It's many years since we met

Luky and Little Guinea Pig

Luky 

IT'S BEEN MANY YEARS since I first wrote an article for a journal.

The day that issue came out ranks as a red letter day among my memories. The thrill of seeing my thought in print eclipsed all other events.

I read that article so many times that I've never wanted to look at it since. I kept it, as I've kept most of what I've had published in a scrapbook.

Every now and then my kids read from the book and say: "Was that me who did this or that, Mom? Shame, I must have been cute."

Marker

Although I won't read that first article again, I know the date it must have been written, because I remember mentioning that my eldest child, nicknamed Little Guinea Pig by the Matron of St Mary's maternity home in Springs, was about to embark on her first year at school and that I was looking forward to learning from her.

  Lourdes job out

Years after the first article was published, my eldest was just about to go to university. Although I had made arrangements for her to go to Lourdes to work there, she wasn't accepted when I wrote to the authorities that year, so I planned to take her there during university vacation instead.

The day I broke the sad news to her that she might be going to varsity, she burst into tears:

 "I'm tired to death of swotting. Why can't I give up studying once I've got my matric?"

 "Would you like to work in an office instead?"

 "Work in an office? I'd hate it!"

 "It'll be thanks to my working in an office if there's money to further your education. What about nursing? In-service training, six free uniforms and a pair of orthopaedic shoes every six months. I should be so lucky that a child of mine opted for a career that would be so easy on my purse."

 "I'm not kind enough to be a nurse."

 "Do you like working with figures? What about the bank?"

 "No."

 "We might be able to get you in at the library. Would you like that?"

"I like browsing in the library, not stamping books."

 "How about driving a bus?"

 "I don't somehow see myself doing that."

 "Listen, Fussy, you'll go to varsity and like it."

"It seems to me, Ma, that you're trying to get rid of your own frustrated desire to get a degree by forcing me to go instead of yourself."

It's true!

A remark of this nature, which would have outraged her Victorian father, which in fact she'd never have dared address to him, only had the effect of making me laugh helplessly, because it was only too true. I had spent a fortune on extra-mural courses, but when it came to writing exams I would drop a line to the registrar, signing myself Yours Unfaithfully and asking to have my examination entry cancelled.

Uncapped 

I had picked up a certain amount of knowledge that way - well, to be quite honest, all I learnt from those studies was just how much I still needed to learn. At that time I had become resigned to dying without the thrill of stepping slowly up to a dais and accepting a scroll which pronounced me, if not a spinster, at least a bachelor.

Yet I could already visualise sitting up there as proud as Punch as our children received their scrolls. Like the time my mother attended a drum major competition which my brother won. She burst out crying, and said to the lady beside her - a complete stranger - "that's my son. I feel so guilty now to recall how many times I shouted at him for breaking my broomsticks."

More to come

In that first article I mentioned that I was looking forward to all the things my eldest would be able to teach me, and teach me she did. In addition to her school subjects the sisters taught her to type, sew, play four instruments, paint and knit, as well as a host of other skills. At home I taught her to clean, wash, iron, cook, bake and mind the baby.

I looked forward to learning from her when she went to university.

Catherine Nicolette

I remember an argument all right, the vague remembrance of which my teenage memory had filed as mom being somewhat unreasonable. Reading over the transcript left me amused. I do remember not being enamoured at the thought of further study.

What mom didn't know was that I had an argument with my dad when when I was in Standard eight and wanted to leave before matriculation. I had heard of a job going at a shop at the end of the street. 

My youthful judgement did not extend to reading the fine print which was that it was a holiday job and for the duration of six weeks. 

No, all I saw was a wonderful job with a massive salary (I hadn't thought to enquire exactly what the amount was) which gave me an excuse to leave the hard work of school study. 

I would work for about five years, then retire a wealthy woman. 

Something now tells me I hadn't really understood about taxes, loans or a mortgage . . . 

No more study 

I digress. When I informed dad that I was leaving school (I hadn't even applied for the job - I merely expected I would get it) he tersely told me; "I've never beaten you every step to school before, but this time I will. You'll go to school, if I have to lock the school gates to keep you in. You'll pass your exams, get a good education, and we'll never discuss this again!" 

Impressed and slightly disgruntled, I gazed at him. He finished off saying, "I won't have you unable to look after yourself if you land in a marriage where your husband is unable to care for you, or if you have children and need to put food on the table and a roof over your head. 

I nearly starved in Britain because I had no papers with educational qualifications, and I never want that to happen to my children." 

Observing my expression, he said more gently, "You mightn't believe it now, but one day you'll thank me."

I didn't believe that day would ever come, but politely I bowed my head and exited the room with as much youthful dignity as I could muster. 

He could say what he liked, but I considered him Cruel Not To Let Me Take A Job.

Sheaf of bills 

Fast forward many years later. A motorist ploughed into the car I was driving. The fallout damage necessitated years of specialist treatment as well as extensive dental work. 

Some months what came in the door in earnings seemed to almost all go out on medical bills. If I had not been able to earn a salary due to proper education, what would I have done? 

As I paid a sheaf of bills one day, out of the blue Dad's words drifted into my mind - one day you'll thank me . . .

Thanks Dad. 

Photograph by Sean Whittle

Let's make the most of our peace

Luky and Elly

Luky
YEARS AGO WE HEARD A LOT ABOUT DÉTENTE, and we all hoped for peaceful solutions to be found for the ills that beset countries.
It's all very well to criticise leadership. People are always doing it, but how would you like to be in charge of a country? You cannot wipe out injustice of centuries in five minutes even though some seem to advise just that. There are many people all over the world who feel that the only way to combat injustice is by violence, but I disagree with them. No mother wants to raise her sons for cannon fodder.
  I was born in Amsterdam near the time our petrol harbour was set alight, and until I was about to celebrate my fifth birthday my country remained under occupation. My father did not go away to fight, so we were more fortunate than most of the other children in the street, yet I remember those years with dread and horror.
  Whenever you heard the older people talking they'd begin with the words: "Before the war . . ." and then tell some fairylike story. Little girls got dolls and little boys motor cars. You could buy some delicacy called lollipops that tasted so good you couldn't believe it. There was some delicious white stuff called sugar that you could put in your tea, and while we're on the subject, what's tea?
  One morning my sister woke me, brimming with excitement.
  "The war is over . . . peace has come."
  "Peace?" I asked unbelievingly.
  Like people who cannot understand that God had no beginning because all earthly creatures have  beginning, I never having known peace, could not believe in its existence. 
  My sister laughed. "Look outside!"
  I put my head out of the window and saw then the flags, red, white and blue, some orange in honour of our royal house. Where had they come from in that impoverished country where we had thought that every spare centimetre of material had been used to cover its inhabitants over the past five years, and the very trees in the street had been chopped down for firewood by fathers of families, moving out stealthily at night? 

  What a day that was.
  Small though I was, I still remember the joy on people's faces. And then I made my first mistake: So that, I thought, is what i was like before the war.
  Of course, things soon changed back to normal. People loved and hated, started moaning again about prices, the weather, the neighbours - you know how it is. But to me the absence of war remains a glorious miracle.
  The author Beverley Nichols once wrote that for him, one vital ingredient of happiness is the absence of pain. How well I understand him, because for me one vital ingredient of happiness is the absence of war.
  Some time ago a young man remarked: "What this world needs is a third world war." And although he was not speaking to me, I broke the rules and interrupted, saying: "Oh please don't say that, don't!" 
  He stared at me in amazement, for never having experienced war, he never could understand its horrors.
  Let's make the most of peace. Now is the time to make friends with each other, and rather than pointing out injustices ad nauseam, let us pray and work that they  may be wiped out peacefully.