Confessions of a serial mower - Peaches, no cream
My late paternal grandfather; the gentleman farmer, the rich man, the horseman, the very cruel man.
For all his airs and graces, his smart handmade suits, his car, his house on the hill, he was heartless and cold..
My grandmother, Anna, who died when I was about 11, had a horrible existence.
She was never allowed out alone.
She lived for Wednesdays.
This was the day he went to market. Whether it was the corn market or the animal auctions I cannot recall. Do you know what she dared to do then? She opened a tin peaches and ate them all! The sheer indulgence. Can you imagine? The highlight of your life, being a tin of peaches. Groceries, bread, meat, everything was delivered to the door and sometimes she managed to order a tin, without him checking the orders. She had no money of her own. He paid for and checked everything. They even had the first telephone in the village but he was the only one allowed to use it.
Who would she ring anyway? Her friends all drifted away, driven off by the fierceness of Grandfather. She became blind in her old age and grandfather put her in a home.
As far as I know, no one else had a say in the matter.
We all lived in fear of him.
She told my mum, and she in turn told me, that when she was pregnant with either my father or my aunt, she was never allowed to open the door to anyone. In case they saw “the state she had got herself in”!
Obviously they had no internal plumbing and the water was drawn from the pond.
They had a stone water filter that lived in the dairy I remember, which adjoined the scullery. The kitchen; and I can still smell that stale milk and damp stone smell, was a
brick floored, huge bare cold room with a copper in the corner and a range along one wall. It had a channel running in the floor through to the outside, for swilling out the spilt milk and floor washing water.
Romantic it was not.
My brother lives in this fine house now. With his designer kitchen, utility room, and
blackened range. The renovated water filter sits iconic in the corner. The brick floors shine with polish.
His version of events long gone are quite quite different from mine or my mothers’.
In this drinking water pond I was told a child drowned. Who she belonged to I never did discover. I knew never to go near the pond. I imagined if I did I would look down and see this little girl still lying there, staring up at me like some Hitchcock movie. I hope it was a rural myth to keep us away from the water. I fear it was not. No one stopped drinking the water anyway.
It is not a happy house, even now, for its finery. It never feels warm, it stands isolated
and alone. It affords some of the finest views in Suffolk. It still has the pond. Appearances can be so deceptive.
For all his airs and graces, his smart handmade suits, his car, his house on the hill, he was heartless and cold..
My grandmother, Anna, who died when I was about 11, had a horrible existence.
She was never allowed out alone.
She lived for Wednesdays.
This was the day he went to market. Whether it was the corn market or the animal auctions I cannot recall. Do you know what she dared to do then? She opened a tin peaches and ate them all! The sheer indulgence. Can you imagine? The highlight of your life, being a tin of peaches. Groceries, bread, meat, everything was delivered to the door and sometimes she managed to order a tin, without him checking the orders. She had no money of her own. He paid for and checked everything. They even had the first telephone in the village but he was the only one allowed to use it.
Who would she ring anyway? Her friends all drifted away, driven off by the fierceness of Grandfather. She became blind in her old age and grandfather put her in a home.
As far as I know, no one else had a say in the matter.
We all lived in fear of him.
She told my mum, and she in turn told me, that when she was pregnant with either my father or my aunt, she was never allowed to open the door to anyone. In case they saw “the state she had got herself in”!
Obviously they had no internal plumbing and the water was drawn from the pond.
They had a stone water filter that lived in the dairy I remember, which adjoined the scullery. The kitchen; and I can still smell that stale milk and damp stone smell, was a
brick floored, huge bare cold room with a copper in the corner and a range along one wall. It had a channel running in the floor through to the outside, for swilling out the spilt milk and floor washing water.
Romantic it was not.
My brother lives in this fine house now. With his designer kitchen, utility room, and
blackened range. The renovated water filter sits iconic in the corner. The brick floors shine with polish.
His version of events long gone are quite quite different from mine or my mothers’.
In this drinking water pond I was told a child drowned. Who she belonged to I never did discover. I knew never to go near the pond. I imagined if I did I would look down and see this little girl still lying there, staring up at me like some Hitchcock movie. I hope it was a rural myth to keep us away from the water. I fear it was not. No one stopped drinking the water anyway.
It is not a happy house, even now, for its finery. It never feels warm, it stands isolated
and alone. It affords some of the finest views in Suffolk. It still has the pond. Appearances can be so deceptive.
