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Ashbourne W.I. — Sketch 4: ‘Memories’

Cast:- Two ladies (Sheila and Sylvia). They sit reminiscing in front of the fire.

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Sheila: Thinking back, it was a very peculiar time in which we grew up.

Sylvia: Why? What makes you say that? How did it affect you?

Sheila: My father had to leave his chemist’s shop and go to work in the dispensary of the local hospital — a reserved occupation, I think. It had a few perks with it too. Somehow we managed to get extra sugar and cooking oil for Mum’s baking, and Grandad kept some hens and supplied us with eggs.

Sylvia: It doesn’t sound to me as if you suffered much at all.

Sheila: No, I must admit that we didn’t suffer in that way, but we did have soldiers billeted with us.

Sylvia: Did you really? Up in Lancashire?

Sheila: Yes, they sent them up from London. The soldiers thought it was so quiet and peaceful up there. That is, until the Germans started bombing Manchester. [. . . a pause . . .] However, the lodger I remember most vividly was the Ministry of Agriculture man we had billeted with us. Alan Bates was his name! I was quite certain he was a German spy.

Sylvia: Whatever made you think he was a spy?

Sheila: Goodness knows; but I remember being so afraid of him. One night, when mother was out, I fell out of bed and woke up with a bad nose-bleed, but I didn’t dare to go downstairs because Bates was babysitting.

Sylvia: Babysitting! Surely you didn’t need a babysitter?

Sheila: Oh yes we did. I was only nine at the time, and my little brother was only three.

Sylvia: And was he afraid of Bates?

Sheila: Oh no! Just the opposite — he loved going out with him. I remember one day he was so excited because Bates was taking him in his car to see a farm. Mother had dressed him up in a little knitted suit with Mickey Mouse braces, and a wash-leather jacket over the top. As they left, mother shouted to Bates, ‘Don’t forget to let him have a wee!’ I remember his face now: it was quite a study. He wasn’t used to dealing with little boys.

Sylvia: And how did he get on with him?

Sheila: Very well, considering. At least he was dry, but his trousers and braces were all in a twist, with his shirt hanging out — but neither Bates nor Timothy bothered about that. They had a great day.

Sylvia: What a good job you didn’t have a little sister!

Sheila: That is what we all thought. [Silence for a little while.] Another occasion I remember was the time Bates was ill with ‘flu. Mother confined him to bed so that we children didn’t catch it. One day she left him with the thermometer in his mouth while she went to fetch a drink. When she came back he had taken it out of his mouth and put it on the mantlepiece, above a good fire. She picked it up and read it. ‘Good heavens!’, she said, ‘You must be dead. Your temperature is 110 degrees’ How they both laughed!

Sylvia: Yes, it is strange how we only remember the good and funny things that happened — or was that, perhaps, because we were only children at the time? I remember when I first went to the Grammar Schol, every time the siren went the whole school had to go and crowd into filthy trenches dug out of the field behind the school. Later, shelters were built, but I don’t remember ever using them. [. . . a long pause . . .] Spam! Do you remember spam? We used to have it for Sunday supper.

Sheila: Oh, yes! We used to have it for school dinner. It was lovely --- came from America, I believe.

Sylvia: Yes, under the Lend-Lease Agreement. It is strange how it never tastes the same these days. [ . . . thinks . . .] And do you remember the Government Orange Juice we got on my little sister’s ration books?

Sheila: I do. We got that for my little brother as well.

Sylvia: It made lovely tasty Orange Curd.

Sheila: Did it, now? I don’t remember making that.

Sylvia: One good thing we all liked was the extra two weeks holiday we had in September for potato picking. We went to one of our farmer uncles’ farm and had a great time. And, finally, I think all of us will remember the end of the war, not only because of the end of hostilities, but for the parties, bonfires and sing-songs that were held in every village and street throughout the country.

CONCLUDING SONG

50 years on we look back and remember
Things that no longer we suffer today.
The war with its hardships, the conflict, the strife,
Were surmounted; new friendships were bonded,
The W.I. was a staff in this life.

50 years on, now afar and asunder,
Parted are those who were members long gone.
Join up, new recruits, continue the link,
Till the halls ring again and again
With the strains of Jerusalem.
Follow up — join the W.I.

[Sylvia Fogg, with apologies to Edward Ernest Bowen]

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