Almost daily diary!

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

In retrospect

When I was 5 the wallpaper in my bedroom was vibrant. There were bright orange cats and lime green mice, clustered together all over it. I remember that my toy box, which my Mother had made for me, also had the cats and mice stuck to the sides, neatly and lovingly cut from the spare paper. On my bed was a candlewick bed spread.

During that time my Father was having an affair with his dance partner. One night he woke me from my sleep to show me glow worms in a jar that he had collected on the way home from a dance. They glowed so brightly, they were magical. I have not seen one since.

On Sundays we would have afternoon tea with Betty and Gramps, his relatives who lived in an old Victorian terraced house in the poorer part of town. Even then I lived in the suburbs; in a Cul-de-Sac, with herbaceous borders and neatly cut lawns.

The terraced houses seemed to me to be dull and cheep, even then. They had shiny painted anaglypta in the hall, slightly browned with tobacco and the stairs went mysteriously down to the kitchen. Sometimes we ate multicoloured tinned fruit salad from china bowls that were painted with horses and hounds. I used to save the cherries until last but they never really tasted like cherries at all.

The Victorian Terraced houses in that part of town are now well sort after. They have been 'done up', renovated and restored. They have become desirable homes harking back to an era which looks much better in retrospect.

Perhaps life is better that way, in retrospect. Only sometimes it is difficult to gather all the pieces together.


7 comments:

Kitty said...

We can only live it one day at a time. Sometimes those days are horrible, and sometimes (as in your last post) they're not. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but is prone to being rose-tinted in my experience.

Take care. x

Steve said...

Life is always better in retrospect when you are not bowing under the pressure of living it...! ;-)

Rosaria Williams said...

"life is better in retrospect..." Wise words. See? Your memoir will be stunning! Thanks for the visit.

Maggie May said...

Yes, its always easier with hindsight ......
I also have memories very vividly etched into my brain from my childhood.
Strange how all the little details stay with us. in some cases and other things have completely been forgotten.
Love these little snatches though.......

You changed your header (that I see so often in real life!)
Maggie X

Nuts in May

Furtheron said...

hindsight is alwasys crystal clear isn't it... unlike looking forward which often seems so very murky

Casdok said...

Even now i think glow worms are magical.

Eternal Worrier said...

I love the paragraph about your father.