My grandmother, Sarah Agnes, was a feisty character.
During the war, (that’s WWII) she bought up houses in London when they were going cheap because of the bombings.
She was a plain cook who, when preparing vegetables as a scullery maid in the kitchen of a fancy hotel, cut all the tops off the asparagus…
and threw them away!
Her husband’s books were packed up and put in the cellar because they messed up the look of a room. She later burned the lot to accommodate a coal delivery.
With a savvy business head on her shoulders she ran a successful boarding house in a comfortable Victorian
near Clapham Common and provided her guests with,
“Bed, breakfast… and evening meal…”
She chided my great Aunt around the corner for giving her lodgers a hot drink with biscuits and cheese before going to bed,
“They talk to each other,” she said, “and will start expecting me to add a light supper…”
She loved a drink down the pub, usually Guinness or a nip of good whisky,
She joined in the sing-a-long and as the evening progressed the dancing began and ‘knees up mother Brown’ could be heard up and down the street.
If there was a party you could rest assured Sarah was in the thick of it.
Once she was bound over to keep the peace for speaking her mind to a neighbor in her not so soft Geordie voice,
“I’d do it again,” she said, “that woman deserved a good scolding!”
Her heart was solid gold, during the war, ration books in hand the queue for meat long, she turned to the woman behind her and said,
“Cheer up love, it may never happen…” to which the woman replied, “It already has…” she and her couple of mites were homeless, their house had been bombed the night before,
“Come home with me,” Sarah said, “I’ve got an empty room.”
My mother had to sleep in the bathroom on the wooden board covering the tub.
Sarah Agnes had quick-as-a-flash reflexes,
She could catch flies!
Daughts claimed to have caught a fly during ballet class…
You couldn’t do better than take after Great Grandmother Sarah,
Daughts already holds her name!
I wonder what else will rise to the surface of the gene pool?
Are you as amazed as me at the traits you and yours have from relatives we’ve never met?
Well hello there! My name is Vivienne McNeny.
I am an empty nester exploring life as a Boomer…you could say I'm happily Boomering along!
As a homeschooling Mum I have finally quit the job of role model and mentor to my four children. I do what I want to do, eat when I feel like it, enjoy life with my blue eyed cowboy and clean my house once a month or so whether it needs it or not!
In true English form I write about the emergence of my true identity now that I can no longer hide behind my children as their Mum.
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