One of the first of my books published by Books We Love is Cabin Fever. It is the story of Ellie and Drew who both chose to work at Christmas rather than spending time with their loved ones. Instead they joined the ship The Osprey as Cruise Director and lead dancer on its journey from Aukland to Sydney and back. Thinking back to how the story came to be written set me thinking about Christmases past. Then I read fellow writer Nancy M Bell's post of 18 December where she reminisced about the changes we have all experienced in the last 50-100 years, and even more memories returned.
I was born when rationing and shortages were still very much part of life in the UK, so Christmases then were very different from now. Parents, unless they were wealthy, had to be inventive when it came to presents, and mine certainly were. I remember the doll house they made me. It was no more than a box divided into 4 rooms. The outside had stick on paper bricks and the roof had stick on paper tiles. Somehow they had found scraps of carpet and wallpaper to cover the floors and walls, and there were handmade curtains on the painted on windows. The couch and matching chairs were made from matchboxes covered in a blue floral fabric and the painted chest of drawers was made from matchboxes too. The wooden bed had a knitted blanket and tiny pillows stuffed with cotton wool. There were other things, including a family of tiny dolls, and I absolutely loved it. I didn't worry that there were no stairs or internal doors. Nor that when the front was closed I couldn't see inside. I cherished that doll house for years and it was only when I was much older that I realised how much love had gone into the making of it.
I remember, too, the blue pinafore dress that arrived one Christmas. It was dark blue with bright pink daisies embroidered around the bodice and I loved it. It was much later that I discovered it had been made from my mother's airforce uniform and that she had sawn it together and embroidered the daisies. My father, who had worked in the northern mills before the war as a cutter, had made the pattern and cut it out for her.
When I see what my grandchildren receive now at Christmas, I don't begrudge any of it, but I do wonder if they enjoy their Christmas stockings quite as much as children did when there was so much less to be had. Then, the tangerine in the toe together with a small bar of chocolate, a packet of wax crayons, a colouring book and maybe some plasticine and a few other things were the highlight of the year. I remember a mouth organ, a set of dibs or jacks (does anyone play that now?) a skipping rope, a drawing pad, a small box of watercolour paints, and of course books. Books were read again and again and if they began to fall apart they were mended and covered with brown paper. I still have a very battered book that was my mother's when she was a child and which she read to me, one chapter every Sunday, until we finished it. Then, when I was older, I read and re-read it for myself. It is one of the original copies of Anne of Green Gables, and it is still one of my favourite stories.
Nancy is right. Times have certainly changed but they have left behind some lovely memories.
Happy Christmas everyone. May you all be blessed and may 2023 be good to us all.
