So that was Christmas! For us it was a very quiet time. We had great food and enjoyed the fact that there was no pressure. The pressure is on now, of course, to use up the mass of leftover food. At least, with the internet, there's any number of recipes and we've had garlic prawns fettucine, ham quiche and leftover turkey lasagne to excite our tastebuds. My favourite Christmas meal is a fry-up of ham eggs and fruitcake. In the old days I would also have black pudding, tomato and mushrooms but, with the simplicity of the times, I've pared the dish down to its essentials. Great stuff!
It's dangerous to count the cost of Christmas and we don't. Even the surprising number of presents to people we hardly know must add up. Marilyn likes to buy chocolates or biscuits for the people she sees regularly: the hairdresser, the chemist, the lady who does the ironing and so on, and a heap of small boxes of chocolates for the unexpected. She decided on Tuesday morning she would leave out a box for the garbage man, thinking back to the time when it was expected that the garbo, the milko, the baker, the ice man and anyone else who called regularly would all get a Christmas hand-out. The norm was a bottle of beer left standing in a conspicuous spot. In those days when most of us had outside toilets, the dunny man who changed over the full pan for an empty one would also get his bottle. I suppose when he got home his wife would have to wash down all the bottles to remove the smell.
Nowadays, of course, we have two garbage men who never get out of the truck. No matter, we'll leave the boxes on top and stand them up so the men don't miss seeing them and drop them into the truck with the rubbish. At least they drive from the left-hand seat so they should see them easily. With the help of a few stones to hold them up, it was done and before long, we heard the first truck coming up the hill. It pulled up near the bin, the garbo jumped down and grabbed the box, tore off the wrapping and, as he pulled away stuffed the first chocolate in his mouth. Success!
We’ve had terrific weather for the whole of the Christmas season and today we’re expecting another 27 degree day. I took a break from mowing for Christmas Day but I’m back into it now, striving to keep the summer growth under control.
I’ve been busy with the family tree. When I discovered that June Gillies had a mass of information about the Gore family, I made an effort to flesh that out and see what I could discover about the Donachies. There’s a site called Scotland’s People where, for a fee, you can get access to lots of information: birth, death and marriage records, census, etc. I spent a few dollars and have now pushed the Donachie line back to about 1820, when the family first came from Ireland, and the Gore family back to 1762. With one or two exceptions, all the males were coal miners and the women worked in the weaving mills.
I’ve found people who died young, others who had two or three marriages and others who never married. Nobody seemed to stay long in one house: in a 10-year period, it was not unusual to see three or four moves, often within the same street. It would have been a hard life, living on the edge. At the time, mining would have been one of the most dangerous industries, wages were pitifully low and families were large. My generation climbed on the shoulders of those who went before and grabbed the opportunities and advantages that the 20th century made available. We should remind ourselves every day how lucky we are.
And that's my century - 100 posts in 2011!
No comments:
Post a Comment