No More Stories...: There was a time... - Lung Conditions C...

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No More Stories...

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10 years ago•12 Replies

There was a time not so long ago, when sitting in a waiting room chatting to the person sitting next to me, gave enough stories to fill a book and more besides...tales of childbirth out in a potato field...the sickly calf brought into the cottage to be hand fed...walking five miles without benefit of a breakfast to be churched at Mass after the birth of a baby...

Stories of donkeys going home on their own when their owners were drunk...getting married, only to see your new husband once a year from then on, when he returned from his work on a building site in England...he'd leave, after the two weeks holidays were up...leaving you pregnant again with a farm to run.

Tales of the pig killing time in early Autumn when the bladder was blown up and used as a football by the boys...

Whitewashing the cottage rooms and the sheds and barns in Spring...lighting a candle to be placed on the windowsill to guide the Holy Family at Christmas...taking the pilgrimage to Crough Patrick ...sending out the youngest child to find a new laid egg for the village Priest...

The midwife arriving on her black tricycle while the children were sent out to play and the Father was in the 'pub...

Your husband meeting a lorry driver in the 'pub toilets...paying out five shillings for packets of condoms the driver had bought 'up North'...smuggled down into the Republic he did a roaring trade...

Confessing at Mass to a horrified priest who gave you penance of ten Hail Mary's and hissed from behind the confessional curtain he'd be keeping an eye on your belly from now on...

Giving your eldest son to God...knowing your reward would be in Heaven.

Paying the local Doctor, who reeked of whiskey, a shilling to come out to your remote cottage to tend a sick Mother...he proscribing expensive medicines that didn't work and that you could barely afford...

Buying a length of hand-made lace from a Gipsy girl standing at your door who read your palm and then stole the clean sheets you'd hung on the bushes to dry...

Having baby siblings, who had died soon after birth, buried in the local cillin in the dead of night by the Father and the Uncle...

All these examples and many more are the stories people have told me while I've waited in waiting rooms...waiting for x-rays or blood tests...waiting to see Doctors...waiting for the Social Welfare person...

One would lean across and ask how long are we here...and I'd reply and say I've come home...then another would join in and ask if we had Asses...and I'd answer we do so...then another would say...do you mind the time that Paddy's Ass would come home and leave Himself in the 'pub? The stories grew from simple beginnings...from tales heard from Great Grandfathers to stories of their own...schooldays, with a baked potato in the pocket for the dinner...the tribulations of growing up with a Father away for the work...the pure joy of Fair Days and the fishing for Trout...

I still need to sit in waiting rooms...but now everyone has their nose firmly glued to a gadget of some sort or another...they're playing games I suppose or perhaps they're trawling the internet or putting updates on Facebook...I no longer have conversations with complete strangers about intimate details of their lives...I no longer need to sigh when one of us is called into to see the main man...wishing I could have had just five minutes longer to listen to the tales of going to school in the 'Thirties...

They have to have their names called twice now because they have things in their ears and cannot hear and they look up, vaguely surprised away from killing mutants in some on-line game...very few now lean towards me in a conspiratorial fashion and ask how many acres do we have and do we own any Asses...women no longer confide in hushed whispers about the sheer joy of finding out about condoms to prevent yet another baby...they are sending messages on their I-Phones...absorbed in another world.

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12 Replies

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redted10 years ago

How life has changed,and not for the better I think in many ways our lives are lonely,we not longer chat over garden walls,or even pass the time of day,very sad.

10 years ago

Phew I was panicking for a minute there vasthi thinking you were not going to write us any more of your wonderful stories. Thank goodness it wasn't that. Lovely story as usual.

I remember my local pub back in the 80's which was full of old East End people and the amazing tales they had to tell. Such as when one of them when a boy. they 'encouraged' the family dog to run into the butchers and steal a string of sausages coz they didn't have enough food to feed the family.

The old geezer who sharpened my darts the old fashioned way with guiness and sandpaper, to when I changed from bought fags to rollies, and being indundated with rollie lore such as the woman who could roll with one hand, to how to roll when you are driving. It was brilliant. I am richer for knowing these great people and hearing their life stories of a different time and age.

Don't forget though that we are all getting older and maybe it's our turn to pass the old stories on? xx

Azure_Sky• in reply to10 years ago

You have a point there cough, My grandchildren and great grandchildren ask me questions. They are amazed to hear about living without electricity. having a privy down the garden, water from a well. No running water or bathrooms.

I can remember the old black ranges. Brass fenders. Flat irons, they boy on a bike delivering groceries. People taking their Christmas cakes to the baker to be cooked. Primus stoves, Tilley lamps, oilcloths on tables.

I knew people who had never been further than the nearest town. The strict rules about never hanging out washing on a Sunday. #water being boiled in a copper heated by a fire underneath.

When cars were few and far between. Sit up and beg bicycles. My grandfather could remember the first cars, when a man with a red flag had to walk in front. Telephone boxes where you pressed button A and could talk as long as you liked. When the operator put your calls through.

Photogeek• in reply toAzure_Sky10 years ago

Hi Azure Sky that is really reminding me of those awful

Phones with Press Button A and they always seemed to

Need more money than you had. Thank goodness for progress.

Ah the Primus that by late Mother used to bring on picnics

To the beach. Ah memories.

H x

• in reply toAzure_Sky10 years ago

Well I don't go back quite that far AS But I do remember the old brownie cameras, the tape recorders with reels and how excited we were to get one, the old twin tub washing machines, radiograms, our first tv back in the late 50's.

My mum used to tell us stories about her RAF days during the war and seeing Douglas Bader (she said he was a horrible man, arrogant and sexist), and when as a child living in Yorkshire she would wake at dawn and listen to the workers going to work in the mills tramping over the cobblestone streets. That was one of her earliest memories.

My father would tell us about his very strange aunts and uncles, one of whom never worked and spent his life tramping the streets of Manchester and sitting in the chair tapping his foot on the floor and wearing out the carpet in that place - they just used to patch it up. He was looked after in his later years by his sister, a very forceful woman who had been a head mistress. She apparently hated him but did her duty. I remember as a very young child visiting them, she scared the life out of me and he would just sit there muttering ice lollies are just water and tapping his stick on the floor. I was always glad to escape!

My mum said my fathers parents wanted a girl (he was the only child) and used to dress him in girls clothing when very young. That could expain a lot My grandfather was very Victorian and very much the man of the house. He was a salesman and I just remember his big black car and how excited we were to travel in it (he died when I was 7)though can't remember any more than that.

Memories... x

Towse195010 years ago

Spot on that was truly wonderful..thank you for sharing and making me smile this morning! Audrey, Jersey

Jolyn10 years ago

Very true Vashti...times move on...sometimes for the better and sometimes not x

sassy5910 years ago

The price of technology eh vashti. Not always worth paying. xxx

Bernardbreather10 years ago

We do tend to forget the stifling insularities of those old days. The new insularities are not as stifling, but yes, strangely lonely.

Offcut10 years ago

You got me all shook up as I thought you were packing up your joyful blogs?

You are so right I live in a small town who's early life was in the mining arena, now no longer the industry that kept it vibrant. The young ones do have the heads in their information input device's. But the older ones still crave the community chat about all sorts of things that never seem to have a path but are all of interest?

Be Well

Nikkers10 years ago

Spot on as usual Vashti. I think people look deformed all walking around with their hand stuck to their ear! lol. Give me a good old natter any day. You can't beat memories. Thank you for that lovely trip. XX

coughleigh10 years ago

great as usual Vashti.Knikkers you made me smile.I am sure my grandaughters phone grows out of her ears.Cough yes I to grew up in London but mine was much older than yours ,but what a fabulous city.My sister and brother in Law ran pubs for years and I remember seeing t he kray twins s lot there.I also had old Dublin so I had yhe besy of both worlds.I wish we all lived closer I eould love to meet up eith you all ,esspecially those who have unkowingly helped me with their advise to others .Have a peaceful night. mags xx

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