my reply. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/11/painted~1424158/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/12/11/painted~1424158/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/30/into_bondage~1385684/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-11-30:/2006/11/30/into_bondage~1385684/Thu, 30 Nov 2006 14:49:47 +0100 <p>He was into bondage and role playing, and he was all of thirteen years old. I was eleven. It was the summer holidays, and he was staying with his uncle next door. We played in his uncle’s garden which was overgrown and ideal for games of cowboys and Indians. You can see how sophisticated we were. He was cowboy, I with my long dark plaits was Indian. We would rush round whooping and hollering, then he would catch me and tie me to the washing line post. Passionate kissing followed (although no tongues). Then he would release me and we would start again. Sometimes though we just lay in the grass or kissed propped up against the wall, or in the 'entry' that ran between the two houses. Six weeks there was of this delight. And almost the best part was that he cared only for me, and no matter what my sister did, he just wasn’t interested. Ha! </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/30/into_bondage~1385684/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/30/into_bondage~1385684/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/17/so_that_s_what_happened_on_sunday_aftern~1339758/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-11-17:/2006/11/17/so_that_s_what_happened_on_sunday_aftern~1339758/Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:01:06 +0100 <p>Once when my husband and I had returned downstairs after out usual Sunday afternoon shenanigans, our then four or five year old daughter informed me that she'd been outside our bedroom door. "I thought you were having heart attack," she said. Great. You leave the children, what you imagine is well entertained downstairs, whilst you go up for a "sleep" because you're "so tired", and it turns out they're outside your door listening to every sound.<br> And then years later you discover that your younger daughter and that mischief, her brother, regularly entertained themselves in this fashion. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/17/so_that_s_what_happened_on_sunday_aftern~1339758/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/17/so_that_s_what_happened_on_sunday_aftern~1339758/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/15/birthday_memories~1331256/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-11-14:/2006/11/15/birthday_memories~1331256/Wed, 15 Nov 2006 00:45:33 +0100 <p>I celebrated over thirty of my husband's birthday's with him, and I'm having difficulty remembering more than a couple of them.</p> <p>The first one I recall was either the first or second one after we started dating. I was a student at the local college and he was a day release student there. It just so happened that that year his birthday fell on his college day and he called round for me on his way to the college. I leaned out of my bedroom window and threw my front door key down to him. I think he liked what he saw when he came upstairs and into my room. His present was tied in blue ribbon. It was me! The ribbon barely covered my modesty, and was soon untied and the present enjoyed. Twice. Then off to college.</p> <p>The other one I remember was the last one - his sixtieth. A couple of friends from work organised a surprise party for him. The look on his face when he realised that all those people had come to celebrate his birthday with him - it was absolutely beautiful. I don't know how many people there were - at least a hundred, maybe one hundred and fifty. The large room was packed. There were family and friends from work and football and other friends. I so enjoyed seeing him with these people because it was quite obvious that they really thought a lot of him. He was a much loved man.</p> <p>The third birthday celebration that was significant was the one on which our second child was conceived. I can't actually remember it since all birthdays were celebrated with carnal knowledge and a meal out - not necessarily in that order. I'm striving to remember other birthdays, but tonight I can't. I can't even remember what presents I gave him - other than myself. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/15/birthday_memories~1331256/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/15/birthday_memories~1331256/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/14/happy_birthday~1329430/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-11-14:/2006/11/14/happy_birthday~1329430/Tue, 14 Nov 2006 16:44:13 +0100 <p>Sixty-three years ago today, at the age of nearly forty-six my mother-in-law laboured to give birth to her fourth child. She wasn’t very pleased to be having a child at her age, especially as she thought that she’d had the last one ten years previously. And just to make matters worse the ill-timed arrival of my husband meant that she missed her Sunday dinner, something she was fond of complaining about. An unplanned pregnancy; she told me how much she hadn’t wanted him, and how glad she was that she had him. And who wouldn’t be glad to have such a lovely son? I couldn’t understand why he loved her so much, and wanted to spend time with her when he could have hurried home to me. It was only when I had a son of my own who loved me as much as his father had loved his mother that I understood. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/14/happy_birthday~1329430/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/11/14/happy_birthday~1329430/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/25/of_little_green_peas~1259416/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-25:/2006/10/25/of_little_green_peas~1259416/Wed, 25 Oct 2006 11:34:41 +0200 <p>I'm just trying to sift through my memories to decide what to write about today. Some days those memories are so abundant that I don't know which one to pick, and some days, like today, I can barely summon up any, certainly none that seem interesting. I'm looking everywhere, small person days, school days, work, love, marriage, motherhood and beyond.<br> Okay, here's what has appeared at last, although how interesting it is, I don't know.<br> I was probably about four years old, and my parents had an allotment garden. I remember walking back from it one sunny day with my mother and eating some pods of peas she'd grown. The lovely little green balls were so tender and sweet. After I'd eaten the peas one at a time, I ate the pod. First my mother showed me how to remove the inside, which is a bit like greasproof paper in texture, and a bit fiddly to do and then I ate the pod, which was almost as delicious as the peas it contained.<br> The only other thing I remember about that allotment is that my father dug it over, but my mother did the rest of the work. As far as I'm aware that's the only piece of gardening my father ever did.<br> No, I've remembered something else - he dug up a weeping silver birch sappling that was growing on some waste ground and planted it in the front garden.<br> It seemed like quite a tall tree to me, being about twice the height of myself, and before we moved from that place a few years later, it had grown much taller. My father wasn't interested in gardening, although now that I think about it a little more, he used to mow the lawn and trim the hedge - nothing very interesting - that was left to my mother. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/25/of_little_green_peas~1259416/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>peasallotmentchildhoodhttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/25/of_little_green_peas~1259416/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/24/i_ve_been_ill_a_lot~1255821/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-24:/2006/10/24/i_ve_been_ill_a_lot~1255821/Tue, 24 Oct 2006 12:03:08 +0200 <p>Being ill is something I'm super good at - I've been doing it all my life. I once worked out the I'd been ill for a quarter of my birthdays and a fifth of holidays, or was it the other way around; suffice to say, I've been ill a lot. Many of the illnesses were flu or tonsilitis, particularly the winter ones. Some of the birthday ones are memorable because they were one-offs - appendicitis when I was six, chicken pox when I was thirteen, glandular fever when I was twenty, and as I rarely do these things by halves, I ususally managed to be very ill. Holidays - the first one I ever went on at the age of six, I had dreadful stomach pains and was burning up with a high temperature on the way and then spent the first week of the fortnight there in bed, whist the other children were enjoying themselves on the beach. I was twenty-one before I went on my third holiday, and I had tonsilitis in a foreign land, plus the difficulty of explaining via an interpreter that I was allergic to penicillin. I've spent Christmasses utterly miserable in bed whilst the rest of the family enjoyed themselves downstairs. This was particularly difficult when my family were young and my husband was left struggling with the Christmas dinner by himself. I've managed to be ill when I was supposed to be taking exams too - German measles for one of my O Levels and bronchitis during my degree exams. Particular periods of illness were when my eldest child started school, and when I went to university. Now my granddaughter is in education she is sharing everything she has picked up at nursery, and school with me. It could be worse, I suppose. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/24/i_ve_been_ill_a_lot~1255821/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>illnesseshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/24/i_ve_been_ill_a_lot~1255821/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/22/suffering_for_beauty~1248524/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-22:/2006/10/22/suffering_for_beauty~1248524/Sun, 22 Oct 2006 12:06:16 +0200 <p>There's a family photograph taken when I was about six or seven. We're walking down the road where we lived. When my father saw this photograph he noticed something about me that he'd missed before, and he decided to do something about it. From then on every day for I don't know how long, it seemed like forever to me, but was probably only weeks, I would end up in tears. Having noticed that my feet turned inwards, he made me walk with them turned outwards. Up and down the room every day. It was so difficult and frustrating because at first I just couldn't do it. I'd be walking up and down that room bawling away as I tried to do what he wanted. I noticed that as I concentrated on turning my feet outwards, my hands would turn outwards too. My brain just wouldn't separate my upper limbs from my lower ones. Every session would end with painful muscles in legs and arms.<br> Eventually I did learn to walk properly and I'm forever grateful to my father for his persistence. I imagine that the last thing he wanted when he came home tired from a hard day at work was to listen to me crying and protesting when what he was actually doing was showing me he loved me. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/22/suffering_for_beauty~1248524/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/22/suffering_for_beauty~1248524/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/12/when_schools_had_no_tv~1212275/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-12:/2006/10/12/when_schools_had_no_tv~1212275/Thu, 12 Oct 2006 08:54:05 +0200 <p>Up until the age of eight I was a pupil at a village school, and one of my memories whilst there is that we quite frequently went for nature walks. I recall sitting in a fresh green field and making daisy chains with some of the other children. The way they did them was quite different to the way my mother had taught me. They would make a little slit at the bottom of a stalk and then push another daisy up to its head through that, then make a hole in its stalk, and so on. I used to plait mine so that the flowers were close together and the resultant 'rope' rather than 'chain' was far less fragile than those of my fellow classmates. Each type has its own beauty, though.<br> Those nature walks are a pleasure to remember - sunny days during which we learnt the names of flowers - daisy, buttercup, bluebell, celedine, dandylion, poppy and many more; walking by the river learning about whirpools and waterfalls; going to a farmyard and seeing the fearsome bull making enough noise to scare me half to death; going to the woods to paint bluebells in the spring. How much more interesting and pleasureable that was than it must be for children today, watching it all on TV. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/12/when_schools_had_no_tv~1212275/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>nature-walksschoolflowrershttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/12/when_schools_had_no_tv~1212275/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/11/another_country~1209231/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-11:/2006/10/11/another_country~1209231/Wed, 11 Oct 2006 12:18:20 +0200 <p>The past is another country. It wasn't one I visited often, and I used to think that those who lived in it had something amiss with them. Why live in the past when there is a wonderful present? But now there is something amiss with me and the past is where I prefer to be. It increasingly takes up my thoughts, not just because I'm writing this, but because I don't want to be in the present. It's an awful thing not to want to be in the present. It's not even as if there aren't many good things in my life now, because there are, but unfortunately all of that is overshaddowed by the past; not the old precious past, but the more recent grief-filled past. And I feel guilty that I can't be happy in the present because I do have much to be happy about, and my daughters are very precious to me and I worry that they may think that they aren't enough for me. They are, but not having their father and brother around is so painful that it spills over into every other aspect of my life. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/11/another_country~1209231/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>the-pasthttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/11/another_country~1209231/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/10/first_days_at_school~1206055/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-10:/2006/10/10/first_days_at_school~1206055/Tue, 10 Oct 2006 13:19:29 +0200 <p>As we walked to school on that first day, my mother (with my sister in the pushchair) and I, she said "If you want to go to the toilet say, 'excuse me' to the teacher."<br> Of course, with the strangeness of it all, I forgot what it was I was supposed to say. Naturally, I needed to go to the toilet and I remember wondering what I should do. In the end I just left the classroom without saying a word, all the time afraid that the teacher was going to call me back, come after me, smack me, I don't know.<br> Just in case you're thinking that I could have used some other words, I could not, because I didn't know any words, not English words, anyway. The only foreign child in the class and quite unable to exchange a word with anyone.<br> After I had been at the school a week, my mother asked, "Do you understand anything the teacher is saying yet?"<br> "Yes, everything," I replied.<br> "So, what did the teacher say today?"<br> "Oh, nothing interesting. Exactly the same as yesterday." </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/10/first_days_at_school~1206055/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>languageschoolhttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/10/first_days_at_school~1206055/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/09/when_i_couldn_t_stop_smiling~1202035/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-09:/2006/10/09/when_i_couldn_t_stop_smiling~1202035/Mon, 09 Oct 2006 09:41:07 +0200 <p>There was a time when I used to fall asleep with a smile on my face and it was still there in the morning. It really was. I would fall asleep wrapped in my husband's body, cradled by his love. It was a wonderful time full of promise for the future. A perfect time. Life took that smile from my face, but the memory of it is so strong that it makes me smile now. To have been <em>so</em> happy. I <em>was</em> so happy. See that photograph of me. My husband took that photograph. I am smiling at him. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/09/when_i_couldn_t_stop_smiling~1202035/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>happinesssleepsmilehusbandlovehttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/09/when_i_couldn_t_stop_smiling~1202035/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/08/in_the_eyes_of_the_beholder~1199210/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-08:/2006/10/08/in_the_eyes_of_the_beholder~1199210/Sun, 08 Oct 2006 11:03:51 +0200 <p>I grew up believing I was ugly. As you can see from my photo, I wasn't, but because I had a younger sister who had what seemed like all the attention, I thought I must be unattractive. It's not that my sister was prettier than me, because everyone says she wasn't, but she had that certain something, that little spark that I lacked, so people were more drawn to her than to myself. My mother never mentioned anything about my attractiveness, but rather she criticised me at every opportunity, although she says she was doing it to make me better. Better in what way, I'd like to know. All that happened was that I was really insecure, very shy and blushed dreadfully whenever anyone spoke to me. My sister, on the other hand, knew she had attractive physical qualities: everyone used to remark on her curly hair and her dimples. My hair was straight, but it was no less beautiful than hers, and I had dimples too, albeit not so pronounced as hers. But the odd thing is, I never even realised I had them. Because no one mentioned them, because I never smiled at myself in the mirror, because you couldn't really see them on the photographs we had, I just thought I hadn't got them. It took a long time for me to realise that I was actually attractive. Even when I was voted the prettiest girl in the class in the fifth form, I still had difficulty in believing it. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/08/in_the_eyes_of_the_beholder~1199210/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>hairmotherlifebeautydimpleshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/08/in_the_eyes_of_the_beholder~1199210/#commentshttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/07/flowers_in_my_hair~1198284/tag:anothercountry.blog.co.uk,2006-10-07:/2006/10/07/flowers_in_my_hair~1198284/Sat, 07 Oct 2006 22:39:36 +0200 <p>When I was small and my mother took me for walks she would often pick a flower to put in my hair. I always loved flowers in my hair. When I was older I would pick the flowers myself, sometimes slipping one or two above my ear interwoven in the dark stands of my beautiful long hair, sometimes wearing a wreath of daisies tightly plaited together. I regret that I'm too old for flowers in my hair now. They were a symbol of youthful freedom. A symbol of the time when my soul was wild and there was real joy in living. I was a true flower child - my spirit danced and I was free. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/07/flowers_in_my_hair~1198284/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>joylifefreedomyouthflowershairhttp://anothercountry.blog.co.uk/2006/10/07/flowers_in_my_hair~1198284/#comments