Then
and Now
An autobiography of a brief relationship
I was already about 150 years old when this family turned up. My
previous family had left after a lot of shouting and banging about
which rather upset my usual tranquil nature. I don't want to appear
unkind about them because before they came I was a wreck and they put
me back together and made me feel respectable again. It was
wonderful at the beginning once they had smartened me up, but
gradually things got a bit fraught and that's when the yelling
started.
When you've been around as long as I have, you tend to look at time
in a different scale. I don't honestly know when I came about, but I
do know that families come and go, and, being stuck in one spot for
all this time, you tend to see things change rather more than might
appear if you take a shorter perspective. I can remember a time when
there weren't any of these noisy roaring things that rush past from
time to time. All there was when I came about were horses and people
coming along the road; and to think I used to think that they were
noisy!
Anyway, I keep getting off the point. I'm trying to tell you about
the people I have now, and have had for the last 31 years. Most
families don't stay that long. You'd think that the lot that came
before would have stayed longer, after all, they made me pretty much
what I am today, but, as I say, they started yelling and banging
about and let the new lot, the ones I'm telling you about, move in.
My very first family stayed for quite a while, or at least they or
their children did, but eventually they moved on and I was left with
one man who ran the farm and had a woman and her husband living with
him. They had children and for a while they too lived with the
farmer, then for a short while one of the children brought her
husband back to live with us. Everything moves on of course, the
children all moved away, though I saw them from time to time, but
then everybody left and I was left alone for the first time ever. I
had no one to look after me and I began to feel very old and unloved.
This was the saddest time I can remember.....
Where was I? Oh yes the people I have now. Did I say that they've
been looking after me for 31 years. Sometimes they have been better
at it than at other times, but at the moment I feel pretty good. You
may not realise it, but when you get a bit older it is difficult for
you to stay dry. Your plumbing gets a bit creaky and your sides get
leaky. But right now I am as dry as I have ever been. And warm.
When I first came about I would get very cold in winter nights but my
people would light fires to warm me up. This was the way it was for
most of my time until the folk who came before my current family, the
ones that rescued me you might say. They gave me a big new overcoat
which kept the rain out, but it made me a bit damp and sweaty because
my skin couldn't breathe. When they had finished I felt shiny and
new and really quite proud of myself. The people who made me first
wouldn't recognise me if they could come back. Anyway, the family I
have now liked me a lot and couldn't wait to join me.
31 years they've been with me. The children have gone, and even
though they come back from time to time it's really just the man and
woman who are left. They do their best, but I think it's time for
someone else to look after me. I think that if I am to stay for
another 150 years I need someone who wants to bring new ideas to me.
I shall miss them if they go, but I really like to have children with
me. In my opinion, they make a house a home and I have been too long
without them.
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