Nostalgia (With Amendments)
Written by Joanne Tedds on Tuesday the 22nd of November 2011
Unlike most people, Freddy liked October. Clear skies and crisp air cut through the complacency of summer and made a man want to work. Factory work and sunshine was the devils joke. Not that he believed in the devil. Now all his holidays were spent, he was happy to take comfort from the warmth of the machines again. Peering cheekily through the latticed windows, Uncle Freddy presses the doorbell and waits to see a familiar mass of curly blonde hair ducking to miss a low wind-chime. "Ayup Freddeh. What you doing here?” Looking behind him surveilling the street. "Come in off the step then.” He followed her into the tiny kitchen. What she didn't have in size she made up for in cleanliness and order. "You've just missed our Tony. Came round to borra ladders.” Flicking the kettle. Slim as a girl and though she'd shifted most of the stubborn swells of pregnancy, a little paunch of family still rested on Carols front. She had a pretty, so not an unkind face, that had buried hers and everybody else's troubles deep in the creases of her smile lines. Her eyes, always ready to listen, searched every face for a story. "Did he just come round to scrounge a free dinner? He'd do owt to get his'sen a Sunday plate up, fixed by your fine hands Carol.” "Spose your' ongry yourself young Freddy” His hands cupped to beg and eyes opened innocent wide "I wouldn' say no” he winked. Flattered she giggled like a young girl. "Ya daft bogger” Slapping him with the tea towel she pushed him through the row of shell, dolphin and bell chimes collected from other peoples holidays abroad and one or two of their own, to the sitting room. She was good our Carol, the sort who was quick to laugh and to cry. "Your brothers in there. Fasta sleep as usual” ''Ard work?” "Are you picking my daisies or what Freddy? Whadyou reckon? He's just come back from the social club. Too sociable if you asked me, he's pissed as a rat!”
Freddy sat on the sofa that his brother Art and wife Carol bought new some twenty odd years ago. Mottled brown and shabby, a bobbly wool blend that had been restyled regularly with posh shop bought cushion covers that were now and for the last couple of years a flat lime green. Marge and Homer tweeted happily. Their cage previously the home of Mork and Mindy, Sonny and Cher, John and Yoko. Carol didn't half love them budgies. Talked to them as though they were listening. She was daft.
It started like any ordinary day. Ordinary folk treasure the peace in their ordinary lives above everything else. Freddy didn't peddle in drama, excitement was too often tragic. Better not to know. Women's business any road he thought.
Carol brought in two steaming cups of tea in the boys favourite mugs. Arts read "World's best Dad” but the kids had doctored it with Carols red nail varnish. It now read "Drunk.” But he couldn't have been that bad otherwise they'd a not got away we it. Freddy's was a mug that had been saved from his Mothers house. Floral design, a rim of gold that streaked down the handle and around the base. Must have been bone china, probably not a Spode but almost certainly from Stoke-on-Trent. Auntie Julie married a man called Harry from that way.
It reminded him of earlier days, the nostalgia warmed him nearly as good as the tea did. Sometimes just knowing you had a past, that you came from somewhere, was enough to get a man through life. It didn't matter that his memories were tepid, diluted and stretched with the years.
[story continues]