I fell asleep at teatime and dreamed a dream fired by a conversation with my elder sister today .
I “woke” and my grandmother was sitting quietly in the arm chair next to the fire. Finlay on her lap
The fire was reflected in her glasses and I could smell cold cream and fairy hand soap.
She was smiling and had a white cardigan on
I could even see the handkerchief she had suddenly pushed up one sleeve
Finlay smiled too
My grandfather was asleep on the couch next to me in his shirt and tie, I could smell tobacco
Winnie snoring gently next to him and across the room my aunt Dena waved gently and Albert swished a tail in his normal bad tempered way from the back of her chair.
Meg, and Willian and Dorothy lay in front of a fire I could feel from my dream and I could hear my sisters laughing from the kitchen though I couldn’t see them
When I woke , I could only see Roger in the arm chair
And all I could smell was the spiced Christmas candle given to me from a neighbour
And I suddenly felt I had missed something all rather special
I’ve know the Irish powerhouse Gráinne and Liverpudlian Hillary almost as long as I have Nu, though have seen them and their husbands more sporadically than I have my best friend. Today I remedied that by driving over to Anglesey to catch up with them all, including extended family and Nu’s husband Jim at a beautiful Georgian farmhouse just outside Beaumaris.
It was lovely.
Of course the decibel count was through the roof, but moments after sitting down at their dinner table set for 11, I was blissfully transported to back 1989 when young physiotherapists met young nurses at the Irish pubs of Sheffield .
I sat and listened to the banter and shouting and singing and warmth like a thirsty man would look at a pint of ice cold lager.
Mrs Trellis called around yesterday with her erect bobble hat very evident .
She brought me a small golden alpine looking house which lit up ( in part) which was incredibly sweet of her.
She’s spending Christmas Day with a great niece and plans to re home another whippet in the spring.
I gave her a fat robin to sit under her Christmas Tree which pleased her enough to clap her hands gayly
“ God bless you!” She said as she left…and I suddenly felt as though I had been visited by one of life’s real survivors, which was nice.
Around teatime Trendy Carol called by . She was wearing something festive in green and red ( with a touch of green glitter) she delivered a bottle of Bombay Sapphire ( with massive bow,) as well as matching Christmas Jumpers for Mary & Roger. I promised they would wear them tomorrow as I’m taking them both to work with me on Christmas Day
Yesterday evening I met my sister Janet and went to the cinema to see the horror thriller The Housemaid which was a passably shite drama if you like people pulling their teeth out
I got home around 11pm so missed a plate of Spritzkuchen sat on the kitchen wall. Now generally a semi retired nurse doesn’t recognise Spritzkuchen When he sees them but when I went outside this morning to see fifteen rings of glazed dough on a plate covered in rainwater and cling film with the blurred hand written note of apology and explaination from my German friend, I was sort of pleased . They tasted like shite ….which made me smile even more
But it is Christmas !
This morning I picked up 6 coffees from MacDonalds and went to meet my family in Prestatyn for coffee and cake. Now I love my eldest sister Ann dearly , but she does make crap coffee! ( hence the takeaway )
We shared gifts and cards, as I’m working all day tomorrow and when I got home some more gifts had piled up on the kitchen wall, before the postman arrived just with enough cards to fill the gap in my living room garland…..what fun
I’ve got some nice food for later, and have lit the fire….
This is my official blog Christmas Card. For those that don’t know , this is Finlay my very first Welsh Terrier.
Unlike Roger he was bright.
Unlike William he was selfish
And unlike Mary and Meg he was lazy, and cowardly but in a good way.
He was the first dog to both capture and tear my heart into pieces, and he started my love affair with a breed which is now rare, and remains the oldest in the British Isles.
I remember taking this photo 21 years ago.
Finlay was only four years old and he was asleep just before Xmas Eve in 2005
He slept through the silence of positioning the Prof’s Christmas Santa
And. Didn’t notice it as he was fast asleep, warmed by the coal fire
I remember thinking of how lucky I was that evening . My husband was asleep in his arm chair with a bad tempered Scottie called Maddie at his feet. Finlay was snoring lightly on his sofa and old Joan the cat was curled up by the fire.
The Christmas Tree was lit and it really felt like Christmas .
Like it does today
So Happy Christmas my dear friends
Happy Christmas …..I will leave you with this lovely piece above from my lovely lisping Spanish choir…it’s called Nocturn …….I was in the audience for this !
My friend Della from the village, came with me to the carol service in Llanasa tonight. Llanasa is a picture post village located a mile and a half Northeast of Trelawnyd and its Norman church remains open, unlike our own . Della and I both miss the Trelawnyd service, with Church Warden Christine Davis proudly carrying on the peanut sized baby Jesus.as Gaynor the mad Organist looked on with pouting lips and a wry look, and so we went tonight which was sweet.
One of the most moving readings came from Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. It tells of the time poor siblings Francie and Neeley Nolan take part in a local tradition where Christmas Trees were given away to the poor, but only after they were caught after being thrown by a fierce tree seller.
The Christmas Tree is a metaphor for hope and I was rather pleasantly surprised to see it quoted tonight.
Earlier today my friend Colin dropped in unexpectedly bearing gifts of scotch eggs and a Christmas card, which was lovely and the treats continued as the Cameron’s ( one of my favourite of village families) dropped off a family made wreath at the kitchen wall……
It’s feeling rather festive today all told , and the garland of Christmas cards just under the living room ceiling is almost complete.
When I was a child my uncle Jim divorced his wife and went to live with a woman from South Yorkshire ! The woman was twenty five years (?) his junior and hailed from a family that was colourfully working class and I remember so vividly just how shamed my grandparents felt at the news as they talked in hushed tones and cried together in the privacy of their bedroom.
Yesterday that woman, my aunt Dena from South Yorkshire died . Peacefully in a local hospice
I still love my grandparents so very much and it's nearly four decades after they died, but I know that they could not have coped with me being gay, not in the early 1980s. They thought and were shamed by things that shamed and upset people from another era........we don't live in that world anymore .
Having said this, my grandparents eventually came around to my Uncle's new life, much younger wife and bonny baby grandson. They did this because my new aunt was and is a decent woman with a warm personality. My cousin was a delightful little boy and my Uncle was loved so very much. Loving him, for them, finally out weighed any prejudice they felt.
I would have liked to have come out to my grandparents. I would have liked to have come out to my mother and father too, but it was never to be and it was never the right time........ c'est la vie as they say in Frenchland.......
I did come out to my Aunt Dena who wrote to me often, enquiring about my life, loves and news.
She sent me a gift when I got married, a vase which sits on my bathroom window ledge
When I told Auntie Gladys that The Prof was my partner ( before we all met up for one of my first Flower Show Meetings) I was acutely aware that in some small way I was "re-living" a moment I wanted so much to have had with the matriarchs of my old family all now deceased . It wasn't rocket science....in homespun psychology terms! I said the words that I really didn't have to say and waited with winced eyes for the reaction. Gladys was 86 back then. "Will he be coming to the meeting too? " She asked me, her eyes were bright and interested " I don't think it's his cup of tea" I told her " Right O " she said busying herself with a tea towel " " I'll wrap up some scones for him to have later"
And she left him scones, tied in a bag to our front door for the next ten years!
A memory flashed into consciousness after a patient watched a film full of bonnets and tailcoats.
Christmas Week 2004. I was at work at the Spinal Injury Unit in Sheffield’s Northern General Hospital . My husband was off work and had gone for a riding lesson, so had strode onto the ward in riding boots and tight fitting jodhpurs. He also was tall and often held himself with a slight imperious air, so when he asked for me, a wisecracking Yorkshire nurse called Alexa scurried from the nurses station into the ward round multi disciplinary meeting where I was busy with the consultants and psychologist and physios and hissed at me
“ There’s a Mr Darcy to see you John” she shared rather breathlessly “His breeches are magnificent !”
Auntie Glad’s daughter emailed me today wanting Village Elder Islwyn’s address. She wanted to thank him for the work he had organised for some of her family graves which had been recently damaged during the recent storms “ What a hero he is to me. He's 75 and still physically working. His knowledge of who's who there was quite entertaining!” She wrote with clear affection. It’s nice that Islwyn is being celebrated…………
Jackson’s Shop and Nursery lies a stone’s throw east of the village. Every year they deliver a small plant to every house in the Trelawnyd which is a lovely gesture and mine turned up today
How sweet…….
Animal Helper Pat had a stroke last week. She told me this troublesome news herself, only this afternoon , after delivering a still warm home baked bara brith loaf wrapped in silver paper with an accompanying Christmas card. Apparantly she had been hospitalised for four days and was somewhat upset in missing the village show,
“Where are you off to now ?” I asked her
“ I’m off the deliver Christmas Cards “ she said brightly
“In between nursing jobs, I labelled some tins of gin and tonic for the day staff and wrapped a few gifts of my own.it was then I remembered Mrs Trellis.
On the way to work I spied her on London road her head down against the cold dark wind. Her bobble hat sticking out defiantly ahead of her
She was heading for the cottage
I stopped the car and she dropped a gift, through the window and onto the passenger seat with all of the aseptic technique remembered by the retired midwife .
The gift was wrapped a green felt and was tied with garden twine fashioned into a bow
“ You always giggled at Christine Davis bringing in the baby Jesus” she said in way of explanation
And as I drove away I remembered all too clearly being in fits of giggles when Rector Robert commanded rather theatrically for Christine the Church Warden to “ Bring In The Baby Jesus !”
The small figure , being transported in an upturned palm towards the nativity scene laid out before the pulpit.
The Christmas Eve carol service with nativity was an old tradition I always went to in Trelawnyd.
Last night the Church looked old and cold and lonely.
As did Mrs Trellis
and I wished I would have thanked her more when I finally got around to opening her gift from my place behind the nurses station .
For wrapped in tissue paper inside the green felt was a rather naive but charming Baby Jesus alongside a plump and cheerful Virgin Mary, splendid in blue.”
It’s not been all Trelawnyd Productions this week.
I’ve managed to fit in Chic Eleanor for brunch and another friend for breakfast at Bryn William’s.
Today after a couple of hours sleep another friend and I are off the the Lowery in Manchester to see the camp as Christmas Unfortunate Ursula- The Untold story of Ursula the sea witch
Well,I’ve said it this morning and I will say it again, that Linda sets the tone when it comes to teamwork. She is the voice of optimism and of sanity and of order, and this morning she rang me to express just how happy she was that the show was a success. Linda is an old hand at smoothing the waters when it comes to teams, but in this case , last night she acknowledged that there were no egos in the production, no personal dramas, just “people getting on with the jobs they needed to do.
“ That is down to you, you set the tone” I told her and I meant it.
A lot of people worked together well last night, and it may sound corny, but even the slightly cynical Jason was caught up in the bon Vivre of the night, likening it a film script. Director Kira was beaming
And the two readings one by Filapina Nina ( a tribute to her love for wife Chelsea ) and the other by Linda ( A Child’s Christmas in Wales) were incredibly moving.
The hall was packed, its numbers swelled by the acts and the Gwaenysgor Community Choir, who jumped into the show, filling a major gap in the second half. They closed the show with a bang
My job, was taking tickets and manning the main entrance, which proved to be rather busy given the number of vapers, a drunk from outside who wanted a free admittance and a rather assertive woman who had been blocked in the car park by an audience member. I managed to watch most of the acts but as Imogen finished her Anastasia piece, a messenger note flitted over my iPad screen.
It was from my cousin Mathew ( my mother’s brother’s son) who said that he was in Rotherham Hospice with his mother Dena, my aunt, and that she had just opened the Christmas Card I had sent her.
I am the only one of the my family to keep in touch with her and although I hadn’t seen her for a decade, this news literally took the wind out of my sails,
So I sat quietly, for a bit in the quiet , cold foyer of the Memorial Hall,
And folded my hands into my lap,
And thought of my aunt
As the applause grew and the acts sang their best….
We opened the doors at 6.30 pm and the hall was packed to capacity by 6.50. It was a grand night , which I shall share properly tomorrow.
Velvet Voiced Linda almost stole the show with her spirited A child’s Christmas In Wales by Dylan Thomas and I loved Nina’s “ A Filipina In Trelawnyd “ which had the same vibe
But it was the music won the night, The Folk group Cecryn my dear Gwaenysgor Choir, Chelsea Cameron , ten year old Imogen .all were amazing, and I watched it all from my fire exit duty position as the team produced a night of fun and community .
Much love to the eclectic committee….we made 1000£ in 2 hours
The Hall is prepared , the Trelawnyd Productions committee are shit hot when preparation is concerned. The lighting is up and running thanks to Velvet Voiced Linda’s son in law and Village Leader Ian . Pa Manley is on the lights . Affable Despot Jason and Will are manning the stage with Dave and director Kira.
We have a compare, sorted. All the acts have been sound checked, and powerhouse brummie local counsellor Gina is on raffle sales with Sandra C. The ice creams have been delivered. The health and safety stewards nominated, I’m on the door and local actor and singer Philip Hughes is playing the piano before we start .
Filipina Nina, who is new to the village and who is reading her own little reading A Filipina in Trelawnyd hugged us in excitement “ I feel welcomed” she said sweetly
And ten year old Imogen is singing this lovely song in the second half
And just like a blood family , I don’t always see some of them that often ,
But our lives are intertwined by a commonality of history, and sociability and events and community ..
And I love that
Monday many of the villagers went to the Trelawnyd Community Association’s quiz held in the pub .
I met up with Affable Despot Jason , his wife Clare and daughter Liv
Liv was the wisecracking 8 year old I used to babysit who used to back comb William into a Tina Turner lookalike and who would make zombie cookies with me before smashing windfall apples with me for the pigs to eat in her new school shoes.
I haven’t seen her for an age,
Now she’s talking about university planning
At the quiz I told her that last year I bought a Lego Statue of Liberty and shared that I hadn’t made time to construct it
