WI Memoir Story
The WI Memoir Programme 2011 has produced some inspiring some inspiring and thought-provoking stories. Here is an example of the quality of the work we have received, from Sue Collett, Brightwell cum Sotwell, Oxon, WI.
BEACH SUNDAY
Sue Collett
The recent death of both my parents provoked a flood of childhood memories,which, when shared and layered with those of my siblings, become an increasingly vivid patchwork quilt of my early life. I hang on to it like a security blanket. I am the eldest of five children, born in 1944. My sister Stephanie followed 16 months later, a lifetime ally. My brother Paul, the apple of my mother’s eye, was sandwiched between two more girls, Lynne, and Mandy, the youngest, born in 1955.
The fifties were a time of austerity, but my parents tried their best to give us good times to remember. We lived close to the south coast, so beach trips were a frequent highlight of summer weekends and those memories are strong.Four pairs of sandals lay on the door mat, polished to within an inch of their lives, beside them, red leather bootees ready for baby’s podgy feet.
“Ouch, you’re hurting me,” the little girl sitting on the bottom stair squealed, as her older sisters tugged her hair into a huge white bow, rather more viciously than was strictly necessary.
“Let me help,” Dad gently intervened, before a full scale tantrum ensued. Mum rushed past with an armful of towels and bathing costumes to add to a steadily increasing pile in the hallway. It was a beach Sunday.
Our day began early as we peered anxiously out of the bedroom windows: cold winds and heavy cloud cover and the day out would be snatched away. Once the decision was made, it was sensible to try to help Mum get ready, or at least keep a low profile until we were finally assembled by the front door to pass muster.
I see my mother now, marching along with the combined weight of us all hanging onto the baby’s pushchair. Every now and then Mum would slap our hands off the handle to lighten her load, and we would fall sullenly behind with Dad, who would be burdened with coats and sandwich boxes, but still humming a cheerful tune.
Our excitement was heightened by the prospect of a journey on our beloved ‘Hayling Island Puffing Billy’. It was a thriving, single track line from Havant to Hayling Island, crossing Langstone Harbour via a wooden viaduct with a swing bridge in the middle. Its popularity was all too evident as we queued for our tickets with other eager families. Crowding onto the platform, every one inched forward as the train hissed to a standstill. We vied for a carriage door, whilst making sure the little ones didn’t slip between the carriages or dart off to look at the engine stoking.
Dad heaved the over-stuffed bags onto the net racks, as we sat down with the little ones on our laps, buckets and spades clanking. With a slow, laboured chugging sound, the train grudgingly left the station, shortly to cross the wooden bridge over Langstone Harbour. I always held my breath as we inched our way across the murky stretch of water. In my mind’s eye, I saw us topple, doors flying open, bags, buckets, babies, sunhats, spades and sandwiches, dogs and Dads, tots and teens, all cascading into the thick glutinous mud. This wasn’t such a neurotic flight of fancy, as the line was subsequently closed in the sixties when the bridge was deemed unsafe.
The train rocks from side to side, “nearly there, nearly there,” then grunts and shunts into the station, “slowly, slower, stop!” Doors fly open, a great tide of people spread across the platform, force through the narrow gate and finally out into Staunton Avenue. Framed by the long avenue of plane trees, we can see a tantalising square of blue sea and sky.
My mother sets off at breakneck speed to claim a prized spot on the beach. Stephanie and I lag behind to indulge our favourite game of “which of the posh beach houses will I own when I ‘m grown up?” We fantasise about the merits of the pink house with the balcony, moving on to the green roofed house with the double swing and the fish pond. We are roused from our childish daydreams by Dad returning to hurry us along. Mum has already spread the tartan rug over the flattest shelf of pebbles near a narrow fringe of sand, where we can keep an eye on the little ones as they play in the shallow pools with their buckets and spades.
Lynne, aged four, already kneeling and filling her bucket, looks out from underneath a white sun bonnet with a satisfied smile on her pretty, freckled face. In her pushchair, Mandy kicks her chubby brown legs, and shrieks impatiently, anxious to be part of the scene Within a couple of minutes, Paul is skimming stones onto the water and then hurls himself in, drenching everyone hovering nearby. Stephanie and I struggle self-consciously under our towels, trying to wriggle into our well worn costumes, without revealing too much white bottom or, worse, nipples the size of a sixpence. I have had my costume since I was seven. Good grief, I’m now ten and the ‘all-over’ shirring elastic is sorely tested.
We take the baby down onto the sand and her little legs buckle under her weight, plop onto her well padded bottom as she grabs a handful of sand to taste. Behind his newspaper, Dad tries to convince himself that he’s come for a rest. Mum busily folds clothes and pairs up shoes, keeping a watchful eye on her brood. Paul waves at us to join him, so we dump the baby into Mum’s lap and hobble awkwardly over the pebbles, flinty stones and broken shells. The first ankle- deep water gives us a shiver of excitement, but I try to disguise my ambivalent feelings about sea-bathing, as Stephanie wades in confidently.
At the age of five, I remember all too clearly a visit to a crowded beach at Southsea.
I followed my sister down a concrete slipway. With a briefly startled look, she suddenly disappeared off the end, into the sea. Pushing through the children behind me, I ran back to my parents sobbing. My father raced fully clothed to haul her out, and I remember the mixture of pride and embarrassment I felt when he had to travel home wearing wet trousers. Shortly afterwards, I remember a huge liner coming too close to the beach, as it came to dock in Portsmouth Harbour, causing a swell of water which pushed us back up the beach in panic. I sometimes had nightmares of giant waves roaring over us and flooding the land and felt that the sea could be a frightening and unpredictable force. As I grew older, repeated visits were confidence building and I realised that there was nothing to beat the gentle buoyancy of the salty waves.
Today, I take a sharp intake of breath as the waves hit my stomach and I force myself to acclimatise to the icy water. I can feel the water pulling and relaxing as we practise floating on our tummies and our backs and putting our heads under the salty water. We know not to drift too far away from where our parents sit. As we wade back to the beach, there’s a sharp tingling as the shingle drags itself over our wax-white toes. We wait for a sibling to vacate a spot on the rug, huddling under a skimpy towel with blue lips and fingers. I lie on a corner of the rug, waiting for the clouds to blow over. I prop my book awkwardly against a towel roll and realise that total ‘beach bliss’ is rarely achieved.
Mum starts to unwrap the picnic: sandwiches are fairly shared out, sandwich spread, cheese or meat paste and cucumber. A Christmas biscuit tin, with a picture of the royal family on the lid, contains chunks of Mum’s fruitcake, and another has homemade melting moment cookies. We all had healthy appetites, sharpened by the sea air, and my mother took pride in providing good food for us all.
In later years, we moved up in the world, when Dad proudly bought his first car. Mum grew more ambitious, with a novel idea that we could take our Sunday lunch with us if the weather was chilly. Slices of meat, roast potatoes and vegetables were wrapped in towels and blankets and gravy produced in a flask. As I grew older, this became an embarrassing ritual, and I would try to sit at a discreet distance from my family. Now, I recall it as an affectionate tribute to my mum’s spirit and ingenuity.
Picnic over, we were promised one ride at the fair, which never satisfied us. Would it be the helter-skelter, the big wheel or the tawdry, toy stall? We would linger over the candy floss machine or gaze at multicolour sticks of peppermint rock. Making the choice was difficult and immediately regretted, but with five children my parents finances were stretched to the limit, and I now wonder how on earth they managed as well as they did.
Occasionally, we were treated to a lemonade in the garden of the Barley Mow pub and I see myself wriggling on to Dad’s lap. He’s wearing a fresh open-necked shirt and a well worn sports jacket, rough against my bare arms. As I am the eldest, this is a rare treat and I smooth down his hair to make a funny style, whilst my brother stretches his ears from behind to look like Dumbo. There is usually a joke on the tip of his tongue, but today he starts to sing quietly,
“If you were the only girl in the world and I were the only boy, nothing else would matter in this world today.” He’s singing especially for me, and I know I’m his favourite child. Strange then, that years later my sisters all said that they felt that they were.
More often, my parents finished the day with a cup of tea in one of the beach cafes. We’d peer into the window at day old cakes under a glass dome. My mother would point out that there was a fly on the plate and assure us that they were probably stale. Grumbling out of earshot, we’d follow her in, as she did an instant appraisal of the cleanliness of the crockery and tablecloths and gauge the strength of the tea. If it failed to measure up to my mother’s exacting standards, we’d suffer the embarrassment of a clumsy retreat.
The journey home was a more muted affair, as we trudged down the long avenue towards the station, occasionally looking back for a dropped bathing costume and struggling with bags stuffed with wet towels. Our cheeks stung with sunburn, and once-neat ribbons straggled down our wisps of wet hair, as we were chivvied onto the waiting train. Tiredness overwhelmed us all. The long walk from station to home was daunting, and bath and bed beckoned. My mother was no doubt already thinking of the pile of ironing she needed to do ready for Monday morning, and the line of fluffy, white nappies she hoped to have out on the line before her neighbours.
About
I am a retired teacher with an interest in supporting children with special educational needs. I enjoy the sociability of village life in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, and play a full part in many activities that involve the creative arts.
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell WI