England -- Roseleigh
Without Prejudice
I was in England when The Beatles brought out "Sergeant Peppers Lonely Heart's Club Band"
I was still at Grammar School and I had had had to have it. So I conned My Dad, (Mum would never hand over money ) to let me wash his Bedford Van for 10 Shillings, ( the cost of the Album,) inside and out and it gleamed when I finished.
And then I caught the bus to Wakefield ( Up town or Top Of Kirkgate ) and snapped up a copy and made the bus back to Ossett and ran home, LP clutched to my chest. No one else was impressed but I loved it.
Especially the song, "She's Leaving Home", and all of them. I thought it was new and innovative and my siblings thought it was "weird".
I thought they were weird, Jackie worked and seemed soooo much older than me. George was quiet and stayed in his room a lot and David was running around pretending to be a Dalek.
Jackie was great to me then, though I was still a little rat bag at 14, hoicking up my Skirt as soon as I left the house, and wearing ribbed tights in Winter, and in Summer Lace knee socks and Fabulous T bars.
I begged My Mum to buy them for me and she did as seconds from Wakefield Market and I ended up getting in a load of trouble wearing them, as did my friends, Denise Edsen and Caroline Holmes.
We were like St Trinian School girls. Lace socks, hoiked up skirts, All No No's at a posh Anglican Grammar School, that cost heaps for Private Students but for George and I nothing.
Our Mother was a former pupil there and we were allowed in on a 3 month trial. George and I loved it, school dinners, bonus, swimming Pool, undercover, 5 Massive gyms, a Theatre, Old stone walls.
Masters in Gowns and Mortar Boards, always, and hymns every day at assembly.
George and I were allowed to stay so we must have passed or maybe they just forgot about us.
It was so strange to start School in England. I had left in Grade 7 Aussie standard and was with kids who had been in Form One, five months.
They were already reading French, Latin and were way ahead of me. I who was top of the Class when I left Adelaide, floundered badly for the first few months.
I can only guess my English, History any thing written got me through, because my Maths and French were really bad.
I played a lot of sport, swimming team House captain, Hockey, Movement, gym, tennis, trampoline I was 12 and a half. And at that age, sport was all I thought of and moody dramatic poetry of the Heathcillfe and Cathy kind.
Swimming I had always done, cross country running. no. Gym, no, Hockey, no. Playing Hockey on a field of snow is not an exercise I would recommend, ever.
All the Mistresses looked very English, bulging calves wearing Gilly socks folded over and clumpy brogues and kilts or pleated skirts of good tweed.
I thought it was the ugliest outfit you could put a woman in. They were all a bit mannish looking and the Head Mistress, was one of the most ditzy females I and the other girls had ever met.
She had these vague watery blue eyes and fluffy hair that stood out on end and she was vague, spinster like and would never think of a suitable punishment for us.
Caroline and Denise and I and a few others made that poor woman's life hell.
She was eccentric in a very British way, hiding in her Office mostly except to hand out detentions and confer with "The Boss". Mr Yates, Eric Yates, the Headmaster.
He literally looked like the Head master from "The Wall", he had a cane and he would use it, on knuckles on bums.
If you were called to The Boss's Office you knew were in big trouble. I only went there once and it was for wagging half a day, forging notes from our parents, Denise, Caroline and I.
We had huffed up to town and as luck would have it met up with a Teacher in the Tesco's, and we were in School Uniform, busted!.
Every Saturday we would go to the Mecca (dance hall ) and dance all day and listen to groups, the Who, the herd, Traffic, Cream, Manfred Mann, The Faces, the Moody Blues it was unbelievable.
We would trudge in to the Ladies, put our handbags in the sinks and paint on Pan Cake makeup and draw thick tram lines around our eyes.
We had different eye shadow, false eyelashes like Twiggy , we thought we pretty trendy let me tell you. Caroline was a major rebel, living with an Irish piss pot Dad, no mum, she had run off with a "Black Man", ages ago.
Could have been something to do with the drink or the stench. The first time I walked into the Terrace house, she lived in, all I could smell was urine, but blindingly so, like holding your nose to a bottle of Ammonia Salts.
I had no idea where it came from but God, I hated going there, I used to coax Caroline to come to my house.
Mum and Dad had bought a house in Ossett, set in a Mews, double storey, grey Stone, it was huge and full of spooky stuff. there was a cellar gloomy and dripping and every so often it would flood and the boys and I would stare at the black water lapping up to almost the stone stairs.
When dry the walls were green with verdegris and smelt like swamp water. There were massive rooms and fireplaces and a landing.
George and Dave had a massive room that looked like a dormitory and they spread out their stuff hanging Models Planes from the roof. We had a boarder named Roy, very nice man of about 30. he was massively built and rented one of the downstairs rooms.
He was like a machine, had breakfast My Mother would cook at 6am, out the door to work, back later that night after calling in a the local for several large lagers and then home,
Where he would sit and consume his Dinner and stagger off to his room. Every day/night of the week.
It was extra income, and I don't think I can ever remember him talking. he must have but he was enormously shy and he was massive, he was about 6 2", a mountain of A man with a big bushy beard that he mumbled into a lot.
I found him endlessly interesting and imagined he had a story or two to tell. Maybe a wife left, children, a broken heart from a callous girlfriend, he seemed so NICE and so lonely. A tragic figure!
Him with us at RoseLeigh, our baronial house.It was really an old couch house we eventually worked out. the Mews Having two other mansions in it.
And they were really wealthy people, God, knows who Dad had to rip off for us to have ours, but for 3 years it was home.
And I loved every inch of it. It's elegant lounge rooms with massively high ceilings and period features were luxurious, a huge stone floored kitchen, like a french farm house and upstairs were the bedrooms.
Ours was papered by my Mother, Aunties and Grandma in Barbie wallpaper? I have no comment on that , save to say it was not my choice.
Jackie was then 17 and I was 13.
We had our own lacy little fire place which we lit almost every night. The only problem with the place was the only toilet and bathroom was next to Jackie's and my bedroom.
We met Roy many a time with a towel around him and we just ignored him, like we hadn't seen him.
And Dad would always come up the stairs to say Goodnight girls, just before he went to bed.
And when we had our inoculations to go back to Australia Dad for some reason took it very badly. We were all fine, but one night he stood outside our door and sneezed.....Violently.. and through the muffle of the wooden door, we heard.
"Oh, My God. I think I have just shit Myself"
Jackie and I had to stuff our pillows into our mouths to stop him hearing us, howling with laughter.
He repeated the action of sneezing and mumbling until Mum heard him and came running,
Poor Dad, but he would have laughed if it was one of us.
If I imagine my Dad now, I see his "Band Outfit", black dinner pants with a satin ribbon down the side, a white shirt, sometimes a tie and a beautifully pressed Dinner Jacket, smelling of California Poppy and some dicreet After Shave, exclusive stuff.
He was a handsome man when he took of his glasses, but he was so myopic he was like Mr Magoo. My Dad was happy with his lot, he loved Mum with a passion, us kids ditto, and his life blood, the 24 string Hawaiian guitar and music, all music
Even up to the end he taped Rage every Saturday night and when I asked him why, ( it was all modern stuff, Pink Floyd, Billy Idol) he said to a muso it didn't matter, it was the music he wanted, all the music.
Dad was a great Dad, never loud, just usually telling jokes, he was a happy Man, he built up a successful business selling tyres, recaps picked up In Sunderland, loaded in the Bedford and sold to garages and the Public.
He made a mint and it was hard work, driving all that way, with one of the boys with him. Then make the return trip the same day. Then on selling them to garages in Leeds and Wakefield.
Jackie was married then at 19 and it was the first time I had slept in a bedroom by myself and it felt good at first and then a bit lonely.
When Jackie first met Win, her hubby to be it was love at first sight and it's the same, now, and they have a wonderful strong marriage.
So did Mum and Dad, though she wasn't shy of throwing many a saucepan at his head. And he would laugh and duck.
We kids stayed away from their arguments and we had plenty of places to hide.
Grandma Wilsher brought Jackie and I over books all the time, genteel ladies books about Scottish Manses and Kirks and country manners and Betty Smith's A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and Tomorrow Will be Better".
I think she was hoping to turn me from tomboy rebel to Miss Manners.
Granny was a lady, not in a aristocratic way but in a gentle way. She adored my Grand father, George and in his day had been a bit of a "Lad", a ladies man no less and a drinker.
I could imagine it as he had an awful wicked look in his eye sometimes, a remnant from his "Naughty Days", men get away with murder in Yorkshire, a lot of them Mummy's boys.
And their mothers adore them. It used to be something Mum never wanted for her daughters, to Marry a Yorkshireman, she was vehement about it.
But Jackie did, and he flew to Australia with her and became an Australian. Good on him,
Yorkshire is not as entrepreneurial as Australia, the bankers being staid about how they go about things. Everything takes ages to get done and if you were an Australian, you'd be clicking your fingers within moments.
I found that out when I went back in 2001, twice, in London, expect rude faces and needless hostility for tourists.
I should have gone back to my thick Yorkshire accent I had when there. Northern people are wonderful, down to earth, honest, tell you like it is and they pull no punches.
Pub life there is a culture, a wonderful night life and they look after their elderly. I like it, love it, but I get too homesick for Australia and I get homesick within 3 days.
Australia is the best place in the world and when I come home I notice the Airport people are always smiling,
Love Janette
I was in England when The Beatles brought out "Sergeant Peppers Lonely Heart's Club Band"
I was still at Grammar School and I had had had to have it. So I conned My Dad, (Mum would never hand over money ) to let me wash his Bedford Van for 10 Shillings, ( the cost of the Album,) inside and out and it gleamed when I finished.
And then I caught the bus to Wakefield ( Up town or Top Of Kirkgate ) and snapped up a copy and made the bus back to Ossett and ran home, LP clutched to my chest. No one else was impressed but I loved it.
Especially the song, "She's Leaving Home", and all of them. I thought it was new and innovative and my siblings thought it was "weird".
I thought they were weird, Jackie worked and seemed soooo much older than me. George was quiet and stayed in his room a lot and David was running around pretending to be a Dalek.
Jackie was great to me then, though I was still a little rat bag at 14, hoicking up my Skirt as soon as I left the house, and wearing ribbed tights in Winter, and in Summer Lace knee socks and Fabulous T bars.
I begged My Mum to buy them for me and she did as seconds from Wakefield Market and I ended up getting in a load of trouble wearing them, as did my friends, Denise Edsen and Caroline Holmes.
We were like St Trinian School girls. Lace socks, hoiked up skirts, All No No's at a posh Anglican Grammar School, that cost heaps for Private Students but for George and I nothing.
Our Mother was a former pupil there and we were allowed in on a 3 month trial. George and I loved it, school dinners, bonus, swimming Pool, undercover, 5 Massive gyms, a Theatre, Old stone walls.
Masters in Gowns and Mortar Boards, always, and hymns every day at assembly.
George and I were allowed to stay so we must have passed or maybe they just forgot about us.
It was so strange to start School in England. I had left in Grade 7 Aussie standard and was with kids who had been in Form One, five months.
They were already reading French, Latin and were way ahead of me. I who was top of the Class when I left Adelaide, floundered badly for the first few months.
I can only guess my English, History any thing written got me through, because my Maths and French were really bad.
I played a lot of sport, swimming team House captain, Hockey, Movement, gym, tennis, trampoline I was 12 and a half. And at that age, sport was all I thought of and moody dramatic poetry of the Heathcillfe and Cathy kind.
Swimming I had always done, cross country running. no. Gym, no, Hockey, no. Playing Hockey on a field of snow is not an exercise I would recommend, ever.
All the Mistresses looked very English, bulging calves wearing Gilly socks folded over and clumpy brogues and kilts or pleated skirts of good tweed.
I thought it was the ugliest outfit you could put a woman in. They were all a bit mannish looking and the Head Mistress, was one of the most ditzy females I and the other girls had ever met.
She had these vague watery blue eyes and fluffy hair that stood out on end and she was vague, spinster like and would never think of a suitable punishment for us.
Caroline and Denise and I and a few others made that poor woman's life hell.
She was eccentric in a very British way, hiding in her Office mostly except to hand out detentions and confer with "The Boss". Mr Yates, Eric Yates, the Headmaster.
He literally looked like the Head master from "The Wall", he had a cane and he would use it, on knuckles on bums.
If you were called to The Boss's Office you knew were in big trouble. I only went there once and it was for wagging half a day, forging notes from our parents, Denise, Caroline and I.
We had huffed up to town and as luck would have it met up with a Teacher in the Tesco's, and we were in School Uniform, busted!.
Every Saturday we would go to the Mecca (dance hall ) and dance all day and listen to groups, the Who, the herd, Traffic, Cream, Manfred Mann, The Faces, the Moody Blues it was unbelievable.
We would trudge in to the Ladies, put our handbags in the sinks and paint on Pan Cake makeup and draw thick tram lines around our eyes.
We had different eye shadow, false eyelashes like Twiggy , we thought we pretty trendy let me tell you. Caroline was a major rebel, living with an Irish piss pot Dad, no mum, she had run off with a "Black Man", ages ago.
Could have been something to do with the drink or the stench. The first time I walked into the Terrace house, she lived in, all I could smell was urine, but blindingly so, like holding your nose to a bottle of Ammonia Salts.
I had no idea where it came from but God, I hated going there, I used to coax Caroline to come to my house.
Mum and Dad had bought a house in Ossett, set in a Mews, double storey, grey Stone, it was huge and full of spooky stuff. there was a cellar gloomy and dripping and every so often it would flood and the boys and I would stare at the black water lapping up to almost the stone stairs.
When dry the walls were green with verdegris and smelt like swamp water. There were massive rooms and fireplaces and a landing.
George and Dave had a massive room that looked like a dormitory and they spread out their stuff hanging Models Planes from the roof. We had a boarder named Roy, very nice man of about 30. he was massively built and rented one of the downstairs rooms.
He was like a machine, had breakfast My Mother would cook at 6am, out the door to work, back later that night after calling in a the local for several large lagers and then home,
Where he would sit and consume his Dinner and stagger off to his room. Every day/night of the week.
It was extra income, and I don't think I can ever remember him talking. he must have but he was enormously shy and he was massive, he was about 6 2", a mountain of A man with a big bushy beard that he mumbled into a lot.
I found him endlessly interesting and imagined he had a story or two to tell. Maybe a wife left, children, a broken heart from a callous girlfriend, he seemed so NICE and so lonely. A tragic figure!
Him with us at RoseLeigh, our baronial house.It was really an old couch house we eventually worked out. the Mews Having two other mansions in it.
And they were really wealthy people, God, knows who Dad had to rip off for us to have ours, but for 3 years it was home.
And I loved every inch of it. It's elegant lounge rooms with massively high ceilings and period features were luxurious, a huge stone floored kitchen, like a french farm house and upstairs were the bedrooms.
Ours was papered by my Mother, Aunties and Grandma in Barbie wallpaper? I have no comment on that , save to say it was not my choice.
Jackie was then 17 and I was 13.
We had our own lacy little fire place which we lit almost every night. The only problem with the place was the only toilet and bathroom was next to Jackie's and my bedroom.
We met Roy many a time with a towel around him and we just ignored him, like we hadn't seen him.
And Dad would always come up the stairs to say Goodnight girls, just before he went to bed.
And when we had our inoculations to go back to Australia Dad for some reason took it very badly. We were all fine, but one night he stood outside our door and sneezed.....Violently.. and through the muffle of the wooden door, we heard.
"Oh, My God. I think I have just shit Myself"
Jackie and I had to stuff our pillows into our mouths to stop him hearing us, howling with laughter.
He repeated the action of sneezing and mumbling until Mum heard him and came running,
Poor Dad, but he would have laughed if it was one of us.
If I imagine my Dad now, I see his "Band Outfit", black dinner pants with a satin ribbon down the side, a white shirt, sometimes a tie and a beautifully pressed Dinner Jacket, smelling of California Poppy and some dicreet After Shave, exclusive stuff.
He was a handsome man when he took of his glasses, but he was so myopic he was like Mr Magoo. My Dad was happy with his lot, he loved Mum with a passion, us kids ditto, and his life blood, the 24 string Hawaiian guitar and music, all music
Even up to the end he taped Rage every Saturday night and when I asked him why, ( it was all modern stuff, Pink Floyd, Billy Idol) he said to a muso it didn't matter, it was the music he wanted, all the music.
Dad was a great Dad, never loud, just usually telling jokes, he was a happy Man, he built up a successful business selling tyres, recaps picked up In Sunderland, loaded in the Bedford and sold to garages and the Public.
He made a mint and it was hard work, driving all that way, with one of the boys with him. Then make the return trip the same day. Then on selling them to garages in Leeds and Wakefield.
Jackie was married then at 19 and it was the first time I had slept in a bedroom by myself and it felt good at first and then a bit lonely.
When Jackie first met Win, her hubby to be it was love at first sight and it's the same, now, and they have a wonderful strong marriage.
So did Mum and Dad, though she wasn't shy of throwing many a saucepan at his head. And he would laugh and duck.
We kids stayed away from their arguments and we had plenty of places to hide.
Grandma Wilsher brought Jackie and I over books all the time, genteel ladies books about Scottish Manses and Kirks and country manners and Betty Smith's A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and Tomorrow Will be Better".
I think she was hoping to turn me from tomboy rebel to Miss Manners.
Granny was a lady, not in a aristocratic way but in a gentle way. She adored my Grand father, George and in his day had been a bit of a "Lad", a ladies man no less and a drinker.
I could imagine it as he had an awful wicked look in his eye sometimes, a remnant from his "Naughty Days", men get away with murder in Yorkshire, a lot of them Mummy's boys.
And their mothers adore them. It used to be something Mum never wanted for her daughters, to Marry a Yorkshireman, she was vehement about it.
But Jackie did, and he flew to Australia with her and became an Australian. Good on him,
Yorkshire is not as entrepreneurial as Australia, the bankers being staid about how they go about things. Everything takes ages to get done and if you were an Australian, you'd be clicking your fingers within moments.
I found that out when I went back in 2001, twice, in London, expect rude faces and needless hostility for tourists.
I should have gone back to my thick Yorkshire accent I had when there. Northern people are wonderful, down to earth, honest, tell you like it is and they pull no punches.
Pub life there is a culture, a wonderful night life and they look after their elderly. I like it, love it, but I get too homesick for Australia and I get homesick within 3 days.
Australia is the best place in the world and when I come home I notice the Airport people are always smiling,
Love Janette
