Memories of my Great Aunt Alice.

Aunt Alice Jarvis suffered with her health. I don’t know what the problem was. My Mum said that she loved to go out and she always recovered from her problem if there was talk of an outing. During her last years she lived in a cottage provided by some member of the “gentry”. As a child in the 1930s I remember thinking that “gentry” was a very old fashioned and rather snobbish word which I was surprised to hear still in use. Nowadays it is used again to describe improving old houses, “gentrifying” them. I have been surprised all over again!
I remember visiting her in my childhood when she was still living in the family home. There were chickens wandering in and out of the kitchen. The smell of an oil stove always reminds me of her kitchen.
A Mr. and Mrs. Becket lodged in the house at that time. I remember Mrs Becket. She was tall and gaunt, and she wore a man’s flat cap. I think she may have smoked a pipe but I am not absolutely sure of that. I can see her clearly standing at the foot of the stairs.
Aunt Alice stayed with us sometime before the war. While there she bought me a mussel shell with a ship painted in it. This was purchased at one of the cockle sheds in Leigh, not far from Hockley where I lived. Leigh is on the Thames estuary. I had the shell for years but now I don’t know where it is. She sent me a book for the Christmas of 1939, and she died not long after that.

RNLI at Anstruther, Scotland

I was so pleased to see the sea while I was in Scotland last year. It was particularly lovely at Anstruther where the waves were choppy and glittering in the sun. We had to force ourselves against the wind while walking round the harbour but it was glorious.
I am sure that the lifeboatmen of Anstruther will not mind me putting this picture here. It is from one of the Christmas cards that were in a mixed pack I had this Christmas just gone.

Easter

Snowy gardens on Easter Sunday 2008

A Tiny Church

I love miniature things.

Test picture

This lovely daffodil is a test publishing as I have had difficulties getting through today.

A Fox On Our Lawn

Memories of my dear Grandad Samuel

What can I write of my dear Grandad Samuel. I was only eleven on the verge of twelve when he died so my memories are necessarily those of a young child.
I remember him when he used to come and stay with us in Hockley in the 1930s. I remember one morning when I had had my breakfast and he was having his. The post came and there was a small packet for Grandad. It contained a dictionary that he had won doing a crossword puzzle. He had a look at it and then handed it to me. I still have that little red dictionary. It is in the bookcase in the conservatory.
Once he sent me a lovely postcard. The picture was of a big red rose. I had it for many years but now it is lost. Maybe it is in a large case full pf bits and pieces in our loft. I must get it down and see if it is there. There is even the possibility that it is in an old photograph album, but not very likely.
Another memory is of walking across the fields holding his hand. We were on out way to Hawkwell Church. I have a feeling that he was not a regular churchgoer but I am not sure of this. I don’t really know why we were going to that church.
I can see him now walking down the road where we lived in Hockley. He was carrying his old Gladstone bag as he was coming to stay.
My mother looked after him in our bungalow when he had his last illness. She looked after him during the day and a retired nurse cared for him at night.
I would go to see him every morning before I went to school and I went straight to him when I came home in the afternoon. One day I went to the bedroom as usual and I could not open the door. I am not sure where Mum was. Maybe she had gone for a neighbour’s help. Later I found that Grandad had died during the day. He died in my bedroom but I never had any fear of this having happened there. His spirit would have been a very gentle one. I slept in another room during his illness.
There is still a small mystery in my mind about the door I could not open. This door had no lock.

Cruel Necessity

I love the fells of Cumbria and North Yorkshire. Being old people now my husband and I do not get so far from home as we used to. I hope that we may get to Yorkshire some time this year and also to Scotland. We have family in Yorkshire and also in Scotland. I scribbled the following to try and convey something of my feelings.

Amongst the Fells

I want to go to the fells again,
To feel their presence in my heart,
To walk along lonely paths
With only sheep sounds.

I want to see the hawk hover
Along a ridge, searching the far down ground
With eyes of gleaming sharpness
For poor, small creatures.

I want the small creatures to escape
The cruel beak, but the hawk must eat
And feed its young. The only cruelty
Is cruel necessity.

Here is a picture to remind us that summer will come sometime.

My Love Of Essex Rivers

My Love of Essex Rivers


Since an early age these South East Essex rivers and the surrounding countryside have been deeply in my heart, some of the places I love most of all the many parts of England that I know. The glory of the skies, the salt marshes, the small towns and pretty villages, the salty breezy air of the riverside quays and the peace to be found all have their place in my memories. I think I would be a very different person without those memories. All the years I have lived in London have not taken them away.
I have an extremely early recollection of a visit to Maldon. This was a Sunday School treat as far as I remember. I recall a steep hill and a shop full of little souvenirs where I bought a small china kid with a sixpence that I had to spend. I still have the kid in my china cabinet and here it is. I must have been about seven or eight years old when I went on that trip.

Halcyon Days

This is Mr Swanborough rowing Joe and me across the River Crouch
in Essex many years ago. As far as I remember the dog belonged to
Mr Swanborough.

A Nostalgic Dream of Essex Rivers

Wide open breezy distance,
Tremendous skies, rippling water,
Sailing barges, hard working carriers,
Now rich men’s pleasure or a holiday-maker’s dream,
Muddy creeks, large and small,
Sea walls to stem a flooding river’s ravenous desire for space,
Heat of the sun’s unshaded strength
Or twenty miles on a bicycle in teeming cold rain.
Wild wind, gentle zephyrs,
Skylarks winging their way heavenward
Then flashing down to the nest beneath.
Busy little towns with riverside quays
And mile after mile of banks to walk.
Mud, mud and yet more mud as the tide recedes.
Be careful not to slip!
There’s Othona’s fortress, not visible,
But stones translated into St. Cedd’s dream,
St Peter’s on the Wall.
At Stone empty cargo ships loom through a haze of heat
Awaiting the return of prosperity
While children play on the beach.
Time passes but nostalgia endures.

This poem is a memory of childhood in the 1930s during the Depression. I remember ships empty and laid up during that time. They were high up in the water due to being empty of cargo.

Salt marsh

I am so glad to know that some of the land by the River Crouch in Essex is going to be allowed to revert to salt marsh. It will take a very long time, and maybe I shall not see it, But I am glad to think of it happening. I love that part of the world.

A Collage of everything

I am fascinated with making collages at the moment. How about this one. There are too many little pictures, I know, but, for better or worse, here is another one.

Rosetta and Samuel

My Grandma Rosetta and Grandad Samuel
I remember Grandad but not Rosetta.

A Summer's Day Beside the River Crouch

A Summer’s Day Beside the River Crouch

That day in 1939, such a short time before the second world war started, has lingered in my mind as one of sunshine, the rippling river, and the wide open space of the great salt marsh which stretched, seemingly endlessly, interspersed with little creeks and larger ones too wide to be leapt over.
To start with my friend and I had made up our minds that a day by the river would be something to enjoy. Our mothers gave us sandwiches and we set off. What our mothers did not know was the plan we had in our minds that we did not communicate to them. Looking back I know that we should have told them that we were going to the river, and also the means by which were planning to get there. However, we did not.
We made our way down Plumberow Avenue, not calling on my Grandma and Auntie Maud on the way. Plumberow in those days passed a number of houses and bungalows and then went on through fields to the Lower Road. We took a short cut through the fields, crossing the Lower Road beside a caravan site and carrying on till we reached the beginning of the marshes. This was our great plan; to carry on over the marshes to the seawall that protected the land from the incursion of the river which was tidal. It would have spread far over the land in the past. This was quite a good and exciting plan but could have been a dangerous one as will be seen. We knew our mothers would not have approved of it at all! Our only excuse for this for being so foolish must be our youth.
Anyway, we carried on across the wide and fascinating marsh, peering into creeks to find crabs and jumping across the narrow ones until we at last reached the river. The journey was muddy and quite hazardous at times.
There were the seawall banks, and as we climbed them the beautiful River Crouch came into view. The water rippled and gleamed, the splendour of the huge and cloudless sky above us went on for ever, and there was not a soul in sight. I think we were quite overcome. Our naughty plan had come to pass!
By that time we were both ready for lunch and we produced our picnic. We sat there utterly at peace with the world. Everything was perfect.
After getting rid of the hunger pangs we had to decide what to do next. Paddling seemed a good idea. We walked along to a wide inlet from the river, and we decided this would be a suitable place for paddling (remember we were very young and foolish). There was a wide bank of mud to be traversed before we could reach the water. The mud was sticky and slippery, but we managed slip and slither a little way before my friend slipped right over and was smothered in mud.! Her dress was filthy.
This made us struggle back to the seawall where my friend took off her dress. I have always been somewhat pessimistic about the weather, and I had brought a raincoat with me. This I was able to lend to her. I think she must have bundled up her muddy dress and carried with her. My raincoat pockets were always filled with odds and ends, and were usually unpleasantly sticky, but even they would not have taken a dress however tightly rolled up!
We were very lucky not to be drowned. The water went down and down and we should never have survived paddling in such dangerous conditions. All I can say is that our guardian angels must have been kept very busy that day.
We pottered about for a few more hours and then decided we had better make our way home. As we once more crossed the marshes dusk was falling, and a mist was following us. I remember it as being like the Great Grimpen Mire in The Hound of the Baskervilles. We were luckier than the villainous Baskerville who sank in the bog. We reached home safely.
At both our homes all was fear and turmoil. Both our Dads were out looking for us and my Grandma and also Auntie Maud were there. I think we both realised that we had been very,very bad indeed. In spite of all this I cannot help remembering this as a day of delight.

Here is a poem I wrote in which I have tried to convey something of the feelings of that day.
Salt Marshes.

I remember the marshes,
So wide and sky-roofed,
With creeks where crabs might lie.
Adventure was in those marshes,
Glorious childhood adventure.
On the way to the glittering river
Who knew what wonder might be found
On that wide wind-blown loneliness.

Sitting on the sea wall, eating sandwiches,
The river in front and the marshes behind,
We belonged to the place,
We belonged to the time,
As never before and never since.
Our mud-stained feet and luckily undrowned bodies
Were one with the river.
One with the salt-born loveliness,
And one with Creation’s eternal soul.

MSK

Spring

Now I am looking forward to the Spring, the leaves and blossoms on the trees and the flowers budding,
especially the wind flowers and the bluebells in the woods.

Christmas 2007

This is the last mention of the Christmas of 2007 that I shall make.

I wish a Peaceful and Happy New Year to all the world.