Touching experience

silk

tactile book

I am apt to embarrass in the company of something tactile like sheepskin, fur, velvet  or silk. I have this terrible urge to reach out and feel it and it can lead to some odd exchanges....

I have been thinking about a comment made by a mother to a nine year old daughter about to be ensnared to fashion in a recent family comedy on television. She asked her if she wanted to be someone who spent all morning looking for tops. Now bearing in mind the script was written by two men and it was a dig at women who shop and the stereotype of a predilection for clothes, she had  a point. But is it just about buying clothes? What about that tactile experience that is wandering around racks of clothes sampling so many different textures, rolling it between finger and thumb, savouring its friction, its shininess, its depth, its sheerness. Well that is what I do when I get into a clothes shop. And probably why I can't resist a quick pat on the head of passing dogs too [love the ones with those soft ears!]  And then what about all those gorgeous tactile books now available to children? Perhaps it is us grown ups who get the most out of them? I had a go at making one once and had huge fun.

But it is not all positive. Some things make me squirm. The soft wallpaper they called Novamura that felt like living flesh...and I won't say what kind of flesh it reminded me of for fear of further embarrassment... [not that in its place that is unpleasant I hasten to add!] I know we are not all the same. My mother in law cannot bear anything furry because she hates feeling her hand disappear into it and I am not quite so happy about felt making though others devote their lives to it. Life is full of touching stories...

Family History

I began tracing my family history about 10 years ago before the days of all those fascinating programmes magically unearthing amazing links to historic figures in the past of celebrities - and of course much harder work than it appears too! Being the actual searcher and having the experience of handling the enormous paper registers at the family records office with its earnest and hushed atmosphere - is an unbeatable experience. I am glad too that I have had the experience of hand cranking the microfiche machine when I compare it with the infinitely faster online method. Still I am grateful to the internet for the new opportunities it has given us to track down more and more information about our ancestors and for the online community of relatives it reveals to us.

It can still be a fraught business and lead you up the wrong path. Having found wall to wall working class crafts people on both sides of my parents' family lines I was, for one nano second, interested to see the splindly words Lawyer written on a marriage certificate - only to realise it said "Steam Sawyer".(yet more woodworkers!)

Tracking down my grandmother took another wrong path initially. Not a very common combination of names and the same birth year turned up - unbeknownst to me - two candidates. I only spotted one and established a story in my head about how my grandmother had come from alkali labourer stock in the Preston area. Later in transpired that she came from the only middle class part of my family history. Her family, it seems, were in the luggage trade and were located in a wealthy part of central London. Here is my grandmother in her Edwardian hat in about 1915:

Blanche

Family group

There is a lot of interest in the census records. Over the years this 10 yearly audit added more fields of information but the sense of overcrowding, the age of the children already working, whole families engaged in one industry...the glove trade on the other side...and the mortality rates...fascinating stuff.

It was the sepia postcard photograph of this family group that set me off I suppose - given to me for safe keeping by my father but I think it is the lives of the working families that interest me the most. I try to imagine what kind of conditions a dyer might have endured in 1840s  Devon, or what it was like to be a female home worker making gloves. I have travelled to London and the west country in search of streets and houses to try and get a sense of my ancestors and visited their graves where I could to add to my knowledge and been greatly rewarded and frustrated in turn. I have enjoyed every minute of it though and almost wish I could start all over again!

The thrill of a guinea pig

Tales of the riverbank

What are your wild life thrills? For some it will be the sights of wild game or herds of wild elephants on safari. Not for me – it is the tiniest feral rodents and cavies that make my heart sing…I would rather catch a rare glimpse of a water rat amongst the reeds, or blink and almost miss a shrew dashing across a road than a hundred tigers. Likewise I have a soft spot for guinea pigs and though I would normally run a mile from anything that smacks of anthropomorphism I think my love of Johnny Morris’ Tales of the Riverbank on TV as a child must have been one of the determining factors.

 I actually went on to have guinea pigs as a child – sales must have gone though the roof after these programmes. And they were such characters. Here is my Dad who was definitely NOT at home with a cavy!

Dad and Candy the guinea pig

And when I say I would run a mile – giving human voices to animals doesn’t count…nothing logical about me!

I suppose for me the equivalent in countries I have visited with wildlife potential is the basking iguana or monitor lizard. And one magical half hour watching a two toed sloth come down from a tree on one of it fortnightly forays, not in a wild terrain but in our hotel grounds. I do like the idea that harmless wild animals can wander into our domestic areas. Despite the bad publicity the sight of urban foxes - is there anything else? - still cheers me up. A special day I recall was a snowy January in the centre of the city of Leicester. I had taken 15 minutes longer than usual to get to work due to the snow but the sight of the fox beautifully contrasted against the snow on the street corner more than made up for the unreasonable dressing down I got for being late!

Squirrel on our garden wall

Bizarrely I was in a bird hide the other day watching nuthatches and tits and a man with a VERY large spotter scope [or so I am reliably informed]  pointed to the undergrowth and said in a genuinely awed and hushed voice "It’s a squirrel….!” Perhaps he feels the same as me about our small animals…though I have to say I don’t quite stop in my tracks for squirrels these days with this little devil walking up and down our wall every ten minutes ..still a fantastic shot of a beautiful animal all the same.  

Telling histories

What would you choose to research the history of if you had the opportunity?

Before the days of computers and for my teaching course in the 1970's I decided to research my primary school. I imagine I could get most of what I needed on the internet now but it was such an exciting thing to do to seek out all the primary sources. The school had been built as a Board School in 1874 in response to the Education Act 1870 and was located in the middle of a common in Surrey. I found the old punishment book with its records of worrying sheep on the common - four strokes on the hand, or "dirty habits" or "prevarication". The school log played an important role in recording the changing curriculum, health issues, the changes during war time - digging for victory etc. I interviewed a retired caretaker who had been in post since the 1920s. I found the original map denoting the land to be used. Heady times!

map of land

timetable 1915

It was a very dilapidated building and we had a new one built which was ready for my final year at primary school. I once said to my Mum that the hamster had got out and that the teacher had said it had probably been eaten by the rats! The loos froze over every winter and were definitely to be avoided if at all possible at all times. But how compelling those memories are - memories of those rooms and the playgrounds - boys and girls - still abide. Sad that it was demolished and never used as a living building again but even though there is not a brick left of it on the common its 100 years of history is still very evident in the memories of people, in the archives and in the foundations it laid for current educational practice...and if I concentrate I can just see myself holding a skipping rope in that playground beyond the gate...

the school in the 1960s

A worry wart's solution

blue box for work worries

All my life I have been an agoniser. Trying to see things from every viewpoint. Not only does it create indecisiveness it also means lots of worry - night and day. Of course I have tried meditative exercises, focussing on breathing, all that palava. At night I have counted sheep, taken imaginary walks, recreated journeys - anything to keep unwanted thought from rising to the surface and swamping every waking - and sleeping -  moment.

basket for worries

red box

I should have realised sooner how helpful a visualising technique I was shown 20 years ago from Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) would be. Then I was trying to deal with cat allergy. I believe that  imagining a cage and putting, in my mind, a cat in it and closing the cage door has helped and I haven't had a problem since. I have started to apply that principle to three different worries recently. I have created imaginary boxes and baskets to put worries in. Take work. How easy it is to go over and over things in your precious non working time, nothing productive and the present passes you by while you are engrossed. For this I have a blue box. I imagine putting the worry in and shutting down the lid. I don't have to get as far as locking the box now and it has triggered me back to the present! Then onto worries about family. So many ways to get this broken record of thoughts taking over enjoyment of living the present...I have a basket for this - it seemed appropriate.This is a picnic hamper as it needs to be large and comes from memories of Andy Pandy of children's TV when I was a child. I have a third set of unwanted well trod thoughts...and this is a red box...getting crowded!! I have a friend who uses boxes too but he says they are so brim full there is no room left! For me they are bottomless so I will be alright.

There is one problem. In the middle of the night it is not quite so effective. The brain doesn't seem to respond to these triggers quite so well and things that at night make sense are complete gibberish when you examine them in the light of day. Still I am working on it. Ideas on a postcard...

Ice cream

The topic of ice cream is a rich seam to mine.

mini ice cream cone

My mother and her brother when children had the tantalising experience of watching their parents eat their way through their ice creams knowing that they were not allowed more than a teaspoon on the last inch of a cone -  they thought ice cream was bad for you. This of course was the generation that believed the idea that taking up smoking would ward off the influenza that hit the country at the end of the World War 1! My Grandmother even gave Mum her first cigarette as a teenager during a flood emergency - to calm her I suppose.

Ice creams in my childhood are associated with a broken arm when I was nine when I fell from a tree and was given two ice creams to eat on the way to casualty to stop me thinking about the pain!

Later I  had a lucky opportunity to join a school choir and go an their planned trip as compensation for a teacher accidentally squashing my finger flat in a partition during a school dinner time. The choir went to see Anne of Green Gables, the musical - my first ever experience of a live show. I came across the song about ice cream  with the clever rhyming - is anything more delectable than ice cream? Even the most respectable eat ice cream... I am still singing and still love musicals. Funny how things happen.

Anne of Green Gables poster c1965

Later at 11 at secondary school an ice cream van was allowed into our school playground at lunchtime and we could buy glorious cones with hundreds and thousands on them for two old pennies. The highlight of the whole day sometimes.

ice cream van

I had a dog who had a real penchant for ice cream. If she heard the van's chimes she would start to bark. Must have been something to do with the fact that she got that tiny cone of that sweet cold stuff whenever I succumbed. And I probably did quite a lot now I come to think of it...and now I have this van that has found a rich seam of its own right outside my house. Wait a minute while I relive all this and then grab my purse...

Swim Gym fun

I am so lucky to be in the only town in the UK with a Swim Gym. Three times a week we take a 25 minute walk to the Swim Gym. We have five individual pools, nicely warm, with an adjustable current that you can swim in or use weights or paddles to push against the water. A good 30 minute workout is followed by a  shower in a private bathroom to finish the visit off. A redecorate has made it extra enjoyable to visit!

The benefits are many - I came with a long term low back problem and if I keep going it almost disappears. My partner had shoulder problems and he has had similar positive results. We both enjoy not having to use a public pool and compete with the lane swimmers. We like the warmth of the pools and the additional ways you can exercise in water that the Swim Gym provides. Now that I have mastered the unique way of swimming I find it is the time to do my thinking. Swimming underwater which I do a lot - using snorkel and mask - is the best time though it always has an overlay of counting. It is amazing how the brain can manage to think and count at the same time. Counting can become a bit compulsive sometimes so that even when swimming in the sea I find myself inwardly chanting 1-2-3 and on.

Every time I go for my swim I worry how I would manage if I had to go back to my old ways before we discovered the Swim Gym. More counting then..? My blessings I suppose!