Things Granny left me...

When I was about 7 or 8 me and my brother stayed at our grandparent's up at Africa Cottage. 

It was a wee but'n'ben type place up the Kirbister road with no mains electricity and an 

outside loo and it was always an adventure to stay there, especially as I slept in a box bed 

when I was there.  A real princess bed.  Anyway, one night we were staying there and I was 

in my sleepwalking phase.  My Grandad followed me through as I went and stood in front of 

the mantelpiece and stared in front of me.  He asked me what I was doing. I said nothing.  He 

suggested I go back to bed and I obviously didn't appreciate that suggestion as I put my arm 

out and swiped everything off the mantelpiece in front of me including the clock that they 

got years ago (I think it was a wedding present).  I then scarpered off to bed. I honestly had no 

memory of doing any of this the next morning. Anyway the clock got fixed and from then on it 

became known as "Maureen's clock" and Granny promised me that it was mine when she died.

So here it sits on my mantelpiece, ticking away in a comforting way, the sound of my 

childhood. The inside of it still smells of Benson and Hedges even though Granny gave up 

smoking 3 years ago!

I asked if I could have Granny's old baking tins and funnily enough no one else objected! 

Some of the tins (2 bun (cupcake) trays and 2 sandwich tins) are from the wartime (she got 

married to my Grandad in 1943) and on their last legs but I'll see how long I can keep them 

going.  I spent an awful lot of helping Granny to bake and she would have probably got a lot 

more buns out of the basic mixture if I hadn't been helping! She spent a lot of time making 

nice things that brought a smile to folk's faces and I like to do the same.  When my other 

Granny died I asked for her knitting needles and sewing box because that's what I remembered 

her doing.  While an inheritance involving money can be nice and helpful it's not always a 

relevant reminder of who it is that you've lost.  I find social domesticity inherently interesting 

and the passing on of skills, knowledge and love is a better thing to leave behind than anything 

else.

The one other thing she left me is who I look like and who I am now.  Through her I'm a Velzian, 

Spence and a Brown mixed up with Heddle's and Rosie's on the other side.  There's a rake o'folk 

that look like me and me like them.  I was mistaken for my Mum this time I was home because I 

look so much like her. We're dark and small and "duggit" (stubborn) as hell. 

Thomas Hardy says it best... 

I am the family face; 
Flesh perishes, I live on, 
Projecting trait and trace 
Through time to times anon, 
And leaping from place to place 
Over oblivion. 

The years-heired feature that can 
In curve and voice and eye 
Despise the human span 
Of durance -- that is I; 
The eternal thing in man, 
That heeds no call to die