Wednesday 21 August 2019

Frightening the children


This, believe it or not, would be my family crest if ever my family had been ostentatious enough to use it. It would have been very unlikely, being from generations of pre-war East End Londoners. Tall Poppies usually got cut down in those days.

I can remember my father's sister giving me a very stern look if ever I tried to be clever, and felt very embarrassed if ever my father caught me unawares when I was doing something artistic, either painting, drawing or playing the piano.

We had two pianos in the house - one an ordinary upright and the other a big, black, shiny, full-size Grand. My sisters had piano lessons (which they hated) but I did not. I used to like tinkering away at improvisation, but always stopped if my father came into the room. He would tell me to carry on playing, but I never could.

Thinking back, I felt so effeminate in his presence. I wasn't in fact, but he was so extremely masculine that I always felt inadequate by comparison. He was very big and very handsome.

The funny thing was that whenever I was in the presence of genuinely effeminate and artistic men in later life, I felt stupidly masculine. I felt like a stoneware jug to their porcelain vase. It seemed as though I was inhibiting their flights of fancy with my earth-bound practicality.

I never realised until it was pointed out by my 14 year-old grand daughter that I could be seen as physically intimidating just by standing there without a smile on my face. Some people were actually scared of me - something which never occurred to me at the time. I didn't know I could be scary without trying.

All that is in the past now that I have reached the beginning of old age, but I still yearn to be seen as avuncular. That quality will be forever denied to me I fear.

16 comments:

  1. O wad some Power the giftie gie us, to see oursels as ithers see us.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I had to look it up to see exactly what it means. I see that there isn't really a female word for it except auntly or aunt like. I fear that I failed too. Well, let's be honest, I know I did.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. To me it means 'like an uncle' but there are uncles and uncles... I'm the sort who is not encouraged to visit often.

      Delete
  3. Replies
    1. I would have preferred a lion rampant - anything rampant really.

      Delete
  4. I am all for rampant anythings but have left it a bit late I fear.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's never too late for a rampant rabbit Weave.

      Delete
  5. I had piano lessons but didn’t make the most of it but, I am really good at Les Dawson, pub like piano !!!!!
    I can see that people might be a bit scared of you even though you are probably a pussycat !!! XXXX

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I see you more as a Mrs Mills than a Les Dawson. Pussy has claws...

      Delete
  6. Who came up with this family crest?

    Just a couple more years and you will enter the phase when young women notice you in the grocery store, fumbling with the tinned goods, and say: "Oh, look! He's so cute!"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A: I have no idea.

      B: I don't think so.

      Also, I will never 'fumble' with tinned goods. I might fumble with the young women, but that situation will take care of itself, naturally or unnaturally.

      Delete
  7. No tinned peaches, then, for your old age 😀

    ReplyDelete
  8. I had three kindly old uncles. One had a wooden leg, acquired when he tried to jump onto a box car, on a dare. He signed his name as Uncle Trank, for Frank. He became very old and died of Alzheimers. Once, when his dementia was very new and I was in my twenties, I blurted out he signed Uncle Trank and the F was missing a leg. That's how long it took me to gedit. He smiled and said Well done, young lady.

    ReplyDelete