Chapter Nine; Life On Chapel Street
Dear Reader,
Yesterday I found myself looking up at the building that my mother used to live in with her parents and brother.
I stood, my eyes drinking in the old red bricks, the huge windows and the stairs which I could see through the window in the front door. I had heard about this stairs from stories from my mother.
My grandfather was a butcher, the building was his shop Read & Co. and the stairs lead up to the house. At Christmas, when overrun with orders they would have to stack the turkeys up the stairs with little name tags on them. When the customer arrived to pick up their turkey my mother and her brother would have to run up and down the stairs trying to find the right customers name on tens of turkeys. The thought of it always made me laugh.
I wasn't sure what I was meant to feel, I had never been there with my mother and had only heard about 'Chapel Street' through stories. Suddenly I was here, standing in front of the window she used to look out of, walking along the street she would walk along, accidentally having lunch in the restaurant she used to work in.
I felt the ghost of her past all around me, I couldn't decide whether it mattered that I was there or whether it was all irrelevant because she was gone. What is the point, dear reader, if she isn't here to tell me her stories, to teach me about her life? If felt as though I was learning everything a little too late.
I couldn't believe it when I found out that the place I was sitting and eating was where she once waited tables, I'm not sure I could even explain the feeling that I experienced, it was as though I had been hit be a tidal wave. The emotion slammed into me and I don't know whether I felt closer or further away from her than I had ever felt before.
I wish I had asked her more about her life whilst she was alive. Hearing about her life second hand, as lovely as it is, is never quite the same as hearing it from the horses mouth. If you'll excuse the turn of phrase. Wouldn't it be lovely if we could hear the voices of those we had lost? Just every now and again, telling us our favourite joke or a little story... Wouldn't that be wonderful?
There are only a few things I can just about still hear mummy saying if I listen hard enough and the only one that comes to mind right now is a quote from Disney's Robin Hood, where King John says, "Hiss! You're never around when I need you!"
It's completely irrelevant but I think that's okay. I think, maybe, it might be the irrelevant ones that are most important. It certainly makes me smile anyway.
Goodnight dear reader and if you're ever in Chapel Street, The Giggling Squid has great food and a great waitress (around 35 years ago).
S.P.
Yesterday I found myself looking up at the building that my mother used to live in with her parents and brother.
I stood, my eyes drinking in the old red bricks, the huge windows and the stairs which I could see through the window in the front door. I had heard about this stairs from stories from my mother.
My grandfather was a butcher, the building was his shop Read & Co. and the stairs lead up to the house. At Christmas, when overrun with orders they would have to stack the turkeys up the stairs with little name tags on them. When the customer arrived to pick up their turkey my mother and her brother would have to run up and down the stairs trying to find the right customers name on tens of turkeys. The thought of it always made me laugh.
I wasn't sure what I was meant to feel, I had never been there with my mother and had only heard about 'Chapel Street' through stories. Suddenly I was here, standing in front of the window she used to look out of, walking along the street she would walk along, accidentally having lunch in the restaurant she used to work in.
I felt the ghost of her past all around me, I couldn't decide whether it mattered that I was there or whether it was all irrelevant because she was gone. What is the point, dear reader, if she isn't here to tell me her stories, to teach me about her life? If felt as though I was learning everything a little too late.
I couldn't believe it when I found out that the place I was sitting and eating was where she once waited tables, I'm not sure I could even explain the feeling that I experienced, it was as though I had been hit be a tidal wave. The emotion slammed into me and I don't know whether I felt closer or further away from her than I had ever felt before.
I wish I had asked her more about her life whilst she was alive. Hearing about her life second hand, as lovely as it is, is never quite the same as hearing it from the horses mouth. If you'll excuse the turn of phrase. Wouldn't it be lovely if we could hear the voices of those we had lost? Just every now and again, telling us our favourite joke or a little story... Wouldn't that be wonderful?
There are only a few things I can just about still hear mummy saying if I listen hard enough and the only one that comes to mind right now is a quote from Disney's Robin Hood, where King John says, "Hiss! You're never around when I need you!"
It's completely irrelevant but I think that's okay. I think, maybe, it might be the irrelevant ones that are most important. It certainly makes me smile anyway.
Goodnight dear reader and if you're ever in Chapel Street, The Giggling Squid has great food and a great waitress (around 35 years ago).
S.P.
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