2012 "Deck The Halls" Christmas Geneameme

Thanks to Pauleen (cassmob) from Family History Across The Seas and other bloggers I have been inspired to take part in the 2012 "Deck The Halls" Christmas Geneameme. So here is my contribution:

Whilst Christmas in my house may not necessarily be a religious experience it is definitely a part of the whole meaning of Christmas to me and my family. We honour the occasion for what it truly is, and not for the massive commercialisation it has come to be in recent times.

Do you have any special Xmas traditions in your family?

I’m not entirely sure what constitutes as traditional in this day and age but I do like to uphold a routine of early morning present opening, followed by a cooked breakfast and then I get stuck in to preparing and cooking a turkey and trimmings feast for everyone. Then I fall into an exhausted heap and have a nanna nap!

 

Is church attendance an important part of your Christmas celebrations and do you go the evening before or on Xmas Day?

When I was little, growing up in the UK, it was a very important part of Christmas, as was attending the local cemetery to place a wreath on my paternal grandparents and great-grandparents graves. Nowadays I attend Midnight Mass with my mother but only when I can be bothered to stay up that late!

Did/do you or your grandchildren/children believe in Santa?

I was brought up to believe in Santa and I did until one year when I accidentally ruined everything for my sisters. I distinctly recognised my father’s voice shouting “Ho Ho Ho” at the kitchen door and yelled out “That’s not Santa, that’s you Dad!”. I still feel guilty about that 30+ years on! My daughter was brought up to believe in Santa and the magic of Christmas but a few years ago she pretty much told me her school friends said it was all rubbish. I didn’t deny or confirm, and I still haven’t.

Do you go carolling in your neighbourhood?

I value my life too much to even contemplate doing something like that. In theory it all sounds wonderful and nostalgic but in reality it is just unsafe in our neighbourhood.

What’s your favourite Christmas music?

I don’t have any specific favourites but I do love to play Bing Crosby (as he was my maternal grandmother’s favourite) and Michael Buble but to be quite honest, I usually like to play a mixture from all genres across the board.

What’s your favourite Christmas carol? 
“Joy To the World” is my definite favourite.

Do you have a special Xmas movie/book you like to watch/read? 

For me it has to be Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” – it delivers such a powerful message and one that hits the heart every single time I watch it or read it. My daughter and I love the Muppets movie version but I also enjoy watching Seymour Hicks’ version.

Does your family do individual gifts, gifts for littlies only, Secret Santa (aka Kris Kringle)?

My mother and my aunts do that sort of thing. I don’t have grandchildren and I’m self-employed so there are no co-workers to worry about buying for.

Is your main Christmas meal indoors or outdoors, at home or away?

There has been a mixture of traditions in my life as I came from England where it was definitely indoors and always at home. When I came to Australia it has been a combination of indoors and outdoors (sometimes both if it’s a particularly hot day) and a combination of home and away, visiting relatives and extended family later in the afternoon or early evening or on Boxing Day.

What do you eat as your main course for the Christmas meal and do you have a special recipe? 

Always a turkey and roast vegetables spread with lashings of gravy and stuffing. I am proud to say that I follow Jamie Oliver’s Christmas recipes and they have not let me down yet. Everyone loves my slap-up feast and there are hardly any leftovers!

Jamie Oliver with his Nan

Does Christmas pudding feature on the Xmas menu?

I remember my maternal great-grandmother always started making her Christmas pudding months before Christmas day, and my grandmother and my mother upheld this tradition for many years. In more recent years my mother likes to make a Christmas Cake.

Do you have any other special Christmas foods? What are they? 
Mince Pies and Shortbread mostly, and Brandy Custard!

Do you give home-made food/craft for gifts at Christmas?

When my daughter was smaller we used to bake gingerbread cookies together, using different Christmas cookie-cutter shapes, but both of us got lazy and stopped doing it. Turns out it is cheaper to buy them from the supermarket anyway!

Do you return to your family for Xmas or vice versa?

Before I had my own family, yes always. I do have family in the UK as well and it has been nice to spend Christmas with them whenever money permits (which sadly is not often enough for my liking).

Is your Christmas celebrated differently from your childhood ones? If yes, how does it differ?

Naturally it is different as I grew up the UK and now live in Australia as an adult where traditions and weather is quite different. I do try to continue some childhood traditions for my own family but we like to make our own unique memories too.

  

How do you celebrate Xmas with your friends? Lunch? Pre-Xmas outings? Drop-ins?

I used to when I was a teenager and young twenty-something, gadding about and catching up with everyone I knew. Nowadays I spend Christmas primarily with my family and loved ones.

Do you decorate your house with lights? A little or a lot?

No, I am a tad fire-hazard and electricity-bill conscious so we only have lights on the Christmas tree which are carefully monitored and are only switched on for a few hours per night.

Is your neighbourhood a “Xmas lights” tour venue?

I have to admit, that comes and goes in our neighbourhood. One year we went out and found several houses in the area which were festooned with light displays but in recent years they have either moved away or just become electricity-bill conscious like so many of us these days.

Does your family attend Carols by Candlelight singalongs/concerts? Where?

We've been going to Carols By Candlelight at my mother’s local church group in recent years. This has been really wonderful for all the family and it’s great to have the local Salvation Army Band being a part of it.

Have any of your Christmases been spent camping (unlikely for our northern-hemisphere friends)? 
No, not ever although I did spend my first Christmas in Australia on the beach (which I hated and was very depressed, so vowed I would never do again).

Is Christmas spent at your home, with family or at a holiday venue? 
These day it is always spent at my home, with my family. Twice I have returned to the UK for Christmas there, which was equally as lovely and wish I could do more often.

  

Do you have snow for Christmas where you live?

That is funny! NO. It has never snowed in Perth (as far as I know at least!)

Do you have a Christmas tree every year?

Of course. Usually a tree lasts in our house for about 3-4 years before we need to go out and buy a new one and we always try to go for one that is at least 6 foot tall.

Is your Christmas tree a live tree (potted/harvested) or an imitation?

Imitation *shame-faced* and it is always, always green. I DO NOT believe in Christmas trees that are pink, blue or purple!

Do you have special Xmas tree decorations?

I like to use traditional colours such as red and green, silver and gold ornaments and tinsel. Every 5 years or so I invest in new ornaments (in the post-Christmas sales) but I like to keep and use a mixture of old and new.

Which is more important to your family, Christmas or Thanksgiving?

We don’t celebrate Thanksgiving here in Australia which is good and bad. Good because I don’t think the average Australian housewife and/or mother could handle the stress of two turkey dinners in a month and bad because I think some Australians could benefit from learning the value of being thankful.

Family History Through The Alphabet Challenge : X is for...

I'm giving my Mum's partner full credit for this week's blog. He proved the theory that talking with somebody about a problem you're having can be seen by the other person with fresh eyes. I was truly stuck on what to write about for the letter X until he said, "What about Xmas?"

 

To be honest, there was a time (not so long ago) when I really loathed the expression Xmas because I mistakenly thought it was a form of blasphemy. According to Gerry Bowler's "The World Encyclopedia of Christmas" though, Xmas means thus:

"An abbreviation for Christmas derived from "X" (chi), the first letter of the Greek word for Christ. Though the term has a long and honourable history, some modern Christians have misunderstood it as a disrespectful kind of shorthand unsuitable for the solemn origin of the name."

Or Dr R Brasch's "Christmas Customs & Traditions" says:

In the Greek language, the letter "X" - shi - was the initial letter of Xristos, meaning Christ. Early scribes were busy people and parchment was costly. They often shortened words to save time and money, and that is how they came to use just the letter X.

So, what about my family's Christmas/Xmas traditions? I have many fond memories of Christmas, both as a child and as an adult. Thanks to my upbringing I have long honoured it as being a time for family, the chance to put aside grievances and worries and spend time with people who mean the most. My grandparents were perfect hosts at Christmas time, going all out with large quantities of festive food and beverages (alcoholic and non-alcoholic). My Mum has very fond memories of her parents preparing for Christmas, from her father carrying home a tree over his shoulder and her mother lighting candles on the tree before gathering around the tree with the whole family to sing carols and hymns. Every year my grandmother Lilian knitted jumpers for each of her four children and later, her many grandchildren. She gave out sugared mice, nuts and oranges to everybody on Christmas morning.

Another childhood memory my Mum has of Christmas with her parents was they would not allow their children outside to play on Christmas Day. They stayed indoors all day sitting by the hearth, sharing stories and singing. Boxing Day was a different story however, and my grandfather would race his children outside and build snowmen and instigate snowball fights with all the children on their street. My first year in Australia was mostly spent on the beach near Scarborough, and I remember that it was awfully hot. I was so sad that day because I missed the snow terribly and all the trimmings and traditions of a northern hemisphere Christmas. I vowed I would never again visit the beach on Christmas Day, and to this day I have kept that promise.

My grandmother Lilian at Christmas, 1982

The year before my grandmother Lilian passed away she was given a Teasmaid which all the family chipped in to buy her. She was so surprised when she opened her present, and squealed so loud we all had to politely block our ears. But, she was so thrilled and I remember that very special Christmas moment so clearly (and not just because it was captured on camera). It was her last Christmas with us all.

The last Christmas I remember spending with my grandmother Freda, was at my Dad's house. She loved to sit and watch all of us open our presents from each other, and listen to us all natter. She always got more joy from that than from opening her own gifts. She loved being a part of the family festivities at Christmas. As long as she was included, nothing else mattered and I've inherited that feeling. For me, it's not about the presents. It's about family, it's about providing a huge Christmas turkey dinner with all the trimmings, and it's about love.

My grandmother Freda, Christmas 1993

Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge : G is for...

This week I am dedicating my Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge to my grandmother's gloves. That's a strange topic, you might say, but read on. There is a story to everything if you look closely enough.

  

My grandmother Lilian spent most of her life in poor health. As a young child she contracted tuberculosis, while bronchitis and asthma plagued her adulthood. Despite this, Lilian had a glamorous spirit and this is my fondest memory of her. She had style and she carried herself as though she possessed tons of it. Some may argue that she was above her station in life but I always liked that about her. She rose above her illness.

Lilian always wore gloves. She also smoked cigarettes from a black holder (which I tried to emulate once and only ended up looking like a right fool). She may not have been Audrey Hepburn either but, to me, she was pretty darn close to it. Every photograph I have of Lilian, taken at a family wedding, she is wearing gloves.

Lilian (left) and my Mother at a Family Wedding

She had many pairs in all lengths, styles and colours. When she passed away I was given a pair of her gloves and I still treasure them to this day. They are ruched at the wrist which is my favourite style of vintage gloves. I used to wear them in my younger years but nowadays they are kept in my treasure box for safe-keeping. Even my mother wore gloves well into her thirties. I remember she had a short navy blue pair which she always wore in the winter months when driving.

  

Lilian (right) with my Great-Grandmother
at a Family Wedding

The History of Gloves

While gloves have always had a practical nature they also began to develop symbolic meanings. It was good social etiquette when approaching a person of high authority to remove the right hand glove as a mark of respect. The same was also true for approaching an altar. A lady could show her affection or favouritism to a man by taking off her glove and offering her hand to him.

In Freemasonry the glove plays an important symbolic role. Freemasons believe that the glove alludes to the purification of life. They quote Psalm 24:4 from the Bible "He who has clean hands and a pure heart"

The tradition of wearing gloves for Holy Sacrament by Roman Catholic Bishops became a religious ritual and as early as the 10th century, to keep their hands clean, Popes, Cardinals and Bishops wore gloves. Kings began to wear gloves as part of their ceremonial duties and later as more of a fashionable accessory to display their position.

Copyright: © 2011 (Go Planet Gloves)

http://www.goleathergloves.com/history-of-gloves.htm 

My grandmother's gloves hold a very special meaning in my heart because my grandmother was special, and because I associate vintage gloves with her. Whenever I go to a vintage clothes market I feel as though I am stepping back in time and seeing my grandmother's world as she would have known and loved it. Gloves, hats, handbags, scarves, brooches, feathers, and long coats. Even through the London Blitz, my grandmother still held her head high. She really did "Keep Calm and Carry On".

  

My Grandmother's Gloves
Photography by Jeff Watkins
http://www.facebook.com/LabrugImages

My Love of Writing : Family Letters

This morning I started reading The Shadow of the Wind and already I am completely bewitched. In it, the character Daniel Sempere, describes his passion for fountain pens and immediately I was transported to my father’s study.

For as long as I can remember my father always wrote with a fountain pen. I don’t think I ever saw him use an ordinary ink pen, unless it was passed to a client to sign his or her insurance papers. My memory of my father writing is always holding a fountain pen.

 

Since very early in my childhood the giving and receiving of letters and note-cards played a significant part in my family life. From a tender age I learned to love writing. When I was around five years of age my aunt and cousin emigrated to Australia and letters were frequently passed betwixt my family. Many is the time I would come home from school and find my mother ensconced on the settee, lost in a letter from her sister. The emotions they evoked; the pleasure and the pain I witnessed on my mother’s face; hearing her on the telephone excitedly telling my grandmother the latest letter had arrived; hours spent at my grandmother’s house, drinking copious cups of tea and exchanging letters – all filled me with a deepening love of writing.

When my mother emigrated to Australia four years later, it was my turn to write letters. Now I knew first-hand the effects of receiving a new letter, getting to know the style and colour of the aerogramme and airmail envelopes, the thickness of the folded letter inside, and the anticipation of reading its contents. I loved my mother’s writing; always so curly, neat and decorative. Her life, in the written word, lifted off the pages (Years later, she took calligraphy classes and further improved her individual style of writing). Two years later, it would be my turn to write letters to my father and my paternal grandmother. Then the love of writing letters using a fountain pen grew for me.

As I have already mentioned, my father always wrote with a fountain pen. All of his letters to me were written with flowing, blue ink. There were no blotches or spills, never once. I loved his writing style too, very neat and precise. His words flowed beautifully in the most perfect ink I had ever seen. When I returned to England for the first time since I had left, I sought out my father’s fountain pen. I desperately wanted to replicate his penmanship. I pleaded with him to tell me what pen he used in his letters to me. He told me it was an Osmiroid so I rushed to WH Smith’s in Lowestoft and bought myself one. I was so enthralled and so excited, I couldn’t wait to try it out. However, no matter how much I practiced, I could never replicate my father and his unique writing style. The ink wouldn’t flow properly, the nib would always snag or the ink would blotch everywhere. I was disappointed beyond words, but I never lost my love for the fountain pen or indeed pens in general.

Even today, more than twenty years later, I am still searching for the perfect writing pen. I have bought hundreds of different ball-point varieties and brands. I always prefer to use medium point as fine point simply irritates me. When I compose stories and for journaling purposes, I usually always turn to a Pilot ball-point pen. Even with my scrapbook journaling and page layouts, I prefer to always use medium point pens.

Where does my love of writing come from? The seed was planted during my formative years when I loved writing stories and letters. As a teenager, I was rarely seen without my diary and I kept one religiously for many years, buying only the best, beautifully crafted covers. During my late teens I joined a pen-pal service and enjoyed sharing letters with friends in Scotland, France, Germany and Sweden. The giving and receiving of family letters over the years, until the age of email and internet took away the more traditional methods, increased my love of story-telling.

Then there was my love of books, and the passion for researching my family history. Anybody who has seen an original document or transcription showing his or her ancestor’s very own handwriting knows the exquisite thrill it gives! This is my 4 x great-grandparent’s signature on their wedding certificate of 1846:

My paternal grandmother always used to tell me that I would be a writer. She had utmost faith that I had inherited her mother’s love of writing. For many years I automatically assumed that she only meant writing letters. It was not until recently that my father told me my great-grandmother wrote articles for the Beccles Parish magazine. I felt truly moved by that. As my maternal forebears were printers and stationers and postcard sellers, I also strongly believe that I have inherited their natural flair for the written and the printed word.

My great-grandmother

My Grandmother Lilian : 1920 - 1983

Lilian Katie Humphries abt 1940

I have just come home from the Antiques Fair and felt the strongest compulsion yet to write a blog. Admittedly I have wanted to start a blog for the longest time, and have even gone so far as to research different blog sites and sought advice from several people.

However, nerves won out and got the better of me; that, and a serious dose of self-doubt. There are so many topics I want to discuss, but at the end of the day, I kept going back to the same agonising question. Who would want to know, or care, what I have to say?

For as long as I have been alive I have had a passion for family history. As a child I loved to listen to my grandmothers when they talked about their childhoods, family stories, war stories and more importantly for me, showing me photographs and telling me who the photograph was of, where it was taken and the memory associated with that photograph, whether it be a family member, a holiday snap or a wedding portrait.

I thought about dedicating this first blog to both of my grandmothers but, to be quite honest, I don’t think that would be fair. They each deserve their own dedication, in their own right. As tomorrow will mark 28 years since my maternal grandmother passed away, I shall dedicate my very first family blog to her.

My grandmother was born Lilian Katie Humphries, on 26 November 1920. Her birth certificate says she was born in Bloomsbury Square in the district of St Giles, London. I went to visit her childhood home in 2007 and fell in love with both the Square and its surrounds.

Lilian was always known to me as “Nannie Buster” as her second husband (Alfred Sampson) was known to everyone as Buster. Others called her Lil and some of her nieces and nephews knew her as Lily.

Lilian was the seventh child of Albert Humphries and Elizabeth Dare. Before her were three brothers and three sisters, the eldest of which – Violet, or Vi as she was known - she was extremely close to. She would often spend two weeks holiday visiting her sister Vi in Sutton, where she lived with her husband Cyril Lang above the butcher's shop on the High Street.

When Lilian was just a child she was struck with asthma and bronchial ailments, inherited from her father’s side of the family who all suffered from it. When Lilian was eight she contracted Tuberculosis and the family had to leave their London home for the country air. They moved to Leigh-On-Sea and remained there until the 1930s, when the family moved again, to Sutton in county Surrey. They lived on Clyde Road.

Lilian and her sisters volunteered for the ATS when war broke out in 1939, but ill health plagued Lilian and eventually she had to give up several of her posts. It was in 1945, near war’s end in Europe, that she and her sister Stella were sent to clean ambulance trains in Epsom.

There she met my grandfather Percy Preston, who was stationed near Epsom with the Royal Army Medical Corps. Three short months later, Percy and Lilian were married at St Nicholas Church in Sutton. After the wedding, Percy was stationed back to Epsom and Lilian went, supposedly by rail, to county Suffolk to start married life, not with her husband but with her mother-in-law Nellie Preston who ran a boarding house for single working men, in the market town of Bungay.

After the war, Lilian gave birth to four children: Two girls (the eldest being my mother), followed by two boys. Percy held an Urban District Council job in the town for several years and Lilian worked in various shops and factories in Bungay and nearby Flixton. Then in 1962 they bought the Café in Cross Street, known then as Alfo’s. The tearooms are still there today, although it is now known as the Buttercross Tearooms, named after the infamous Butter Cross at the end of the street.

In May 1966 Percy passed away, of lung cancer. Two years later, Lilian met a local widower by the name of Alfred Sampson and they married in August 1968 at St Mary’s Church, Bungay. Lilian's family of four became a family of nine, as Alf had five children from his previous marriage to Jean Alden. She died of cancer in 1964, aged 35.

As a child I fondly remember visiting my Nannie and Grandad Buster where they lived at St Johns Road, in Bungay. I can still recall the rooms; the front parlour room (which I was never allowed into), the sitting room, the kitchen and walk-in pantry, the narrow staircase and the cupboard under the stairs, and each one of the pokey bedrooms. Whenever I stayed overnight, I loved to explore Nannie’s rooms upstairs, especially her wardrobe filled with flowing dresses and coats, her perfumes and cosmetics on her dressing table, and her endless book shelves crammed with Mills and Boon novels. I would have been around eight or nine years old when I first remember flicking through the pages, fervently looking for the passionate kiss on the last pages! I think she may have caught me out once or twice but I was never severely reprimanded. Perhaps she was mildly amused by my curiosity.

However, I do recall her chastising me for hiding in the cupboard under the stairs or in the kitchen pantry. This was a source of much chagrin between us, as she seemed to forever dislike my need for seeking solitude. She liked me to be where she could see me, not necessarily hear me though!



Lilian with her beloved dog Russ

Lilian loved her dog, a Jack Russell Terrier she named Russ. I shared her love for Russ, and whenever I visited or stayed at my grandparents, he was a delightful playmate for me. We would run amuck outside in the courtyard, or the garages out in the allotment area. Sometimes I would put him in my bicycle basket and wheel him around the yard. Nannie would knock on the kitchen window at me when she felt her poor “doggy woggy” Russ had been through enough torment!

When I was nine years old my grandparents emigrated to Western Australia. Alfred quickly found employment with the Alcoa group, which took him regularly to Dampier, for weeks at a time. Lilian, having been advised by her doctors that the warmer climates of Australia would help her bronchitis and asthma attacks, spent her days mostly indoors by the air conditioner watching the tennis, knitting, or baking. When a relative came to visit they would take her out shopping, which was one of her favourite pastimes.

Lilian was always proud of her London heritage. She always sang “Maybe It's Because I’m a Londoner” and if she was ever pulled up for something or feigned any sort of ignorance she would simply shrug her shoulders and say, “Well, you know it's just because I'm a Londoner”.

When my Nannie was ill, you knew about it the second you walked into her house. The atmosphere was electric when she was confined to her bed. An eerie silence hung on everything around you. Everywhere was deathly silent. There were no sounds of her singing or her slippered footsteps, the kettle wasn't whistling, and not a song could be heard. When she was well however, the atmosphere was the complete opposite. You could hear her bustling around, the washing machine going, the kettle boiling, the dog yapping nearby, her singing at the top of her lungs a tune by Roy Orbison, Bing Crosby or the Andrew Sisters. She would be cleaning, baking, making endless cups of tea or talking idly to Russ, making an absolute fuss over him. I found it funny whenever she threw open the kitchen window and shouted out to Grandad or my Uncle to come in for dinner or a pot of tea.

When my Nannie died, I was in my last year of high school. Her death was sudden and nobody in the family got to say goodbye to her. Lilian had suffered a massive heart attack at home and despite being rushed to Fremantle Hospital, she died on arrival. I was devastated, as was my mother who (understandably) took her mother’s death extremely hard. Losing my Nannie at that time in my life was so intensely shocking because I never had the chance to tell her all the things I would have wanted to. I never had the chance to ask her more about her life in London, and Surrey, or her war experiences. I never even knew her parents names, until 10 years ago when I started the family tree research in earnest.

I will always fondly remember my grandmother Lilian for:

“In the Mood” and Glen Miller Band : Lilian loved to sing this song more than any other I recall in my memory. She would saunter up to me and sing it in my ear or walk around the house with the carpet sweeper or broom.

When getting dressed to go out, Lilian would spend hours applying heated rollers, tweezing, curling her eyelashes, and "putting her face on". There was always singing and dancing involved, and I loved to sit and watch her in the mirror pulling various faces at me or throwing her head back in laughter.

Bourjois Cosmetics : Her rouge pots are still in the family today, and I also love to wear Bourjois products.

Chanel No. 5 perfume : Her most expensive and indulgent perfume, she wore this only for special occasions and always applied the smallest amount in order to make the bottle last!

Merely Musk Impulse : Her everyday perfume, or 4711 or, sometimes, the latest Avon perfumes.

Daphne du Maurier novels : in particular, Rebecca and it was one of her favourite movies of all time.

Engelbert Humperdinck : She was a lover of this "pop" singer.

Bing Crosby and the “White Christmas” movie : Her most passionate love was for all things Bing, for his musical talents and for his acting.

Roy Orbison : Another crooning voice she loved to sing along to whenever she was cooking or cleaning.

Despite her asthma and bronchial ailments. Lilian smoked cigarettes. I recall seeing her often using one of those long black cigarette holders, and I thought she looked just like a movie star! She used to smoke Du Maurier cigarettes or Benson & Hedges.

Her cooking and baking, but for me especially I will always miss her:

Rhurbarb Pie (usually always served hot with lashings of custard)

Apple Crumble (again made with lashings of custard)

Rice Pudding (the sweetest and softest I have ever tasted)

Shepherds Pie (made with any mince she found cheapest on the day)

Nannie's famous Sunday fry-ups: heaped up platefuls of soft runny eggs, oily bacon and grilled tomatoes

Roast dinners of chicken or lamb (mostly) served with lashings of sauce, gravy, peas, over-cooked cabbage, carrots and cauliflower, broad beans (she knew I hated them but she still put them on my plate and made me eat them!), runner beans, swede, and the best ever Yorkshire puddings.

Two weeks ago I found, amongst my mother’s rather extensive photograph and memorabilia boxes, a cassette tape with family members voices recorded onto it. It was recorded in January 1975 and it was intended for family that had recently emigrated to Australia. The very first voice you can hear is my grandmother Lilian. When her voice filled my living room on that day, two weeks ago, it was like having her back again. Hearing her accent, her laugh, her singing, was like I had stepped back into a room with her sitting there.

I cried like I have never cried before. For an instant I was grieving her loss all over again but then, a powerful sense of joy washed over me. Even though my sinuses flared up and my face swelled from excessive crying, I realised that I will always have a piece of her with me. I have some of her favourite things, I have my childhood memories to hold on to, and now I will always be able to hear her voice whenever I want to. All I have to do is press the play button and close my eyes.

“Mr What-you-call-it What you doing tonight?

I hope you’re in the mood cos I’m feeling just right…”

  

Enjoying a boat ride on the Swan River 1982