Writing done in the Cotswolds, May 12-16, 2008

Our themes were:

Footprints
                         Memories
                                                   Photographs

We chose one piece for each person to go on this site.

More writing will appear as people send it in!

 NB Copyright remains with each writer

The people were:

Left to right: Samantha Watson, Lorraine Spindler, Chris Ellis, Ann Stringer, Delphine Roche-Gordon, Judy Perry (then Katie Fforde and Elizabeth Lindsay who were visiting us) Julia Nelson, Pat Price-Tomes, Isabel Morris. Chris Leonard took the photo. Elizabeth James and Sheila Bowen appear below, alongside Ruth and Samantha preparing leeks - lots of leeks!

Chris Ellis managed to write about all three of our themes in this piece

FOOTPRINTS, MEMORIES, PHOTOGRAPHS

As I threw back the curtains, bright sunshine bounded across the room, drenching it with light and pushing the contrast control off-scale. I turned away from the window, blinking like a startled owl in torchlight. The room was its usual homely disorder with the Sunday papers in various states of undress on the floor – the Money section still coyly buttoned up, the Review as tidy as a tart’s blouse. A quick shufty round should do it, so I gathered up the papers and dumped them in the rack, returned cushions to their intended positions and collected the coffee mugs, kneeing the coffee table parallel to the sofa as I headed for the kitchen. My eyes caught a shaft of the Eastern sun spearing a glass vase on the window sill; it cast a starburst spotlight on the TV, illuminating the chiffon film of dust on the screen. Dammit, I was going to have to find a duster and have a quick flick round. It’s funny, I rarely dust on dull days, you just can’t see the benefit.

I came back into the lounge, armed with a buttercup-yellow soft cloth and wearing an irritated grimace and wiped the dust from the dryly crackling screen – that should bring “Waking the Dead” into shaper focus tonight. Feeling I’d made a visible difference, I decided to extend my dusting to all the visible surfaces, just for the thrill of turning all the “matt” surfaces into “satin sheen”. I worked round the room and found myself humming “a spoonful of sugar”, a real Anthea Turner moment. Hmm, a bit worrying…

I left the book shelf till last, as its couple of shelves of bits and pieces were a bit of a fiddly area but eventually started dusting round things irritably. I picked up a picture frame and gave it a cursory wipe. As I put it back, I noticed some faded neat writing on the mount. – “April 1950, Sandown, IOW”. It was a photo of my parents on a seafront. Dad was wearing a suit and a broad smile, hair Brylcreamed down as ever. Mum also had on some sort of suit, cinched in at the waste, her feet neatly planted together and shod in what looked like lace up shoes. I’d had this photo several months, since we cleared Mum’s house but hadn’t really looked at it before. How strange – who wears a suit to walk along the prom? Nobody now but in 1950 I guess it could have been the norm. They both looked very happy, if slightly posed and unnatural. The date betrayed the event – they were married in April 1950 and honeymooned at Sandown on the Isle of Wight. They both looked so young, the parents of my childhood, not the old people they had become. This was them, before life and time had gobbled up their youth , their straight limbs - and faded their dark hair. Dad looked surprisingly like our son James, similar build, same shape head. But this picture was taken before I was born, and 33 years before James.

It’s a poignant thought that since this photo was taken they have both lived, loved, laughed, died and turned to dust but their footprints remain, in photos, in memories and in the faces of their grandchildren. We are all the conduits of each others’ immortality. But if James is late for lunch again today, I’ll flippin’ well kill him!

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A MEMORY TO SAVOUR by Julia Nelson

The grass is a chloroform carpet, luminescent beneath an azure sky.  In the velvet heat, a butterfly flits, silently, whilst above, the odd flimsy cloud is shooed along by the occasional light relief of a gentle breeze.

On the tilt of an emerald slope, strung between the branches of an elderly mulberry bush and a lithe young buddleia, a silken cerise shawl ripples languorously. Against the verdant green its startling colour is like a mirage in the desert. The heat is so sultry, the air now so still, that a mirage seems quite natural, feasible. The undulating material is like a magic carpet and, suddenly, I am in Arabia, a bustling Crusaders’ encampment, with fluttering pennants in jewel bright colours.  Aladdin’s carpet continues its journey, soaring over sculpted desert sands, when from out of the shelter pops my very own Jasmine, followed by Belinda, a watering can in her hand.

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Elizabeth James also wrote on MEMORIES - if only websites could convey her wonderful Welsh way of reading this piece!

PA’s Restaurant in Mumbles was well-aired and pleasant, and there was a choice of menu.

“What would you like, Elisabeth?”

“I’m going for the traditional lamb and mint sauce”.

Annette says “I’ll have duck”. Choice made.

“Well, it’s so good to meet you again and to enjoy lunch together”

“Yes ENJOY! Do you remember the canteen rules at school when we had to be SILENT until we had our food in front of us?”

“Oh, BUT we managed to chat with fingers, feet and facial gestures until we were caught out. quite often by Tommy Tweet”.   Ha, ha!

“ I loathed the smell of the milk we had to drink from those quarter pint bottles, especially on cabbage days!”

“The smell I remember was that of gas at the school dentist clinic. It was nurse and dentist – WHAM!  Slam! Mask On and teeth out  with bad dream and blood in handkerchief in those days. Any  visit to the dentist scared me for years!”  Ha, ha!

I suppose the worst smell we both remember in Morriston was the one that came from the oil refinery in Llandarcy. “It was like really bad eggs, when the wind blew it in our direction. It was horrible - and more horrible on damp November days.”

WHAT BEASTLY SMELLS OUR MEMORIES INSIST ON CHERISHING.

“Oh, here comes the waitress with our food.”

“Wow, This really smells good—just like Sunday lunch cooked at home long ago – without the washing up!”

The waitress smiles and says, “ENJOY!”

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This is Ann Stringer’s piece on our PHOTOGRAPHS (and memories) theme

Black and Gold

Sonia's beautiful face, framed by the black burkah was smiling back at me from the photograph.

Behind her was the extraordinary Dubai skyline. Huge, graceful buildings, highlighted against the starkness of the golden desert, sprouting up like mushrooms in a forest.

Memories tumbled around in my mind.  Sonia is Frances’ niece.  Frances, an old school friend, was my travelling companion for this adventure. A late 'gap year' discovering Dubai, New Zealand and Australia that was to take five weeks and a mere scratch on the surface of discovery – but we were to discover a few surprises in Dubai in only 3 days.

Sonia is British, married to an Emirate engineer and now lives in Dubai. She had been the face of Fly Emirates some years ago - emblazoned on jumbo jets and bill boards in every city around the world. A beautiful girl – a golden girl.

As we cruised along the creek viewing the old city with its souks selling gold, herbs and spices, her black burkah fluttered in the sea breeze and she shivered. We were concerned and asked if she was cold but we were also very curious to know what was worn 'under the burkah'. Sonia told us that the Arab women wore only very expensive and fashionable clothes underneath.  Armani jeans, Prada blouses, exotic Le Croix jewellery but all of this finery was only seen by their husbands or close girl friends.

She added laughing, that being British she had been known to wear pyjamas under hers, especially if she was late getting the children to school!

I picked up another photograph – this one of my niece Charlotte who was also living in Dubai. She was laughing into the camera, her lovely fair hair shining in the evening light. Her pretty mischievous face, so like my sister, lit up the photograph.  She was wearing jeans and a creased linen top and she was sitting at a bar of one of the many expensive hotels. I remembered the architectural grace of those hotels, the marble floors, the fountains set under Arabic arches, banks of tropical fish illuminated by discrete lighting, gold plated statues, jardinières with arrangements of exotic flowers – like nothing we had seen before.

We hadn't walked, we had floated along the wide corridors, open mouthed with the splendour. We had sniffed – expensive smells of huge tropical flowering trees, banks of flowers reflected in the transparent water of the pools and man-made rivers, all of it we absorbed – the sight, the smell, the sound and the feel – all our senses alive to the opulence.

Expensive boutiques beckoned the well dressed tourist and anonymous black burkahs alike. Gold jewellery, silk pashminas, shoes, bags all without price tags, displayed in lush perfumed boutiques. The luxury could not be photographed – it lingers as a tempting memory.

I look at the photographs again. Here is one in complete contrast – it was chilling and one I had forgotten. I had pushed it to the edge of my memory.

It was of a gang of about thirty tiny Indians, so pale and thin in their navy blue dusty uniforms they blended into the background. Hunched over, they were all looking down at the ground - no eye contact at all.  They were repairing a patio in our hotel. I looked at the photograph that I had taken so guiltily, half hidden by a pillar.

My late husband Bill would have been amazed at the quality of the work that they managed, given the inadequacy of their tools.  They were using small trowels and tiny childlike hammers to fit in the missing stones, hunched over their work like little ants with about ten men in a small space, covered in dust, so anonymous that you could have tripped over them without realising that they were there. Painstakingly slow – little shadows of men worn down by the heat and the dust.

I remembered the things that Charlotte had said about these workers. They were bussed in from camps outside the city limits every day.  They were allowed home once a year to see their families but had their passports confiscated as soon as they returned - until the next annual trip to India. They laboured in appalling conditions with no shelter from the blistering heat, working at enormous heights on the construction sites without any safety harnesses. It was numbing to be a witness to these slaves of the 21^st century, when as long ago as 1847 slavery had been banished from our own country.

I looked at the photographs again. At Charlotte with her golden hair who had now come home after her year away in Dubai, away from the blackness.

I looked at the golden city, there because of the blackness – the blackness of slavery.

I looked at the workers with no escape from the blackness.

I looked at Sonia again – her beauty and her gold hidden by the blackness of her burkah.  It was as if she was trapped by the blackness – but she had said she was happy hadn't she – that golden girl?

MEMORY LANE by Samantha Watson

She came out of nowhere, knocking me to the ground.

‘Is this Memory Lane?’ she puffed.

 Rubbing my sore knees, I gave the woman a look, my special look, that I use for grown-ups only. A funny looking lady she was, wearing a baggy knitted coat, with a bobble hat to match. She reminded me of a giant tea cosy. But, what fascinated me more, was the huge butterfly net in her hand.

‘Is this Memory Lane?’ she repeated.

‘Dunno,’ I shrugged. ‘I’ve never heard of it!’

‘Well, I suppose you’ve no need for it yet. But,’ she said in that voice, the one all grown-ups use, when they think they know more than me, ‘you will, one day. I’ve lost some of mine,’ she sighed. ‘Faces and places, that sort of thing. I’m eighty, and that’s a lot of living for one person. It’s difficult making them all stay in my head! The bad stuff I don’t mind about so much, but there are some memories that I would be sad to lose.’ The old woman’s eyes shined brightly.

‘So what’s the net for?’ I asked.

‘Why young man, to catch them of course! Will you help me? Some memories can disappear in a flash, especially those of my grandchildren. But your young legs will be able to keep up with them. So what do you say?’

 ‘Okay,’ I agreed, taking the butterfly net. ‘I’ll take a walk down Memory Lane with you.’

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OPEN HOUSE by Patricia Price-Tomes ©

Inspired by the story of the Open House Project in Ramle, Israel, see  http://www.openhouse.org.il/

The day they called, knocked on our door,
the day that changed our lives, our carefree lives in Ramle:
Ramle which we love, where at last
we had a home, a country
we could call our own –

everything changed the day they called,
knocked on our door – a hesitant knock – standing nervous
on the step, fear
etched in weary faces.

‘What do you want?’

Fear gripped us too, recognising
the enemy – Arab faces, Arab dress.

‘This was our family home.
Back then.
Please, we only want to look,
to show our children,
then we’ll go away.
Please.’

‘Of course, of course, come in, come in’ –
not because we want to but we must;
Jewish hospitality demands it. Shaking inside
we escort them round.

Watching our children and theirs, who do not share
 our fears, our hearts
begin to melt.
Coffee and cakes are offered.
And accepted.

‘Wander round on your own’,
we hear ourselves say.
Have we gone mad?
Aren’t they thieves, all of them? terrorists,
plotting to kill us?

By leaving time, a grain of friendship
has taken root in our softened hearts.

‘Come again. Whenever you like.’
What have we done? Something has begun in us.
Unbidden, unasked, they have begun in us.
What we now know cannot be unknown. We have taken,
all unaware,
their home. It is no longer ours.
And they have taken,
all unaware,
our peace of mind.

Whose home is this? We live here. We own it,
So we thought. After all, we paid
good shekels for it. Not knowing
it was stolen property, we weren’t responsible.

But now?

*************************

Ruth Peploe did some WRITING FROM A PHOTOGRAPH

She says it is one which she took and which now hangs on her living-room wall.

It was a glorious day in early March and eight of us changed into our walking boots in the car park of Gates Garth Farm, Buttermere in the Lake District. The sky was clear blue and there was snow on the hills. We started our ascent up through Scarf Gap and up eventually to the summit of Haystacks.

Looking back, the views of Buttermere and the surrounding hills, were magnificent. We sat by one of the Lakeland tarns at the top for our lunch and on the way back, descended to Innominate Tarn, where the ashes of Alfred Wainwright, the author of the famous Lakeland guide books, are scattered. That’s where I took my picture – Great Gable, partly covered in snow, looked majestic in the background and the rushes and ripples of Innominate Tarn fill the foreground.

It was one of the most memorable days of my life and I have a photograph on our wall as a constant reminder.  Wide angle lens, Fuji Sensia 100 slide film and f16 for long-distance clarity!

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INSIDE THE WINE HOUSE by Isabel Morris

On crowded Camden cardboard streets, I dodge among you with skirt flounce
Where once I pranced as confident pony for shallow shots of notoriety.
Your Ivor Novello gal is more than novel beneath flashlights to my door.
I am your muse. I could still amuse and tease as before.
Collaborate to paint and re-focus, smother the others and line your pockets.
Hard on heels saturating supermarket shelves with sadness and madness.

Addiction becomes the height of fashion
With you pursuing this Billie to give you your next holiday.
Clothe me in costumes of self-destruction
Make the most of passionate desire, greed and cruelty.
This is my life thru a lens baby and while you click the shutters
I am still shut to the reality of my calamity.

Stumbling, skin paper-thin, defiant wide child orbs, dancing unending bloodied ballet
 My interpretation of red shoes a losing game with absent courtroom kisses.
It’s not OK now. I am all alone with no one to whisper Hello
to curled up babies in pristine snow.
This picture is negative. She is shot through.
Dramatic pause for lucid thoughts…

Box-brownie descendant,
could you envisage me a study of salvation once more?
Is that you delivering healthy tonics,
get-well soon cards to my door?
Knelt at tombs of many chanteuses and icons gone before,
In hair shirt recall lest we forget and let another cash cow fall?

Inside the wine house
we break unleavened bread and butter out of sight
Before you kiss me gently on the cheek with your Kodak,
co-conspirator then
Drink my blood, eat what’s left of my body and
See how well we sleep tonight.

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