Living Between the Lines
A wry look at family life
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Smile please!
I was sorting out some old photograph albums recently and they brought home just how precious photographs used to be. The sepia ones, the black and white ones and the first to be taken in colour. A Kodak Box Brownie, was still the order of the day in the fifties and sixties. Do you recall the days when you’d buy a roll of film and wait for the right moment to use each frame? No use wasting any frames as the film was quite expensive to develop. I don’t know about others, but I would keep the last, unfinished roll of film from one holiday to the next. I’d often…
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Wait! The writer in me is trying to get out…
The post that isn’t a post… Today I am determined to post something on my blog. I have been determined to post something, anything, every day for the past week. Determination is not all it is cracked up to be and can be easily diverted I have found. Hence, I sit at my keyboard and begin to type only to find myself writing something else entirely. I am very aware of the need to be writing stories and this need seems to be interfering with my ability to update this blog with anything noteworthy. What is the problem? No inspiration? No, I think it is lack of Focus. My head…
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I Meant to Say
There are some things I wish I had said but didn’t, some things I did say but wish I hadn’t. I don’t suppose any of us get it right all the time. Indeed, what would we do if given a second chance to say what we had wanted to say all along? Would we take it? Would it change things for the better? I dare not guess but, just to set the record straight, here are a few of the things I would like to say if I had my time again… As a school girl: To my Irish, English teacher, *Sister Marguerite, who came across to where I…
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Are you being served?
Self service is not always what it is cracked up to be. Take yesterday morning for instance. On the way to visit my new grandson and his parents, Zoe and I stopped at ‘Marks and Spencer’ to pick up a few supplies for lunch. Being just off the motorway, M&S would be a quick and easy place to stop we reasoned. We gathered what we needed in record time. We loaded the goods into our basket and headed for the check-out. “We may as well go through self-serve,” Zoe observed. I was, it has to be said, dubious. My experience of these ‘self-serve’ checkouts has never been good. I normally pick…
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He is here!
Eleven days late but perfect in every way, our new little grandson has finally arrived.
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In the blink of an eye…
I was thinking the other day, how fast time goes. Now, when my mind moves in this particular direction, it normally flies ahead showing me how little time we have left. I then take a backward look and pull myself up sharply telling myself to ‘stop right there, enjoy today’, there would be no point to life if we did not stop to experience it. The far wiser me, knows that we truly do arrive everywhere in a blink of an eye. When my first daughter was born, I remember gazing at her tiny form and wondering at the fact that one day she would be eighteen, I would be…
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Gas-tri-onics
(Written April 1st) Now I know it is April Fool’s Day but really – can this be right? It is definitely NOT ‘A Gas’. You may recall that we had a lot of trouble with our central heating boiler last December and again after Christmas but you may not know that the problems dragged on well into January when British Gas decided to flush the entire system. This didn’t happen immediately of course because they cancelled the appointment twice. February dawned before an engineer finally arrived to do the job. After being without heating for so many weeks we were ecstatic when the boiler burst into life even if it had taken an…
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The Final Countdown
The final instalment from memories of my lone trip to California in 1997 Standing on The Golden Gate Bridge, we must present an odd sight by anyone’s standards. I am trying not to look like a typical tourist but am failing miserably as I point the camera and exclaim at the views. My friend clutches the straw hat to her head in an act of desperation, lest the wind snatch it from her and send it flying across the bay. Her skirts have given up and billow in the wind. Annie is wearing full make-up and high heels, making her tower head and shoulders above me. I feel very under…
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Making Assumptions
Jumping to conclusions, making assumptions – all can be embarrassing. We all do it to some extent I am sure. The other morning I was in a well-known Chemist’s in town with a colleague who is also a good friend. Paying for a small number of items I then waited for my friend to pay for hers. This particular well-known store has a points card system. My friend had lost hers and suggested she put the points on mine. (I was happy to oblige). The young sales girl smiled and took my card, saying to my friend, “You are going to put it on your mum’s card yeah?” My response was…
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The Final Countdown
The final instalment of my Californian Memories will be published next week. Apologies if anyone has received advanced notification – a slight technical hitch occurred with the scheduling.
