Extra twist and the bottle top

Luky;
When my second daughter went to the first grade in school, she looked like a convent mascot. Inside her classrom there were thirty other little girls, looking just as tiny and heartrendingly cute to their own mothers as she did to me. Have you ever noticed how, when your child or grandchild brings home a class photo, somehow your eye immediately focuses on your own offspring?

Other problems
I went home, wondering how my daughter would like school. She is so different from her brothers and sisters. When she was small I had a lot on my mind, because her father became sick before she was a year old, and was bedridden for the next six months. There were other problems too, and because of them I found myself more a spectator than an active participant in her development.

One afternoon I was late fetching her, having forgotten that their class came out early for the first week or two. Approaching the playground, I heard her chatting before I could even see her. There she was, on a swing, talking away to the little schoolboy, who was pushing her forward. He, too, spoke nineteen to the dozen, so it took a while before they spotted me.

They all look the same
"Oh, there's my mom. I've got to go. Can you stop the swing for me?" The boy complied, smiling shyly into my direction. After she had thanked him and he had gone off to wait for his mother, I asked who he was.
"I don't know," my daughter replied, "I wish I did. He's very nice, but I know I won't be able to find him tomorrow. You see, there are so many of them, and they all look exactly the same."

I kept a straight face until I told my husband about this while we were preparing the school lunches.
"Yes," he said, "I knew she had found some male admirers. Remember the first time she told me not to put the top so tight on her cooldrink bottle, because she couldn't twist it off during break?"
I nodded.

Strong boys
 "Well, last week she came and said: 'Please Dad, put it on tight! The boys in my school are very strong, and they love to open my bottle for me. When you put it on tightly, they can show the other boys how strong their muscles are.'"
We laughed, and then my husband said: "Not even six years old, and she's discovered every man's Achilles heel." And he gave my daughter's bottle top an extra twist before putting it into the fridge.

*Photograph taken in beautiful Cape Town by Catherine Nicolette - a rainy day

WEDGED LIKE A SARDINE

Luky;
Years ago one of my sporadic attempts at self-improvement led me into the office of a music teacher. 
I took my second daughter with me to lend moral support.

Toiling up the staircase, I ruefully contemplated my previous endeavours to keep from turning stale. 
The slimming society had done its part to teach me to lose weight, but I hadn't done mine. 
The exercises had proved too strenuous for a person of my comfort-loving habits.

My eldest daughter and myself had attended two years of singing lessons, and now our singing teacher had joined the ranks of working girls. 
I was once again at a loose end. So why not take up the organ?

As I approached the door, I could hear that the teacher was on the telephone, so I knocked and went in.
"I agree", he was saying earnestly into the receiver, waving his hand as though the person on the other end of the line could see it.
"It has always been my contention that ... Don't sit on that chair!"

Now how could he see that the other person was sitting down, I wondered vaguely. 
Was he clairvoyant in addition to his musical gifts?  
I had chosen a comfortable-looking chair next to his desk, and as he yelled I fell right through it.

Wedged like a sardine, most of me on the floor, I looked up at him and realised the horrible truth. 
It wasn't the person on the other end of the line he had yelled at, it was me. 
I was more surprised than hurt, stuck there like a sardine, and having taken one concerned look at my face he continued talking on the phone.

"No, I wasn't talking to you. A lady just sat down on the chair beside my desk that has no bottom. But she's all right." 
All right? How could he fail to see that I simply couldn't get up out of the chair?

My daughter tried manfully to pull me up, but she is a skinny little thing, taking more after her Irish forebears than her sturdier Dutch ones.
I contemplated resting my arms on the arm rests, but suddenly they too looked as though they too might splinter if I contracted my mighty muscles.
And I couldn't do that to the music master, because he must have had a reason for placing that chair where it was.

I could hardly believe that it stood there just as a booby trap for prospective pupils.
So I just stayed put, hopeful that he couldn't stay on the phone forever.

The door opened and a beautiful young girl appeared. 
"Could I talk to Mr So-and-so?" she asked shyly.
"By all means", I said, "But do you think you could give me a hand up first? I appear to be stuck."
She regarded me uncomprehendingly, and I subsided morosely. I have my pride.

A delighted cry came from the music master: "Danielle!" (or whatever her name was).
"Well, I never. Sorry, a friend of mine has just come in - I haven't seen her for six months. 
I'll call you back."

To heck with you and chair, I thought acidly, when he had put the phone down and he and Danielle stood smiling at one another. 
If it breaks even further, you can pay to have it fixed.
I leaned my elbows on the armrests, gave a mighty heave and presto, I was standing up, much to my daughter's relief. 
"Are you all right, Mom?" she whispered.
"I'm fine", I replied curtly, and strode out of the office, head held high - although my huffy departure was apparently not noticed either by the music teacher or by Danielle.

I did not take up the organ after all. I decided to go in for flower arranging instead.

The Dentist from Amsterdam

Luky;
When I was a child in Amsterdam a woman came to us daily to help with the housework. For the benefit of Paul Gallico fans I'll call her Mrs Harris.

Mrs Harris, although somewhat rough of tongue, possessed a heart of gold.
I have a feeling she couldn't read, because once when I was ill she bought me a book about Little Red Riding Hood, written in English, which at that time none of us could make head or tail of.
But illiterate or not, Mrs Harris possessed a shrewd inborn sagacity which she displayed in the education of her intellectually challenged son Peter.

Confidence in appearance
Peter was fourteen at the time, and doing very badly at the school he attended.
He was a placid, lovable child. When he had lost his milk teeth and his permanent teeth had appeared, they were large in size.
On the whole Peter had been an extremely amiable child but by now he had become somewhat sensitive.
His mother loved him dearly and was always working out ways of helping him to develop his social skills and feel confident in his appearance.

With great patience she taught him to tell the time.
His inability to work with money she solved as follows.
She'd put the money for the baker - my father - into his left pocket, and that for the butcher into the right one.
The grocer's list and money was kept in his shirt pocket.
Lots of Peter's anxiety was cured in this way.
Mrs Harris told my mother one day that she and Peter felt that his teeth detracted from his appearance.
She went on to say, "I've decided to have the lot extracted and get him some dentures."

Ability of dentists
Somewhere my mother had read or heard about the ability of dentists to extract teeth and to fit artificial ones into their sockets by means of a bridge anchored on either side of the remaining good ones, and she suggested that Mrs Harris try to have this done.
Mrs Harris agreed and made an appointment with the dentist.

When they arrived at the surgery, Peter grew very nervous, and in a bid to reassure him the dentist showed him a set of dentures which had failed to meet the required standard.
He pointed out each tooth, giving it a different name.
"This is Jane," he said about one, "and here is Olive.
That one over there is called Deborah and these two are Angela and Gladys."
Peter was fascinated and kept repeating the names, so the dentist kindly added:
"You can keep these teeth, my boy. And you must come back next week so that I can continue working on your own."

That evening Peter and his mother sat at the kitchen table, looking at the dentures.
Patiently Mrs Harris made him repeat each name and when they returned to the dentist the following week Peter, normally so taciturn, rattled off all the names of the teeth in rapid succession.
"Clever boy," the dentist praised.
"Why don't you come and work here during your holidays?"
It is doubtful whether he seriously meant what he said, and it is certain that Mrs Harris forgot his words, but on the first school holiday Peter rose at the crack of dawn, dressed with care, shone his shoes, slicked down his hair with water and made his way to the dentist's rooms.
My mother said that Mrs Harris, normally a human dynamo, was so distressed that she could hardly do a stroke of work that day.

Beaming
Late that afternoon Peter came home beaming:
"I'm allowed to come back tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow!" he proudly announced.
Eventually Peter became assistant to the dentists' technician and never overbaked an artificial tooth in his career for as far as we followed it.
He earned more money than some of his peers.

The kindly dentist always took a great interest in Peter's work, and the latter became a man full of joy and confidence.
It sounds almost like a fairytale, but it really did happen.
And the chief credit, I believe, goes to his mother.
When Peter got Mrs Harris for a mom he hit the jackpot.

*Photograph taken by Catherine Nicolette in beautiful Amsterdam

A Tale of Two Sparrows

Luky;
Many years ago I received a letter from a mother whose son was critically ill. 
It was not a complaining letter; on the contrary, the illness was mentioned almost dispassionately and in passing, yet there was such a thread of sadness running through the letter that it still haunts my mind.

I've been to Lourdes twice, and I often feel I'd never really lived until I went there the first time. 
If you've been there yourself you'll know what I mean, and if not, you can take my word for it.

Clarification
Kneeling before the grotto I found that many things I had found puzzling before about my life in general and my religion in particular suddenly became clear. 
I cried a lot that time, although I had previously scorned tears as belonging only to the weak. It was all immensely relieving, I must confess.

The second time I went things were different. 
This time it was no longer an emotional experience, and most of the time I was too busy encouraging other pilgrims to think much about myself.
Sorry to keep saying "I", but how else can one explain?

This time I cried only twice. Once was in the Piscines where we bathed daily. 
One morning an Intalian woman brought in a most adorable baby boy who had water on the brain. 
He was dressed in a red plastic suit with hood and laceup boots.
The child did not want to be bathed and screamed in terror. 
The more he screamed the more I wept.
Eventually he went so rigid that he banged his head hard against the side of the bath.
The look of suffering on his mother's face was as hard to bear as her baby's crying.

The second time I dissolved was in the underground basilica. 
A small bird had flown in and its mother was trying to steer it back to safety.
As it was Holy Week I had been thinking about the role Mary of Nazareth played when her Son was crucified.
What puzzled me about this was that she has gone on record as having taken this silently without pleading with the soldiers as another mother would have done.

Showing how
The little mother bird kept flying down to her baby. 
She'd stand on the ground beside him, then fly on to an empty pew to demonstrate how easy it was.
He'd fly up too and followed by him she flew on a little farther each time.
When it came to the final flight to freedom, however, exhaustion took over and he flopped down.
Immediately his mother anxiously hovered down beside him and recommenced her lifesaving lessons.

Too quick
At first I tried to catch the baby bird but he was much too quick for me.
Then I desisted, remembering having been told that once a baby bird has been touched by human hands its parents reject it.
How I cried, for here I was being shown by two little birds that there was nothing more a mother can do for her suffering children than to stand by them in their grief.

Poignant
Thinking about it now, however, I've come to the conclusion that the most poignant sorrow in the world is not the pain felt by a mother for her child. 
What would be unbearably sad would be for us to deliberately turn our backs on God and the help and graces He gives.

*Lourdes is a place of pilgrimage and peace. See the link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lourdes
With thanks to Wikipedia

*Photograph taken by Catherine Nicolette in beautiful Amsterdam - why not visit?

THERE'S A MOUSE IN THE HOUSE!

All animals trust my brother Joseph

Catherine Nicolette
My mom has been talking about animals a lot, lately. I really love animals. 
One of the realities of Charity work is that I need to be ready for a call out or field trip from time to time. Animals pine when the owner is away, so I have learned over the years that it is kinder not to put the little innocent through feeling abandoned. 
So I don't own a cat, dog or pet.

When I visit South Africa or India, well, it is simply marvellous. 
Animals everywhere in the garden, and all know me as I visit from time to time and an animal never forgets you. 
The simple eyes full of adoring devotion, the cat that falls asleep on your lap, the dogs whose tails nearly wag off with happiness to see you. 
All these things mean so much when you don't have the daily joy of this simple blessing.

Dad and Mom were absolutely marvellous about allowing us to have animals. 
The only time Mom ever struck out, though, was the Time Of The White Rat.
I was about ten years old at the time, and one of my brother's school friends owned a sweet little white rat which he had trained. 
The rat had a placid and loving temperament, and had learned to run from the palm of your right hand up your right blazer sleeve, around the neck (tickling your neck with its little whiskers in the process), navigate your collar successfully, and run down your left blazer pocket to land happily in the coccoon of your left hand to receive the little prize of a piece of cheese. 
We were amazed at the little thing's intelligence, and soon the scholarly entrepreneur had a booming business going of renting out the white rat to his friends for twenty cents a go for two days.

For two whole glorious days the temporary owner of the white rat would be the envy of his school friends as the little creature would snuggle to sleep in the top blazer pocket when the teacher came in to class. 
When woken up after class, he would run around the blazer and all would sigh in amazement. 
It must be explained that twenty cents at that time was an exorbitant amount of money. 
A full Wilson's buttermilk toffee (the large one) could be bought for half a cent. 
Two Chappies bubble gums could be bought for a half cent. So twenty cents... why, you were the next best thing to a Welkom billionaire. Anyhow. I digress.

I had somehow managed to save the princely sum of twenty cents. 
I pestered my brother's friend to let me rent Henry for two days. 
He refused, on the irrefutable grounds that I was a girl; his rules were that only boys could rent the rat. 
The only thing for it was a dare. I dared him to two games - one of football and the other of marbles. If I won both, I could rent the rat. 
Well, the boys were glum when I won both games (I was a bit of a tomboy at the time), and I triumphantly handed over the twenty cents and gloried in Henry's sweet nature.

Henry slept in a lined shoe box next to my bed the first night, and happily accompanied me to school the next day.
How the girls in my class oohed and aahed at the little miraculous creature.
Snuggled in my blazer pocket when Sister gave us geography, I felt the warmth of the little one sleeping peacefully, and I felt Rich Indeed. Until I got home.

Mom had a lovely meal ready for us around the table. 
I sat with my brothers (no sisters yet at that time), and after prayers Mom started to pour tea. 
I had just taken my first spoon of her delicious soup, when an unearthly shriek shattered the air.
Mom had staggered back from the table, right hand clutched frantically around the teapot, left hand pointing in horror. 
I looked behind me - what dreadful thing had happened? 
Henry's little nose was twitching in dismay, his whiskers tickling my neck, as he cuddled closer to the warmth of my neck - the poor little pet had got an awful fright. 
Mom was screeching, "A rat! A rat!"
"Oh," I said, realisation dawning, "That's not a rat, Mom. That's Henry."
"I don't care who he is," she said. "I have put up with rabbits. 
I have had dogs, cats, and birds from every corner of Welkom. 
There have been hamsters and silkworms and even a tortoise. 
But now I Have Had Enough! Either that rat goes or I do!"

I was brokenhearted. Banished from the warm house into the gloomy Welkom evening, I trundled my way miserably two doors down to hand over my little friend to his owner. 
I had my first encounter with a businessman to the core of his soul.
Upon my hesitant request for a refund in full or in part of my twenty cents, my brother's friend informed me dispassionately that none was forthcoming. 
I went home sadly to contemplate the empty shoe box that night. 
Moms were very hard, I thought. 
I heard Mom giving out about the rat to Dad when he came home that night, and his peaceable murmurs. 
He never said anything about Henry to me - Dad used to think I was quite a hoot at times.
"Such spirit, Ma," he would say about me to Mom, "Such spirit!"

I was very bitter next day when I found Henry had been rented out promptly to the next in line for another twenty cents the evening I had returned him. 
Henry's owner was well stocked with sweets and the Beano. 
He magnanimously let me have a read of the comic, which went some way to mollify me. 
And to this day, I remember my brother Joseph's reaction upon seeing Henry's sweet little face at my blazer collar; he cried out in delight;
 "There's a mouse in the house!"

MARRIAGE MEANS GROWING OLD TOGETHER

Luky;
My husband and I celebrated many anniversaries together, and I feel that the most significant feature about our marriage was the fact that we were still together and content to remain so.
This may be because although my husband was once an extremely casual Irishman and I very precise Dutch girl, he adopted my attitude that "if a job is worthy doing, it is worthy doing well, and if there is work to be done, there is no time like the present"; whereas I, yawning luxuriously, learned to stretch my legs closer to the fire and plead:
"Put on another log and stop fussing. What's your hurry?
Sure, when the Lord made time he made plenty of it."

Thinking that made me remember my grandmother and the letter she sent us two weeks before our wedding.
My grandfather having passed away a few weeks previously, she was writing in reply to my letter of condolence and including her congratulations to us.
She was not given to dispensing advice, which is why we were all very fond of her, but on this occasion she got her point across to us by writing:
"If you could have known two people as different from one another as father and I were, you might ask:
'How did two people, so totally different, ever stick it out together for 53 years?'
But we did, and we loved it, and I only wish we could add another 53 years to it."

Story book granny
My grandmother was the sort of granny depicted in story books.
At the age of 46 she went into black clothes, and nothing her fashion-conscious daughters said could induce her to go back to coloured garb.
She wore glasses, and her hair - which she had never cut in her life - was neatly put up in a bun.
She seldom spoke unless she had something to say, but then she got more into one sentence than other people could put into ten.

Valley of tears
Like the time when I asked her:
"Why do people call the world a valley of tears, when it is so lovely?"
She replied, not theatrically, but in a very matter of fact way:
"You'll find that out when you're big."
And when I did, some twenty years later, I suddenly thought:
"So that's what Ouma meant that time", and a wave of comfort engulfed me.

Eleven children
Having had 15 pregnancies in 20 years, my gran had been of a nervous temperament, but by the time she had brought up her 11 surviving children she had learned to relax and when I knew her she was a stoical, reserved woman, deeply but undemonstratively religious and extremely generous, hardworking and self-effacing.

As her children left home one by one to get married, she refused to reduce her milk order because the milkman still had eight children under 15, and she did not want them going short.
So we all remember my grandmother's plaintive request:
"Are you quite sure you wouldn't like a nice, health-giving glass of milk?"

For the last 14 years of her life she suffered from diabetes and had to remain on a strict diet.
Characteristically, she never complained, although she prepared all sorts of delicacies for her family when they came to see her.

She died without much fuss, and outwardly one could hardly notice the difference, or so those living near her said.
But when I went back to them for a visit some years later, I felt an almost tangible gap, and though a lovely blooming plant had been taken out gently, roots and all, and transplanted into a more beautiful garden far away.

*Luky and both sets of grandparents on her First Holy Communion Day

The family that prays together stays together

Luky;
I attended a memorable weekend retreat when I was in my standard nine year.
During the course of the Retreat the Archbishop giving the retreat spent ten minutes explaining to us that you never call an animal, however well-trained, intelligent. 
The word for such an animal was, he insisted, sagacious.

Family visit
An anecdote the Archbishop told us also comes to mind.
The previous week, he said, he had gone to visit a family and arrived unannounced, to find them at prayer. They were praying the family rosary.
They didn't stop when he came in, just smiled and indicated to him that he was welcome to join in.
So he knelt down and did that.
He told us this to prove that we must never be ashamed when visitors arrive to continue praying. 
Even if we have not started our regular prayer, we should rather ask them to join in or go and read a magazine in the next room until we finish, in preference to skipping the daily prayer for that night out of deference to the visitor.

Not so smooth
Lest we got the idea that this particular family prayer was an exalted event, he added that there was in that family a little year-old baby who kept crawling from child to child, making everyone laugh.
Yet somehow this homeliness did not detract from the serenity of the family prayers.
And so the Archbishop made the point that all the children must always be made welcome during family prayers.

How often as we in our family were praying together did I recall his words.
Somehow there was always a little baby, crawling around and making the other kids laugh.
One time one of my daughters wasn't paying attention and I reprimanded her.
She made an imaginary phone call to God.
"Lord says Luky say sorry to me," she lisped.
When I wouldn't, she told him so in shocked dismay, again over the telephone.
Then she paused for a few seconds before handing the imaginary receiver to me, saying:
"He says He wants to talk to you Himself."

One story I didn't tell you was that from the age of two my youngest daughter started saying her own form of decade.
I'd say the Our Father and the Gloria and she'd say the Hail Mary.
Kneeling down angelically, dressed in her nighty and eyes closed, she'd pray:
"Hail Mary Jesus", and we'd fall in: "Holy Mary, Mother of God..."

I regret to report that the other children used to love my daughter's decades.
They went so quickly.
I'm still waiting for the day when they would cheer: "Mommy says it's rosary time, yippee!" but it may never arrive.
But I shall always remain grateful to the Archbishop and Fr Patrick Peyton for giving of their precious time to teach us the important fact that the family that prays together, stays together.

Sean and I started praying together when we were engaged and we still said the rosary together until he went to heaven.
 I wouldn't be at all surprised if that wasn't the main reason why after so many years he still surrounded me with his constant loving care.

Catherine Nicolette;
We used to pray together every night. As the eldest, I had to show the example and keep my eyes closed, and devoutly pray. 
From time to time I used to break out in laughter, which did not go down well in the quiet family rosary time. 
But the then baby of the time used to crawl behind and tickle my toes when I was least expecting it...

*Photograph taken by Catherine Nicolette. Please feel free to use copyright free for any worthy purpose

WHY IS IT SO EASY TO BECOME FAT?

Luky
When I look at mothers of seven or eight children who are as slim as their own teenage daughters - and I seem to know a lot of these - I have trouble in fighting down a rising pang of envy.
I know it's far more important to be good and kind than it is to be slim, but does one necessarily have to wear a  very large dress to be good and kind?

I've tried everything
I've tried every way in and out of the book to shed an excess 25 pounds in weight but it is or they are sticking to me like glue. In the end I bought a mixture to put in a glass of milk to be taken as a meal. I didn't want to lose a lot of weight, only twenty five pounds, but do you think I could?
Twenty minutes after taking the supplement, I opened the fridge and behaved like a locust.
It is a terrible thought that many go hungry and that I am tempted to eat too much.
You may frown upon my lack of self-control - I do myself - but that still does not cure me of being tempted to over-eat.

I contemplated joining a group which could help me monitor my eating, but I felt I ought to be able to teach myself free of charge so I was denied this solace.
So it seemed that I'm stuck with my weight.
Actually I can live with it - it's the next twenty five pounds I'm afraid of.

Overdone
Like most good things, weight watching can be overdone.
Years ago a friend of mine who had become a little underweight and was feeling run down went to see her doctor about it.
She flushed as she told me he had asked her whether she was eating properly. She was mortified.

Well, there's no danger of any doctor asking me such a question, that's one consolation.
In a final bid to lose weight I went to the local bookshop to find a book on the subject and bumped into a man I knew.
We got talking about weight watching and he confessed that he had stuck a large sticker inside his fridge door:  "I must NOT eat at night".
When that didn't work he gave his wife the key to the kitchen door and I believe it was pathetic, with him pleading half the night for the key and moaning half the day because she gave it to him.

Why is it so easy to become fat?

LIFE AS A MINER'S WIFE

Luky;
Although I am dithering, indeterminate and uncertain when my life is going smoothly - this does not often happen - I become efficient, pragmatic, and as cool as ice in an emergency.

Sean worked afternoon shifts on the mine and whenever he did so, was due to get home by about 10 pm. When he didn't, I could be sure that there was some sort of an emergency at the mine. 
On those occasions I would awake with a frightened feeling at around 2 in the morning and spend hours alternately praying and wondering whether to call the police. 
Yet somehow I always managed to pull myself together and do what needed to be done.

One particular morning things were easier than usual because I had slept through the night. 
When I woke up at six and found Sean not yet home, I at least felt rested.

Just in case
I called the children and told them to go to school by bus after their breakfast.
I dressed very neatly in case something had happened to Sean because I wouldn't have liked to digrace his memory before his colleagues.
I promised the children that if they didn't hear from me at school their father would be all right.
If anything was wrong I'd come and tell them.
Then I left them in Angeline's capable hands, got  into my blue Mazda  (Sean's was red) and drove towards the mine.

Plan of action
On the way there, my mind was working overtime.
Fortunately I have a black dress, I thought, but the girls must wear white.
Thank heavens Sean was at confession recently, no worries there.
How long would the mine let us stay on at the house?
Just as well I typed out that last will and testament a year ago.
Must ask my friends to sing for the funeral.
I'd like to ask the organist to play the Ave Maria as they are wheeling the coffin out of the church, because Sean loves Our Lady so much.
He always said he was scared of God in addition to loving Him, but He only felt love for the Blessed Virgin.

Which one?
Now was it Schubert's version or the Bach/Gounod adaptation he preferred? 
No use asking Catherine Nicolette to play it for us, I knew. 
I asked her once if she'd play the Ave Maria at my funeral and she said: "You must think I'm made of stone."
Maybe I was made of stone, all I could think of was whether we'd have enough money to live on.

I started  humming the Schubert version of the Ave Maria as a red Mazda drove towards me and flashed its lights. I drove around the circle and turned back after Sean. 

Relief all round
As we drove into the gate after one another, the children were just leaving to catch the bus. 
All of us went back into the house.
Bully was frantic in the courtyard. He must have sensed something was wrong.
I remembered again the look of my brother's Alsation the day my father died.
That was the day I stood next to a plant and drops fell on my hand.
I thought they were my tears, but my eyes were dry and only the dog and the plant seemed to care.

My mother and the others had gone to arrange for the funeral and left me behind to answer the telephone and receive callers. 
Funny, that day I had the same stony feeling. 
The only thing I had been interested in was whether my father's insurance policy had been paid up to date so that my mother would have enough to see her through.

It was long after everyone else had finished crying that my own bout started. 
But it had proved very useful to my mother, who didn't need a weeping willow just then but a person whose mind was clear.

When Sean had finished telling us the reason for his late return home (and any miner's wife and child know what those reasons can be) I said to him:
"You know how I've been moaning at you about saving. Discard everything I said.
I was talking through my hat.
I was adding and subtracting all my way to the mine, and I'm happy to tell you you've made a convert of me at last.
Never again will I obstruct your attempts to save for an emergency.
From now on I'll be behind you every step of the way."

One might think he'd be grateful that he'd finally convinced me of the need to save, but ingratitude, thy name is man.
Do you think he felt uplifted by my cool pragmatism?
On the contrary, he was distinctly chilly...

Catherine Nicolette
How well I remember the times Dad didn't come home. 
We as miner's daughters and sons, were so blessed that eventually he always did make it home. But some of the miners didn't ... names come to mind. 
We still remember and honour each one, especially a Sesotho friend of Dad's that he grieved until the day he went to heaven.
Whenever I see an item made of gold, I think of the self-sacrifice and heroism of the miners who put their lives on the line for their families and children. May blessings be with them all.

It's no good crying over spilt milk

Luky;
A thief in the night
Some years ago the milk coupons were stolen from our bottles. At the crack of dawn the milkman knocked us up and demanded more coupons.
 "The coupons have been stolen from every house in your street", he told us.
"That must have been at 2am when I had to get up to tell Bully and Snowy to stop their din", I said.
"No it wasn't", my husband argued, "I came home from night shift at five and checked the bottles. The tokens were there then, and it's not quite six now. There's something funny going on".
Unhappily he produced more tokens.
For quite a while afterwards I could hear him talking to himself, saying things like "there's more to this than meets the eye."

He knows better than to talk to me that way. In a life as fraught with pain and disappointments as that of any other human being, I've firmly taught myself not to look on unfairness with smouldering rage, but always to look forward.

What can't be cured must be endured. Let's hope the poor soul who pinched the coupons learns honesty and finds mercy and forgiveness. I have known friends who have been left in financial straits after the dishonesty of others. I, too, have had my own tragedies. For years when I looked at difficulties, questions came soaring to my mind. Then I began trying to accept the inevitable.

What is it they say? "Lord, grant me the courage to change the things that I can change, to accept the things I can't, and the wisdom to know the difference."
It is the most comforting prayer I know, and has saved me much frustration. 
After all, if God had wanted things to be different, he could have granted a miracle.

I learned this attitude from my parents. My dad, who died a lingering death of cancer, never - but never - complained.
If the pain and fear got too much, he'd pick on something unimportant and explode about that just to get a little relief.
Like the Christmas when my mother arrived late at the hospital for lack of transport.
"Everything is wrong today", he burst out angrily, "Look, even the little angel they hung over my bed has a broken wing!"
After which they both laughed until the tears poured down their faces. But he never mentioned the real cause of his grief.

Mom laughed
Another time my mother laughed like that was when I was small. She had a porcelain dinner service, a wedding gift and the pride of her heart.
She and Mrs. Alberts our char, were washing up after a dinner party and packed the entire service on to a tea trolley.
In passing Mrs Alberts lost her footing and fell against the trolley, which overturned.
Everything was broken except for the meat platter and the gravy boat still in the sink.
We used them for years afterwards.

Holding her apron to her eyes, Mrs Alberts sank among the smithereens and sobbed her heart out.
"I'll never be able to replace any of this!" she wept.
"Oh, what shall I do?"

Suddenly my mother burst out laughing. Sobering up, she said: "Well, the first thing I'd suggest would be to sweep up the debris.
"And wipe away those tears, please; you've done me a favour.
I've never been able to fancy that pattern.
Besides, didn't you know smithereens bring luck?"

So you've been treated unkindly, unfairly, with indignity or injustice. Are you going to let yourself be turned into a wreck on that account?
You can't help what happens to you, but you can help the way you react.

So your life is destroyed, and your heart is broken. Why not mend the cracks as best you can, and carry on from there? What the heck! Smithereens bring luck.

As for the one who pinched the entire street's milk tokens, I hope all that milk made him or her very healthy.

*Name has been changed
*Photograph taken by Catherine Nicolette - please feel free to use copyright free for any worthy purpose

Happiness is the sounds of home

The Whittle family at the time

Luky;
What seems like only the other morning I was busy in one of the bedrooms. Garbled sounds came from all over the house. A child was practising on the piano. My husband was teaching Latin to another: "Can't you use your head? No Ma, O Romans is NOT O'Romanes. You keep out of this - you know about as much Latin as he does!"
The baby lay gurgling in her cot. A child was playing with her doll, and two little boys were squabbling about a Dinky toy. As I listened, my heart filled with joy. "This," I thought, "is happiness."
Since my boarding school son was back with me, I often felt this way. To me, there is something enchanting about having all my chicks under my wings, even if they do turn into fighters at times.
However, this happy state of affairs was doomed to end soon. My eldest child was soon to complete her matric and leave the family circle. I knew that if all went according to expectation, No. 2 would be ready to depart two years later.

I knew then that from the moment my first child left home, I would never again know such deep joy and contentment as I experienced that morning. Every mother has to surrender her children after bringing them up. It is nature's way, so I don't ask for it to be different. I just give thanks for having been allowed to keep them as long as I did.

In addition I tried to make the remainder of my eldest child's stay with us as pleasant as possible. My husband agreed, and so we came to the joint decision to make the most of family get-togethers such as weekend, public holidays and birthdays. However, as my hairdresser and discreet confidante remarked:
"Things do always seem to go topsy-turvy for you people, don't they?" A case in point was the holiday we didn't go on.

Another was the birthday issue. "We've been organising this whole thing badly", my husband explained. 
"On a birthday my mother always produced a lace cloth, her best crockery and an enormous iced fruitcake. Why can't we do the same?"
"Why not," I agreed, "provided you buy the cake from a good confectioner. I'm no good at doing icing, and the ingredients for a fruitcake are so expensive that we may as well pay the experts and have them do the whole job." 

Thus it happened that my husband called at the bakery on the occasion of the next birthday in the family, which happened to be his own.
 "We can't ice the cake for you at this late stage", the woman behind the counter told him,
"But I can sell you a fruitcake to ice yourselves."
Hiding his disappointment, my husband asked if she could let him have some candles, which he thought were sold in boxes. Happy to be able to do something, the woman produced birthday candles. 
"What colour would you like your candles?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Would you like blue or pink?"
"I'm not fussy", my husband said magnanimously. "Give me any colour you have."
"I'm afraid you don't understand, sir", the woman replied patiently. "Is the party for a boy or a girl?"

Comprehension dawned, and my husband nervously fingered his wallet. "Well, I suppose you might say it's for a boy", he ventured, hopeful of hiding the boy's identity. 
"I see. In that case you'll be wanting blue candles. Now tell me, how old would this boy be?"
Confession was never like this, my husband thought desperately, but since she kept looking inquiringly at him, he stammered, "F-forty-four."
She looked across at his venerable bald patch and he could see her putting two and two together.
"I see," she commented pleasantly, and to her undying credit she kept as straight a face as the salesman did the day my mother asked him for pants with long sleeves. But my husband did not get over his embarrassment.

"I'll never set foot in that shop again", he vowed.
"As for your daughter, from now on she'll just have to put up with our inadequacies and take us as we are. It's not too soon for her to find out you just can't teach an old dog new tricks."