'Pleasures of an Ordinary Life'

Today is an ordinary day, 30th March 2015.

I am reading my letter of 30th March 1987, it was an ordinary day.

So many years, so much life between then and now.

The 30 of March in Paris.

The clocks have been set to summer time and the littley's are sleeping in late.

Barry is standing up, using our coffee table for support. And he is starting to crawl too.

Fred is travelling. To Germany and to the USA.

I forgot my parents anniversary.

I buy a gift for Fred's birthday.

And I am doing admin.

I am learning French.

I am interested in my parents adventures as Mayor and Mayoress of Howick.

I tease my sister Doreen.

I am organising photos for the family.

I am writing letters.

The 30 of March in Johannesburg.

I am up early.

Fred and I walk to my pilates studio and I take my regular friday class.

I am doing admin.

My quilt group meets today and I am excited to start on a new quilt, the small 2 inch squares are cut and ready for final design input from the girls.

I am getting a few things organised for our trip to the Loft for Easter.

I am reading, looking at photos and writing.

Barry learning to stand using our coffee table.

How I love these ordinary days.

 Pleasures of an Ordinary Life

I've had my share of necessary losses,

Of dreams I know no longer can come true.

I'm done now with the whys and the becauses.

It's time to make things good, not just make do.

It's time to stop complaining and pursue

The pleasures of an ordinary life.

I used to rail against my compromises.

I yearned for the wild music, the swift race.

But happiness arrived in new disguises:

Sun lighting a child's hair. A friend's embrace.

Slow dancing in a safe and quiet place.

The pleasures of an ordinary life.

I'll have no trumpets, triumphs, trails of glory.

It seems the woman I've turned out to be

Is not the heroine of some grand story.

But I have learned to find the poetry

In what my hands can touch, my eyes can see.

The pleasures of an ordinary life.

Young fantasies of magic and of mystery

Are over. But they really can't compete

With all we've built together: A long history.

Connections that help render us complete.

Ties that hold and heal us. And the sweet,

Sweet pleasures of an ordinary life. 

Judith Viorst

A little dress from Macy's, New York

Shawni wearing her Macy's dress and straw hat.

From little Shawni has worn clothes from all over the world as Fred and I travelled on business trips.

Even now her wardrobe has a notable pedigree.

And it started with a little dress from Macy's in New York.

Initially I kept it for special occasions, like a trip into Paris with her Oma, but I see from our photos, she eventually wore it whenever she felt like it.

Barry and Shawni in Holland, August 1987

Clarity of a painful memory

'There are moments when history and memory seem like a mist, as if what really happened matters less than what should have happened.'

Karen Joy Fowler: We are all completely beside ourselves.

As I read my letters written from Paris during our two year stay between 1986 and 1987, I am continually surprised. Both by what has stuck as a memory and by what I do not recall or at best as a misty recall.

I am starting to think about our Easter Plans so I went looking for one specific incident in my letters which has stuck like glue.

Barry falling down a flight of concrete stairs.

Our house at 2 Ave Corneille in Marly-le Roi had a very useful basement which we accessed from a door off the downstairs passage. I had the washing machine and tumble drier down in the basement, along with all sorts of kitchen stuff, so I was up and down these stairs all day long.

They were unfinished, raw concrete and angled steeply into the basement. We also used the space along the wall of the stairs to hang the vacuum cleaner and brooms etc.

Here is my letter to Mom telling her about his fall.

I had been happily describing a 'pillow house' that I was knitting - this is one of those misty moments, I have forgotten how much knitting I used to do, and as I was reading the detail, I can picture the knitted house in a far recess of my memory.

I can still feel the shock of finding him lying at the bottom of the stairs, the panic about how to deal all of the next steps with my barebones French and the awful aloneness, Fred was in the USA on a business trip.

Sally, once again was the go to phone call for help. I see that a neighbour helped out with Shawni, not something I remember, oh my did I thank them....

I look at these darling photos in my album. Barry with his black eye and my heart still tightens. The irony was he survived the stairs, it was the vacuum cleaner hanging on the wall that caused the black eye.

I finish off the letter to Mom listing the lovely gifts Fred brought home for us.

I must go looking for the photo of Shawni wearing her dress with its straw hat. He had gone into Macy's in New York and was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things to choose from, so he asked for the dress on the model, got to love it and he would do the same today.

Connectivity and staying in touch

Sunday morning at Millstream, Fred and Barry were quietly chatting on the veranda, I fetched my iPhone, opened FaceTime and called Shawni. We all had a wonderful 4 way catch up and I was able to both see her and chat.

I miss my family but love how we can be in touch so easily from wherever we are.

I was struck this morning how quite wonderful our communication tools are; our cellphones and computers, with Facebook, WhatsApp, Skype, FaceTime, email, voicemail, sms and digital instant photos.


Shawni and I were on Whatsapp early today, both watching South Africa playing cricket against Sri Lanka in the World Cup quarter final, she in New Zealand and me at home in Johannesburg.

It's not too long ago that we used letters, postcards and telegrams.

So I went digging though my box of letters and found a set of cards and a telegram from Fred sent during the winter of 1984.

He was working for Telemecanique and was on a business trip to Hong Kong, Singapore and Bangkok.

He sent me this telegram from the airport as he was leaving: 'Hi Beagle, missing you already'. How different staying in touch is 31 years later.

Postcards and stamps!

I did send a few postcards from the USA on my last trip because Dad is no longer using technology but it's a rare occurrence to shop for cards and to buy stamps.

Such a treat to reread these cards from Fred.

He was enjoying his course in Singapore, was hot and bothered by the pressure of 'small people' in Hong Kong and as I recall he had some wild, crazy experiences in Thailand.

" One longs for one's family" Heather Norman

I found this card in Mom's album that she kept along with her photos of Shawni and Barry.

The card is from Heather and David and congratulates Chip and Estelle (Dad and Mom) on the arrival of their new grandchild.

My Barry.

I visited Dad a little while ago and we were talking about his cousins. I had met Patsy while in Cape Town in January and was sharing all the news with him. He talks fondly of times with her and also of another of his cousins' Heather and her husband David.

Heather was the daughter of Ivan and Primrose Matcham (nee Wedderburn). Prim was Grandpa Percy's youngest sister.

We all have memories of the flamboyant Heather from summer days at Kalkwal. She was colourful with a wicked sense of humour. I remember her bold use of make-up which made her blue eyes pop and kept me staring as a little girl.

Doreen showed me her photos of visits that she remembers with Heather and David, sometimes to Pretoria but also down at the coast.

Heather's card mentions Carmen, her youngest daughter of three, the others are Jill and Viv. Swimming and playing endless rounds of cards with Ian and Shirley and the Norman girls defines so many of the hot, long December holidays in the Free State.

Primrose Wedderburn (1899-1967) youngest daughter of Alex and Alice Wedderburn, sister to Grandpa Percy.
She is sitting bottom row, second from the right in the old family photo.

Photos across the decades - Jill and me swimming down at the Modder River on the farm, 1965.
Mom and Doreen at Ballito with David and Heather, 1985.

The Remington Typewriter

This dear little Remington Typewriter is with my sister Doreen.

She remembers Mom using it and I was wondering if it originally belonged to Nan.

Most of Nan's letters are typed and she was a typist too.

I can just picture her, folding her paper lengthwise, getting comfortable and typing up the news for Mom.

Looking at the typewriter got Doreen and I interested in seeing the precious pieces of jewellery she has inherited and who they had belonged to.

Mom, just like her mother, was meticulous. She made a special effort to pass on her treasures to us while she was alive and she also shared the story behind each piece.

This letter that Doreen showed me is quite remarkable.

It is dated 12 November 1974 and Doreen would have been 4 years old. This was the year Mom had her fight against ovarian cancer and she was getting her affairs in order.

Nellie van der Veen's brooch.

The little note had been folded to fit into the brooch box so when the time came Doreen would know the story behind the brooch.

Mom writes 'Nanny had the brooch as a young girl so it is very old now'.

Last night I had a look at some of my pieces and was amazed to see that I have a brooch that was made up for my mother using one of Alice Wedderburn's (nee Cawood) jade earrings, she was my father's paternal grandmother.

I am inspired to document what I have inherited to make sure Shawni and Barry continue to be custodians of our family heritage.