Ancient history

I was musing about my scars recently – as you do when the weather’s foul – and was thinking about how permanent they are. Well yes, of course they are – that’s in the job description for a scar. But I was particularly engaged with the scars on my forehead and down to my nose. They’re the reminders of my earliest introduction to sewing and its ancillary arts and crafts.

We lived in Eastwood when I was small and I would go next door to visit Mrs Onion (it was actually Unwin but the nick-name stuck). She was a great sewer and sat for hours at her sewing machine. I would pop up on the table facing her and presumably chatter away while I watched her work. On one inauspicious day, her sewing table collapsed sending me – and all the pins, needles and scissors – onto the floor. The scissors cut my forehead just above my nose and the pins and needles went into the rest of my forehead and my nose. I don’t recall the accident, but I do have a faint memory of our doctor dabbing at my forehead with some sort of antiseptic. Needless to say, I was extraordinarily lucky not to have been blinded and a bunch of now very faint scars was not a problem under the circumstances.

I have some scars on my arms and back where small lumps were removed – never (and again I was very fortunate) turning out to be a problem. The same applied to the moles which were taken off my front. I also have a small scar on my calf from tripping over a concrete step in the craft gallery where I worked a very long time ago. However, these scars have now almost disappeared in the forests of age spots, varicose and spider veins.

Other ancient history musings take me on the drive between our home (but I can’t remember if this was our Eastwood or Pymble home) and my grandmother’s home in Parramatta. Quite vividly, I can see a group of very large buildings on our route which I remember being told were homes for orphans. Perhaps these were Aboriginal children stolen from their families or children orphaned in other ways. I can’t remember any details other than a feeling of sorrow as we passed them by.

My grandmother came to Australia with my youngest uncle Alan after my grandfather died some time after we arrived Down Under. I remember very little of her house, which she must have chosen because we were then living also in Parramatta, except for a very ugly, dark and unwholesome goldfish pond. By the time we moved to the North Shore my uncle was married and my grandmother lived with us although she eventually moved to live with the same uncle in the Eastern Suburbs. I regret vividly not asking her much about her life in England. All I know was that she lived in a fairly large house with her husband, her four sons and two grandfathers who lived with them. Imagine how hard it must have been cooking each day for seven men. And one thing I do know was that she was taken out of school at 16 to help her own mother with her multitude of siblings. Consequently she became one of those “housewives” who only understood what the Germans called Kinder, Kirche, Kuche – children, “church” and kitchen.

I don’t remember that she did much cooking when she lived with us. The two things which stand out are the kasha she cooked for my father – disgusting buckwheat – and her legendary ginger cake which was in fact a honey cake for the Jewish New Year and any other time she decided to bake. She and my mother did not get on well. This I do remember. I was often irritable with her myself because she used to tell on me when I did something wrong. I must have missed many punishments because my mother was so cross that she “dobbed” me in.

Back to the memories which may have sparked my interest in sewing and other crafts as well as what had stuck from watching Mrs Onion sew. At one stage in her life my mother patronised a dressmaker and sometimes took me with her when she had to go for fittings. I recall walking to the sewing room through a long hallway lined on one side with shelves. These held bundles of fabric left over from each of the many, many dresses she had created and formed a kaleidoscope of colours and textures which I found breathtakingly wonderful.

When I gave birth to a girl (my second child) I determined to learn how to make her clothes. My mother was not interested in sewing but my father had worked with patterns and cloth all his adult life. So he showed me how to use a sewing machine and how to lay out the pattern pieces, pin and cut them. I became a dab hand at making delightful dresses for Jessica and eventually even clothes for the boys. This was after I took a course in sewing stretch fabric and could make a creditable go of creating t-shirts. I also sewed my own maternity clothes. In those days 50-plus years ago we actually wore special shapeless tent-like maternity dresses which were easy to sew because they didn’t have to fit. I am bemused by the young women of today who stuff their bumps into t-shirts and other “normal” clothes; I really don’t like the look but then I’m old and out of touch!

 

Quote of the week from Chambers Dictionary of Modern Quotations.

British actor A. E. Matthews: “I always wait for The Times each morning. I look at the obituary, and if I’m not in it, I go to work.”