RECOLLECTIONS - CHAPTER #1.

To new friends and old ones. This is a little memoir I wrote just on five years ago as a gift for my old Mum's 92nd birthday..... she lives in South Africa with my brother, Edward, and sister-in-law, Joan.

Mum is 96 years old now - brave and feisty - and, although her health could be a lot better than it is, Eddie and I often feel that she may well outlive us both.

I was born in South Africa 74 years ago, have lived in seven different countries and now reside in Toronto, Canada, with a husband, a step-son and two Siamese cats. My story has sixteen chapters in all so, if you care to read on, I will start at Chapter 1 of Recollections of a Joyful Life.
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CHAPTER #1.

This is the second year of a new century and the year in which I turn seventy.

It's strangely awesome to have reached this advanced chronological age without growing old inside because, most of the time, I really don't feel much more than about forty.

Like most people, when I was young I just couldn’t wait to grab life by the throat and give it a good shake. I even had the confidence to think that one day I might accomplish something special myself! Of course, I had no idea what that something might be - it was just a vague hope that someday I would light a little fire of my own out there in the world.

Alas, the years passed by far too quickly. No matter how hard I rubbed two sticks together, I was unable to produce more than a few little puffs of smoke. So now, having finally put away my pyrotechnic dreams, I can concentrate on simply being grateful for the gift of life my parents gave me, for the love of my family and friends, and for the sense of humour that I know will help me make it through those golden years ahead.

On being born and family portraits

Looking back in time, I don't remember my actual birth itself, of course, but I've seen enough of them on television to know what it must have been like. The year was 1932, during the Great Depression; my father had been out of work for two years and times were tough. Then my brother came along 13 months later to make it even tougher.

I wondered why my parents chose to have two children during the Depression - were they so filled with passion that they couldn't contain themselves? Were we accidents of that lack of self control? I don't know. Dad's not here to enlighten me and Mum's certainly not talking.

Like so many other young families who had to live with their parents during those difficult times, we stayed with my grandparents in Pietermaritzburg until Dad was able to find work again. Years later, after we were well and truly established living in Johannesburg, it was turnabout and my grandparents came to stay with us. I don't remember how long our extended family lived together but it was a happy, carefree time for my brother and me, as we remained blissfully unaware of any financial constraints there might have been on the family budget.

Our Dad, Harry, was a handsome man who loved to have fun with us but he was also a strict disciplinarian who taught us to behave properly and always be polite. Mum, on the other hand, was a loving, kind pussycat - we knew we could get away with anything as far as she was concerned.

We also knew that our Mum was beautiful, with sparkly, brown, almond-shaped eyes. Dad told us she was Chinese. Then he said that he'd had to pull her out of a tree in Rhodesia and cut off her tail before he could marry her. When we were small we didn't know whether to believe him or not and it's probable that on more than one occasion, her bottom was felt surreptitiously to see if there was any evidence of that mythical tail.

Grandfather Pratt, a big, bluff man, never lost his Yorkshire accent. "Put two fingers of whisky in that glass for me, luv", he'd say, "and fill it up with water". It was a task I assumed when he came home from work each night and sat himself down at the kitchen table.

Everyone congregated in that kitchen, especially in wintertime, because, apart from the fact that it would be filled with the wonderful fragrance of mother's baking, it contained a huge coal stove that radiated warmth even on the coldest days. Mum would make her own bread in those days and it was customary always to see two loaves, covered by a warm blanket, set near the stove to rise.

Alongside the rising bread, would be a tray containing small lumps of dough which were destined to be fried up into "fat cookies". These little deep-fried rolls, spread with butter and Lyle's Golden syrup, were pure ambrosia.

It was a shock when our grandfather died unexpectedly in 1944 (of a thrombosis) and our lives changed even more when, a year or two after his death, Gran moved back to Pietermaritzburg to live with Aunt Nell - one of the five Pratt siblings. These were (in order of birth): Doris, Nell, Harry, Sid, Bernard, and Gwen.

Gran was a real character and we loved her dearly. She would often say to us "Don't call me Grandma in front of anyone - just call me Elizabeth". Also, if anything went wrong she would occasionally say "Shit!", much to our delight and my father's annoyance, because he felt that she was not setting a good example for his children.

In her bedroom Gran kept a musical jug that played "On Ilkla Moor, baht 'at" which had on it little drawings to illustrate each verse: the tale of two courting lovers who met on Ilkla moor without their hats, how they caught cold and died, were buried on the moor, then eaten by worms which, in turn, were eaten by ducks. The ducks eventually became eaten by "us" and the circle of life was completed. I knew all those verses by heart and could probably sing them still.

Both my grandparents, my father and his two sisters, Doris and Nell, were born in Yorkshire, England; they emigrated to South Africa when Dad was only two years old but they never lost their accents. Gran died when I was about twenty and even though she was no longer living with us at the time we had visited her frequently over the years and missed her very much.

The aunts and uncles mentioned above were the ones with whom we were most familiar - but there was another whole slew of aunts and uncles on my mother's side living in Rhodesia - the Thurtells. Mum had six siblings: Edward, Thomas, Arthur, Henry, Sid and Eileen, all of whom are now dead..... however, that's another story. Although some cousins have died, too, I still have quite a few of them scattered around the world.

Primary school days.

When we were small, my brother and I could walk to school from our home in Cottesloe: down a steep road, across a busy street (at the light, of course) and then over a large, grassy field to Richmond Primary School. Here we worked our ways through Standards 1 to 5. In South Africa the school system consists of 5 years in primary school and 5 years in high school. I was always a year ahead of my brother, of course, being a year older.

During lunch breaks we often played in two enormous peppercorn trees behind the school building, supposedly off limits to children, but climbed by them anyway. I'd never seen peppercorn trees before, nor since, but can still recall their pungent odor and visualize the delicate pink peppercorns that carpeted the earth beneath them.

Many school teachers came and went during my school years, some left good impressions and some were bad. Several of those first primary school teachers still take up space in my memory: Mr. Coldry (the principal) who taught us English, Miss Vandenburg, the Geography teacher with her piercing blue eyes and really short, mannish haircut, and Miss Pienaar who wore rimless glasses and would punish naughtiness in (mostly) boys by beating them with a length of rubber tubing that stung like blazes. Those were the days when that type of abuse was not only tolerated but thought to be the only way to instill obedience into recalcitrant children. Being a well-behaved girl myself, of course, I was never subjected to any such indignities but I expect my brother got a cut or two during his school career.

Touch and go.

You'll be glad to know that this journey into my past will not contain lengthy anecdotes about ailments I've had over the years - even though there have been quite a few. There was one episode, however, that does warrant a mention. At the age of eight, I developed peritonitis and spent over a month in hospital - for the first 5 days in a coma. Since my survival was in doubt at the time, Mum stayed in the hospital with me, day and night, until I turned the proverbial corner. I recall nurses putting an enormous hotbox on my stomach from time to time - it was a large metal dome, lined with row upon row of light bulbs - which, presumably, was designed to hasten healing. I wonder if modern doctors would consider using such an apparatus now.

Nothing could rival the absolute joy I felt when it came time to leave that hospital. My going home outfit included a beautiful blue astrakhan coat that Mum had knitted for me herself, a blue knitted beret and a pair of leather slippers to match. Weak and skinny as a matchstick I hid behind the door of my bedroom just before Dad arrived home so I could jump out to surprise him. It was a great homecoming.

As a treat, after that ordeal, Mum took Eddie and me on a trip to Rhodesia to visit Granddad Thurtell and the famous Victoria Falls. When we reached the falls, our train stopped on a bridge and we trooped out onto an observation platform, all of us dressed in raincoats because spray from the falls was so strong. Billed as one of the seven wonders of the world, we watched the continuous and endless thunder of water fall into the gorge below without realizing that the experience would be indelibly impressed on our young minds forever.

Granddad Thurtell was a large, very tall man with big brown eyes and a long droopy mustache. He worked on the railway and was always ready to put on his hat and go out - anywhere at all. The house he lived in had many trees in the garden and, while we were there, hundreds of tiny worms came down from the leaves on delicate strands of thread, getting in our hair and eyes.

There were spiders everywhere, too, and, although I didn't like either the worms or the spiders, we were fascinated by the resident chameleons and lizards, some of which were encouraged to live inside the house so they could dine on other less welcome insects and flies.

One of the highlights of our visit to Rhodesia was a trip we took to a crocodile-infested river for a picnic. Eddie and I were roused before dawn, bundled into the back of a pickup truck, bedded down on a nice thick mattress, given lots of pillows and covered with blankets. Too excited to sleep we drove through the black night serenaded by the squeaks, squeals and cracklings of unseen animals in the woods along the way. When day finally dawned we thrilled to frequent sightings of small bush babies (or nag aapies) with light reflecting off their enormous eyes as we sped by.

Although we never did see any crocodiles in the river where we picnicked, several large footprints of rhinos along the muddy banks persuaded us of the need to be extra cautious. Not surprisingly, the prospect of being eaten by a crocodile meant there was little interest in swimming that day. When the time came to leave, going home to Cottesloe must have seemed incredibly tame to two small children after having experienced the wildness of Rhodesia in those days.

Acquiring "culture" and other exciting events

It was around this time in our lives that Eddie and I were both introduced to piano lessons. A teacher came to our house once a week and poor Mum would have to suffer through the sound of endless scales and jerky renditions of The Skater's Waltz and other timeless favorites. Ed quickly lost interest in practising and while I continued to study for three or four years, achieving passable renditions of Grieg's Wedding March and Ketelby's In a Persian Garden and Bells Across the Meadow, it was clear to me that I was definitely not destined to ever become a musician.

Then, at primary school, I had my first, intoxicating taste of show business: school concerts! The thrill of getting dressed up in special costumes, being "made up" and going out, trembling with fear, onto the concert stage was irresistibly fascinating. From my first act as a sailor in Song of the Volga Boatmen, sitting on the floor rowing an imaginary boat, to playing a piano duet with another boy (whose name I have forgotten) and all the poems and skits in between, it was pure unadulterated fun.

Everyone in our family loved to sing and my grandfather had a particularly fine tenor voice. We would gather around the piano at home, with Aunt Doris pounding away, singing the songs of the day with enthusiastic gusto. When Irish Eyes are Smiling, Mother Machree, Because, Trees.... wonderful melodies all. Mum's favourite was Land of Hope and Glory and rafters would shake when we all let loose on that one.

Travelling to and from picnics meant going through our entire repertoire of songs and it never seemed to take any time at all to get to wherever we were going. We would stop, en route, to buy a big watermelon from one of the many roadside vendors and, whether the destination of choice was a river or a lake, once arrived we'd swim and splash to our hearts' content, play games, lie in the sun getting burned to a crisp, or just laze away the lovely, long summer days.

Spiritual education and more show business.

Although Mum and Dad were not great church goers they did make sure that Ed and I went regularly to Sunday School. Each Sunday after lunch we'd get dressed up in our best clothes and wait for a bus at the end of the road to take us to the United Methodist Church in Melville. We thoroughly enjoyed the Bible stories and other activities were wonderful too, but one day, after listening to a particularly frightening fire-and-brimstone sermon, I became deeply worried. I knew that Eddie and I would be going to heaven eventually because we attended Sunday School regularly but, because our parents did not, they were bound for another destination altogether. For days I pleaded with them to go to church so we could all be in heaven together, but to no avail. Eventually I gave up, resigned to the fact that my brother and I would have to spend eternity in heaven without them.

The best thing about going to church, for me, was being able to sing in the choir and, as a result of that, I was invited to warble Danny Boy and Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam as a solo on the radio. This caused my family members to break into such a storm of proud weeping that they barely heard the broadcast at all.

By this time I had been taking singing lessons for a year or so from Mrs. Evans, a Welsh lady who called herself Madame Evanie. Six of her students were selected to sing nursery rhymes on stage at the Empire Theatre, while a troupe of young dancers interpreted them. The excitement backstage was palpable as we changed into long dirndl skirts and puffy-sleeved white blouses under laced-up bodices. Finally, white doilies pinned on top of our heads, we were ON! After getting through the performance unscathed we each went our separate ways, ears still ringing with the intoxicating sound of loud and appreciative applause.

Somewhere around this time my taste for show biz was further fuelled by Miss Tudhope. The Women's Christian Temperance Union held an Elocution Contest each year and our Sunday School teacher, Miss Tudhope, became the ardent coach of any likely contestants from our church. Happily, I was chosen to be one of them. For three consecutive years I learned the prescribed poems with great concentration and recited them with the utmost dramatic zeal. Miss T., conducting each contestant with her hands (as though we were musicians), would contort her face and say the words along with each of us.

You can imagine the pleasure we both felt when I won first prize, in my category, each time. The prizes were always books, suitably inscribed of course. The first one was called The Lamplighter, a perfectly appropriate choice for abstemious young ladies of the day, written (if memory serves me right) by Mrs. Catherine Gaskell. I'm sure the other books, whose titles have been long forgotten, were equally uplifting.

Life in Cottesloe.

In Cottesloe we lived in a house made of wood and iron. It had a long verandah stretching across the entire front, one end of which was shaded by a beautiful wisteria vine intertwined with ivy. A fence along the property prevented stray dogs from digging up the flower beds and a large palm tree stood guard to one side. Dozens of fruit trees on both sides of the house kept us well supplied with fruits in season and there were two mulberry trees which, together, loomed as large as our house itself.

Picking those mulberries in the summertime dyed our hands, feet and lips bright purple but that was of little consequence because we knew the sweet black berries would soon be baked into one of Mum's mouthwatering mulberry and apple pies. Each day, it seemed, one or two unknown children would come to the back door, lips already stained purple, clutching bowls or paper bags, to ask if they might “have a few mulberries to take home”. They always received permission to do so as there was plenty to go around.

When I revisited Cottesloe, some fifty years later, it was to find that all the houses on that street had been demolished to make way for much newer buildings and homes. No matter, I will always be able to remember sitting on the front steps on hot summer days, with my dad and brother, listening to the buzzing of bees, while Dad taught us to identify the models and makes of cars as they drove by. Of course when I grew into my teens this activity no longer interested me but for then it was companionable and made me feel like one of the "boys".

Crime, Punishment and Neighbours

My grandparents had a bedroom at one end of the house in Cottesloe and my parents' bedroom was at the other end. Eddie and I had rooms somewhere in the middle. I tell you this because on one unforgettable night a burglar decided that our house might prove to be a possible source of income.

Mum was woken up by the sound of curtain rings being slid slowly along a rod. Opening her eyes she saw a huge figure about to step through the window onto the dressing table. She quickly poked my father in the ribs; he woke up with a loud grunt which immediately caused the burglar to beat a sensible retreat. Dad then jumped out of bed, picked up a flashlight and set off down the passage towards the bathroom, which was midway between his bedroom and that of my grandparents.

In the meantime my Grandfather, alerted by the sound of someone moving through the house, decided to do some investigating of his own. He grabbed a knobkerrie, which is a short thick stick with a huge lump of lead on the end (used by Zulu warriors as a weapon), and set off along the passage in search of the intruder.

By now Dad had reached the bathroom and was peering out of the window. When he heard grandfather at the door, he turned around, shone the flashlight into his face and said "It's all right, Dad, it's only me". Unfortunately my dad's teeth were in a glass beside his bed and granddad, blinded by the light, couldn't understand what he was saying so, assuming dad to be a burglar, he raised the knobkerrie and brought it down with a thunderous whack on my father's head!

When grandfather switched on the light and saw my father slumped over the bathtub, with blood gushing everywhere, the shock almost gave him a heart attack. If it hadn't been for my father's unusually thick skull, which was deeply fractured by the blow, he would have been killed and my grandfather might have been jailed for manslaughter.

Next door to us lived an Afrikaans policemen, called Mr. Oosterhuizen. His proximity should have made us feel safe from burglars but because he was a member of an organization called the Ossewabrandwag we suspected him of being a Nazi spy. He also used to keep chickens in his back yard. Each Saturday he would chase one of them around the coop, chop off its head, and eat it for Sunday dinner. This dreaded weekly event was made worse by his two children who used to play with the severed chicken legs by yanking on tendons to make their feet move.

Another family, across the street and two houses down, kept several geese in the garden to act as an early alarm system. Whenever anyone came to their gate the geese would make so much noise that even their neighbours would jump up to peer through curtains in case burglars were lurking in the shadows of their own gardens.

Family Pets.

Unfortunately, crime in South Africa has always been rampant so most people keep big watchdogs in their homes or gardens for protection. Although we never had any big dogs of our own there was a time when our grandfather bred wire-haired fox terriers as a hobby. They were bright and intelligent little dogs but I always dreaded the time when new puppies had to have their tails docked. At the first glimpse of docking shears I would hurry off up the street to visit my friend, Yvonne Else, staying there until all the snipping had been done and it was safe to return home.

After granddad died we began slowly to acquire Pekingese dogs until there were four or five of them around the house at one time or another. The eldest was Lady who would invariably eat her food from a prone position, Tito and one-eyed Toffee were mortal enemies who fought constantly and had always to be kept separated from each other, and Bully, an impressive lion peke, who was once stolen from the garden.

This dog napping caused much panic in the household and Mum went to great lengths to advertise his disappearance in newspapers, store windows and on telephone poles, offering a generous reward for his safe return. Eventually, some 6 weeks later, a kind stranger found Bully walking down the centre of a distant street, thin and dehydrated, paws bloodied, but headed in the direction of home. One phone call and an emotional reunion later meant peace once more restored in the Pratt household.

High School Days

I graduated from primary school at the age of 12 and looked forward after that to be going to an all-girls school. Although it would mean taking two buses to get there, Parktown Girls' High had an excellent reputation and I felt fortunate to have been enrolled there. It certainly was a far cry from the small primary school I had been attending up to that point.

Parktown is a well-to-do neighbourhood and the school was an impressive stone mansion with ivy-covered walls, an imposing entranceway and manicured grounds. Students all wore uniforms. In the summertime these were powder blue tunics with white blouses, black shoes, white socks and a white Panama hat with a band of school colours: black, blue and white stripes. Winter uniforms consisted of tunics made of navy blue serge, long-sleeved white shirts with school ties, navy tights, black shoes and navy hats. We all looked extremely sharp in our uniforms and I soon became a rabid supporter of all things to do with my new school.

At primary school I had been accustomed to being one of the top students but I soon discovered that high school was a different kettle of fish altogether. Lessons were harder, standards higher and I had to study harder to keep up.

Sports were compulsory, also, and I chose net ball over field hockey and tennis over swimming. Net ball was exciting, especially when we played competitively against other schools, but I always got headaches playing tennis in the hot sun so I never really enjoyed that.

My mother, on the other hand, was a very good tennis player and belonged to a local tennis club. So Mum and I made a pact: she would play tennis on weekends while I prepared all the meals and baked whatever cakes I desired. This satisfactory arrangement proved to be a creative outlet for me and gave Mum a really well-deserved break from her daily chores.