Remembering

* nothing to do with the post, the visuals just amused me 


I think I can be forgiven repeating a good story from the Ukrainian Village days yesterday.
I had little to say and no news to speak of.
Repeating a good story reminds me of being a child, when, my sister Janet and I would push for my grandmother to recount stories of daring do from her wartime years.
Of course we had heard them all before.
Many many times before…….
The embellished stories of getting trapped in a blackout on the sixth story of a warehouse only inches from an open pulley door and with rats running over her feel….of running for the shelter as the bombers were over and for dressing my uncle Jim in a chenille curtain and high heels as they were being evacuated from their bombed house on Louisa Street, Liverpool
We knew them all and delighted in how they were delivered, with a wry smile over the ironing board or sat behind the colander being filled with shelled peas 
I was only thinking of my grandmother’s storytelling yesterday when taking the dogs out for a walk
We were passed by a skinny man in Lycra out jogging and a phrase my grandmother other used suddenly popped into my head like an exploding firework , 
….fifty years after I first heard it

“ The muscles on his scrawny arms stuck out like sparrows’ Knees!” 


26 comments:

  1. Some stories are worth hearing again and again like our favourite songs.

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  2. My Dad used to say, "He has muscles like knots in cotton." Or another couple of favourites - "A face only a mother could love." and "He gets his shoes from Cammell Lairds." Thanks for the memories. xx

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    1. A face only a mother could love was one of my mothers

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  3. My mum would catch my eye and say quietly as a dapper man walked by"who got him ready"-On seeing a rather overmade up tarty looking lady"all fur coat and no drawers"-commenting on me smoking"fag ash Lil" x

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  4. When my dad was 3 he was very ill,the doctor of the village was drunk as usual so his relatives(no parents as they had died)and the people of the village carried him across the hills on a donkey to Rome x

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  5. Old embellished family stories are the BEST! In my family, the most entertaining ones all involved donnybrooks of some description or another where people got the crap beat out of them. Two by fours and/or lead pipes usually featured prominently. Occasionally the RCMP were called. I should do a blog post on them some day.

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    1. Oh, and another story that involved stuffing horse shit in someone's mouth! Gosh, all this makes my extended family sound like a bunch of criminals, doesn't it? To quote Monty Python on the Dinsdale Twins -- "They were a cheery lot! Cheery, and violent."

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    2. I meant the Piranha Brothers, of course, Doug and Dinsdale.

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  6. My mum is a story teller. Dad will take his stories to the grave

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  7. Our family retells the WWII adventure of Papa the Merchant Marine on the Murmansk Run, encountering the North Atlantic in winter, an English plane, Finnish soldiers on skis, a German tank in a Russian pit -- and his crew celebrating an ice-bound Christmas, singing "A Mighty Fortress is Our God" in German, for they were German Americans and they made it home because the captain had served on U-boats in WWI. Mum waited a year to learn if she was a widow. They were the Greatest Generation.

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  8. I love these sayings and a family embellished story! Such pleasure in the repetition too. They add spice and fun to life. Wish I had a good one to add.

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  9. veg artist9:05 am

    As a small child I spent a great deal of time with elderly relatives and soon learnt the knack of getting them to tell me a story, just so that it passed the time. Now I realise that I know a lot about how they grew up and what they lived through. Fascinating lives.

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  10. A grandmother who entertained with stories (and not from the bible), what wonderful memories!

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  11. My dad and his brothers were little during the war here in NZ. Grandad was a policeman who bought some GIs home for Christmas lunch. They bought some chocolate to share. Uncle Tom, who was 5 found it and scoffed all 3 blocks behind the couch. He was sick as a dog for 2 days after.

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  12. We used to gather at Nan's knee to hear her tell the story of the Edwards Millions which her grannie supposedly had a claim to. Imagine my shock when I heard the same story on the tv programme Surprise, Surprise.

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  13. Ah yes - they pictured greatly in my mother's stories too.

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  14. I love to listen to old stories. The illustration caused me to think 'Turkey Trot' and laugh out loud. A favorite story was about my great grandfather. He was playing in the river, and suddenly there were oranges floating down the river, hundreds of them. They'd never seen an orange in their lives but were intrigued enough to collect as many as they could. Imagine their delight at discovering they were a real treat. A train had crashed upriver and the oranges had spilled out. The look on a elderly face retelling these old stories is really quite magical, I think.

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  15. I never heard all the juicy bits from my Godmother and aunts-but the local Priest had assistance with more than his laundry in a certain hilltop village in Italia x

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    1. How is a smutty story relevant to John's post?

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  16. I was fortunate to have all four grandparents and one great grandmother live until I was in my late teens. My great grandmother told of her father being late for the train running after it and jumping on as it pulled out of the station in Swansea

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  17. I used to love hearing stories over and over from my Mum, and if I could persuade her to sit and talk to us I would say' tell us about the olden days'. Now looking back I realise she would only have been around 25-26 ... lol.

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  18. Remove me if required John-there were very fine paintings on my dads family home bedroom ceilings-painted they said by a famous man who stayed in their house-does seem odd x

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  19. This has got me thinking. I am trying to remember some of the old family stories and I don't think I have many. Now I am wondering about that...

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  20. My mother has some great wartime stories. Precious memories x

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  21. When growing up I was lucky enough to have my British grandparents live next door,some of her favourite sayings were.."a little bit of what you fancy never hurt anyone" ....."she's no better than she should be " about someone with questionable reputation....."they don't pay my rent" referring to people who she did not care for their opinions. My favourite which I think shows her nature, was ..." it's the good girls who usually get caught" said about unmarried pregnancies.
    I was so happy to have both kind loving people in my life as my Mum was busy with my 3 younger brothers and a part time job.

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