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Posted: Fri Oct 05, 2007 2:04 am Post subject: Re: Try these ...
'Get out of the kitchen if you can't stand the heat!'
I could hear my grandmother's voice as she worked over a blazing stove on a hot summer's day. It was bush-fire weather, with a gusty hot north wind blowing, and here she was, cooking roast lamb. A farmer's wife, she believed in producing a three-course hot meal every day, and a chicken carcase was bubbling in a pot of water in preparation for making chicken noodle soup. A bread-and-butter custard was ready to pop into the oven when the roast came out; it would cool then for tomorrow's dessert. Today's, lemon sago and cream, had been prepared yesterday.
My grandmother was no lady when it came to blistering language, and my protest about all this cooking in the heat was met with an eloquent flow of words. What sticks in my mind is that particular phrase, "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen"!
He was old now, as his white beard told the world. Just today at the bus-stop a little girl had clutched her mother's hand and said "Look Mummy! There's Santa!" He smiled now at the memory, as he had smiled at mother and child then.
He hadn't been trying to impress them. He had long since dropped pretention, just as the trees had drpped their leaves, he thought, looking out from his garden shed. He was happy here, pottering with seedlings, cuttings and dirt, watching the basics of life develop. He was like the bare limbs of the trees now, he thought, plain and basic, down to earth, and perhaps wiser for it.
As dusk gathered, an owl silently landed on a branch, waiting and watching for an evening mouse. "Yes, old man," he said to it as he closed the shed door, "we're two of a kind. Enjoy your evening," and he walked to the lighted door of his home.
Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 4:20 pm Post subject: Here's my go at it ...
Jill had listened to her children as they made their wish lists to Santa, their excitement and innocence was too much to bare. She turned her back on them and busied herself preparing dinner. Dinner – peannut buttered sandwiches. How could she possibly get any of the toys they wanted when she couldn’t even afford a decent meal for her children? She wiped away the tear. Still, it could’ve been worst; at least they had the basics: shelter from the cold and a roof over their heads, even if their house was little more than a shed and the warmed was due to a heater someone had tossed out. Everything in their home had been someone else’s rubblish right down to the owl clock whose eyes no longer moved with each tick. Christmas Eve and she had nothing to put under their twig-like Christmas tree.
The knock at the door was a welcome distraction, at least she could forget about what a failure she felt for a moment. Little Janie was out of her wobbly chair in an instance and had beat her mother and brother to the door; she flung it open and squealed with delight. A large picnic basket and two large bags – one with Janie name on it while the other displayed Jack’s name. The children grabbed the bags and hurried indoors. Jill picked up the picnic basket, her knees buckled under the weight, but she managed to get it to the table and peered in. A hot roast turkey took pride amongst lots of other goodies – there’ll be no boring sandwiches for Christmas this year, she thought, as tears screamed down her cheek. She pulled out the envelope thinking it would obtain the sender’s name, but instead it was bulging with one hundred dollar notes.
Jill turned towards the window in enough time to see something red fly through the air, and had she really heard the sound of bells jingling?
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