Remembering...

I have blogged before about my families' remembrance Sunday tradition of visiting the cenetaph in London. However since we are all scattered across the British aisles with families of our own it doesn't happen anymore but above is a layout I made to celebrate this tradition. In fact we also have some video footage of us all red nosed and shivering, but happily, waiting on a wall to wave at the Queen. My little sister, Gem, always had her 'boy' hat on.

The journalling on the layout reads:

"There are a few things I love about this photo. Firstly we are waiting in the freezing cold to watch the remembrance day parade and that is a family tradition we always loved. Secondly the green jeans, the multi-coloured jumper and baseball cap are 90's fashion all over. Lastly I have my nose stuck in a book and not just any book one of The Babysitter's Club books. I loved those books and got the whole series. It's always the little things that you remember about a big day."

I have always thought its funny the things we remember and how somebody can be at the same event as you but yet remember things completely different to the details that you remember. In fact it is one of the things that I discuss with my sixth formers when we study 'Aspects of Narrative' and the factors that affect the readers' relationship with a novel. I always get them to tell me the details that they remember from prom as an example of how each person's story is different. One girl had just broken up with her long-term boyfriend and so spent the evening glum in the corner, whereas one had over indulged and spent the evening hugging the toilet and one had got to dance with the guy she had always liked throughout school so it was the best night of her life!

Recently members of my extended family have posted pictures of my grandparents on Facebook. Both pictures that I had never seen before and so I was very excited to see them when they were younger and to imagine their lives before me. Since this blog is part of my own personal records and family history I thought I would note down some of my memories of my grandads:-

Grandpa Jones: 

• he made great bread pudding and he would give it to us covered in tin foil and my dad and I would devour it on the way home.
• he always made really tasty roast dinners when we visited on a Sunday and even though I always told him that I was vegetarian, he always gave me meat as he didn't "believe" in being veggie and so I would just slide it onto my sisters plate when he wasn't looking . It was always greatly received by her.
• he had a 'mighty mouse' in his shoulder and would twitch his muscle and we would scream with delight. I think that I really believed that it was a mouse.
• he had a dry sense of humour and I could never tell if he was being serious or not.

Grandad Dallendar:

• I only met him on a handful of occasions as he lived in South Africa and one of these of these times was a two week holiday to France.
• He loved playing cards and taught me to play rummy on that holiday.
• He got stuck halfway down a water slide at the camp sight as it was the children's one! So this little French boy, who was next in the queue, just went down after him and simply climbed over him when he got to the 'obstruction'. We all found it hilarious!
• He loved Maggie Thatcher and thought that she had done great things for our country. (He was an Eastender but moved to South Africa with the army.)

I will leave you with my favourite stanza from the poem Flanders Fields:-

"We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields."