DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to our regular customers and some of our irregular ones…with love.

Thank you for sharing five years with us. Thank you for sharing your home-grown parsley, zucchini, your tomatoes and last, but never least, your cucumbers, your wit and your affection.

This book is a little late in coming, since I’ve had it stashed in a drawer for the past many years. But it’s time to tell the whole truth – part of which is that Summerside Gallery and the Country Kitchen were real places–a real art gallery and a real restaurant, in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, from 1980 to 1985.

I remember Gallery and Kitchen with affection and hope that these memoirs will give you some insights into the peculiar and wonderful behavior of restaurant goers as seen from behind the crock pots by my friends Diane, Tim, and Eunie — not to mention myself, the original Fool in the Kitchen.

Pene Beavan Horton
Copyright Reserved

September 2008

Published by Pixelfx Studios Ltd.

http://www.pixelfxstudios.ca/

Vancouver Island, Canada

To contact Pene by email:

pene@gallerynorth.ca

DISCLAIMER

Since this is a true story I’ve had a hard time writing the usual disclaimer.

I’ve come up with three alternatives, so please choose whichever you find applicable:

a) I promise that if you recognize yourself in these memoirs you bear no relation to any living human being

b) If you think you recognize yourself don’t tell us

c) If you think you recognize yourself, you’re being ridiculous

SPECIAL SERVICES for people with kids or other special circumstances:

We now offer lap restraints, leg restraints, arm restraints and gags.

“Why just for babies?” asks Tim.

Why indeed?

CONTENTS

Dedication

Disclaimer

Introduction

Manners and Morals of …..

Bloopers We Have Made

Some Don’ts for Dining Out

Some Do’s Ditto

How to Slip Out Without Paying

For all of you who ever asked for the recipes from The Country Kitchen Restaurant in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, please find them in the recently released new edition of FOOL IN THE KITCHEN

by Pene Beavan Horton

September 2008

INTRODUCTION

Did you know that not everybody can be a good waitress?

It takes the concentration of a champion chess player, the memory of a computer, the energy of an Olympic gymnast and the friendliness of someone who has five kittens to give away before Tuesday…

Anyone want the job?

JOB DESCRIPTION:

A good waitress remembers who wants what, notes exceptions and amendments, remembers 300 names and matches them to 300 faces, doesn’t she, Mrs. Uh, er, hmnnnn?

She takes orders, serves drinks, delivers food, rings up cash, is friendly, quick, patient, untiring, aware, keeps out of the cook’s way and runs after people who’ve dropped their keys, lost their gloves, changed their minds or who just want to say hello.

She answers the telephone, balances a tray so the whipped cream doesn’t slide off the cake, reminds the cook to get a move on, keeps both kettles boiling, stays sane and keeps smiling.

In her spare time she orders cheese and butter-pats, defrosts fridges and freezers, does dishes, buys groceries, chops vegetables, grates cheese, makes ice, vacuums the carpet and takes out the garbage.

She sees that fifty people feel loved and looked after while they’re here, cleans up after them and keeps her sense of humour.

Our own special waitress, friend and support was Diane. She was unique. And we loved her. She died some years after I left the Country Kitchen, but her memory lingers like the warm fragrance of wood smoke on a cold night.

The first question I ever asked her had to do with picture framing, choosing a frame to go with her furniture.

“What sort of furniture do you have?” I asked.

“Early mother-in-law,” she replied promptly.

I was enchanted and asked if she’d like to work in the Kitchen with me and she said yes. I will always be glad that she did.

We also had Eunie, a delightful, unflappable presence in the Kitchen, moving angelically from crockpots to crackpots, always keeping her sense of humour and enthusiasm.

Then there was Tim.

What panache! What a sunny sense of humour. He made us quiver with anticipation as he described the desserts … Tim was irrepressible.

“I need something to make me laugh today,” said our friend, Mike Landry.

“Go look in a mirror,” quipped Tim, from behind the microwave. Mike was too tired to get up and swat him.

“You are the Essence of the Kitchen,” Tim told me.

“You mean the soup,” I replied gloomily.

“Ah!” cried Tim ecstatically. “In the Great Soup Bowl of your Life…”

He danced through the Kitchen, blond head glinting, eyes sparkling, writing lurid notices, making sandwiches, delivering chocolate chip muffins, witticisms rippling from his nimble tongue and at the same time, being extraordinarily efficient.

We could not have lived without him.

And Bob – how could I write a book about our restaurant without mentioning my ex-husband, who hated the whole idea? Especially healthy food. In that he was not alone.

Over the years, we had a fair number of hopeful customers who came looking for french fries… and some who came looking for cigarettes, and some who came looking for friendship, and some who came looking for love, and even some who came looking for good, wholesome food with a bit of dressing on the side.

They are all here, in essence, as you flip through The Manners and Morals of (maybe not so typical?) Restaurant Users.

MEMOIRS OF A (FORMER)
RESTAURANT OWNER
A short run-down on the manners and morals of typical restaurant users

DIETING?

Lady A practises one-up-woman-dietship on her friend at the same table.

“I couldn’t possibly manage more than half a sandwich,” she says, then nibbles a quarter of it, heaves a big, replete sigh and asks the waitress for a doggy-bag.

“It was just TOO MUCH for me to finish all at once,” she explains.

Her friend is invariably plumper than she is, and has just consumed a bowl of chili bean soup and a ham sandwich. Regretfully, she passes up the cherry cake.

How could she possibly be such a glutton in front of Lady A, who sits and looks on with a skinny smile?

DELIGHTFULLY VAGUE

Lady B looks with astonishment at what you’ve brought her to eat.

“Did I order that?” she asks.

“I suppose I must have. Isn’t that extraordinary?”

DITHERY

Lady C can’t make up her mind whether to have soup, salad or half a sandwich. She asks what’s in the soup, in the salad, in the sandwiches, then says, “I’ll just have a cup of tea. I’m really not hungry.”

ADVANCE DISAPPROVAL

Lady D comes in determined not to like anything on the menu.

“There isn’t a single interesting thing on this menu,” she announces loudly, and sweeps out.

NO SMOKING

Lady E is annoyed because she can’t smoke in the restaurant.

“A cigarette is the best part of lunch,” she says crossly, and leaves.

Fortunately there’s a restaurant that serves cigarettes just down the street.

THRIFTY

A family of eight comes in and orders one chocolate chip muffin and four plates. They’ve brought their own tea bags and they ask for eight mugs of hot water, with milk and sugar.

GOURMET

This gentleman wants his sandwich with a hint of mustard on the top half, a whisper of mayonnaise on the bottom half, no lettuce, with ham, eggs, tomatoes, chicken and cheese in between, not heated …. try to find that on the menu.

KIDS

We love kids who come in except this one. He wants peanut butter on a scoop of ice-cream with grated cheese on the side. He plays with his ice cream, builds sculptures with his peanut butter and sprinkles his cheese on the carpet.

Then he gets under the table and plays peekaboo.

SOUP OPERA

Not a few relationships burgeon among the crockpots–sadly, not a few become unstuck. We congratulate the happy couples and walk a fine line re commiserating with the unhappy ones.

TOGETHERNESS

They come in to eat and the wife orders everything.

“We’ll have this, this, this and this,” she says, before he can open his mouth.

Maybe he’d prefer that, that, that and those, but for some reason he dare not take a stand and say so.

HIPPOCRATES WAS THE FIRST HEALTH FOOD NUT AND HE SURE STARTED SOMETHING

This disciple of Hypocrates can’t eat salt, sugar, food colouring, preservatives, cooked food or fat.

He orders grated cabbage with a slice of organically grown lemon on the side.
For some reason he often drinks black coffee and he nearly always brings his own sunflower seeds to munch on while he waits to be served.

He usually has pouches under his eyes and a hung-over look, which is why most people go on eating salt, sugar, food colouring …

WEIGHT WATCHER

This fellow announces bravely that he’s watching his diet. He orders a bowl of chili soup, a ham’n'cheese sandwich and a piece of raspberry chocolate pudding cake with whipped cream.

“And being me some Sugar Free packets for my coffee, please ….”

TRIED IT ONCE AND LIKED IT

One gentleman we love ordered a tuna’n'cheese sandwich twice a week for two years. And another one only eats ham sandwiches year in and year out. We wonder…do they genuinely hate variety, or just everything else on the menu?

EXCLUSIVITY – or NOT QUITE ON THE MENU

Lady F makes sure that what she orders is not on the menu, then she orders it every time.

DEDICATED DIETER

Lady G is a genuine dieter, with wonderful will power. Week after week she orders a salad with dressing on the side. She just looks at the dressing.

Surely such iron control will snap at midnight, one night. Will she gather up her library of books on HOW TO BREAK THE EATING HABIT and set fire to them on her back lawn? We picture her dancing madly around the bonfire until it dies down so she can go indoors and cram doughnuts into her mouth.

LOVE AMONG THE CROCK POTS

BURGEONING ROMANCE

VARIETY, ALL RIGHT

This person doesn’t want a repeat of anything he’s eaten in the past 12 months.

He doesn’t like fish, pasta, rice, soup or sandwiches. He is averse to eating pork, lamb and chicken. He is tired of steak, potatoes and meat pies, and he hates turkey, frozen vegetables and salad. He’s had stew, pizza and liver once this year already.

We had to give in and tell him we couldn’t help him.

Currently, we hear he is killing himself on a steady diet of pepperoni sticks and Coca-Cola.

TO TIP OR NOT TO TIP?

There are people who tip lavishly and people who tip.

“I left your nickel under the place mat,” they say proudly on their way out.

LUNCH HOUR MEETINGS IN THE RESTAURANT

Sundry groups hold lunch hour meetings in the restaurant, asking to have two of the large tables pushed together.

The twelve of them sit for an hour, ordering a cup of coffee and a scone between them.

They grabbed a Big Mac on their way to our restaurant? Or maybe they just want a change of scene from the office?

COMPULSIVE TIDIERS

People who stuff everything on the table into their empty soup bowls, so you have to fish out a damp paper place mat, a used napkin or two, two empty butter pat cases and three empty packets of sugar.

It is amazing how much a soup bowl can hold if you are determined.

NO-WIN SOUP SITUATION

Some people drop ice cubes in their soup to cool it down and other people send the same soup back to be heated because it’s too cold.

NEUROTIC NEED TO BE SERVED FIRST

Lady H came in and said could she be served right away, please, as she had an appointment in half and hour.

So we put her at the head of the line and she stayed at her table for another two hours, drinking coffee. She just wanted to be loved?

WELL WRAPPED UP?

A group of four people came in out of the snow, took off their gloves and coats, unwrapped their woollen scarves, put their hats on the rack, took off their boots, sat down and looked at the menu.

“What, no french fries and gravy?”

So they stood up, put on their coats, boots, scarves, gloves and hats and left.

We need a sign: PLEASE READ THE MENU BEFORE YOU UNDRESS

WHAT’S IN THE GARDEN SOUP?

Daddy-Long-Legs, parsley, cabbage, slugs, DDT, LIME and whipped cream … anything else you’d like to know?

SHARING

Lady I and Lady J come into the restaurant to have lunch together.

“Let’s split a sandwich,” suggests Lady J, “it’s cheaper … no, you choose, Ellie.

“Well, I don’t want salmon, do you? I had the tuna last time… mmmmmmmmm … canned chicken isn’t my favourite …the shrimp’s too expensive.

“You think ham and mustard? I don’t like mustard. No, no, you must choose, Ellie, it’s your treat.

“Well, all right, let’s have an egg salad sandwich… You don’t fancy egg? Oh, what about corned beef? Or ….”

Lady J turns to the hovering waitress. “My friend’s exhausted…we’ll just have tea.”

PAYING

Lady K: “No, Angie, I’m paying for our lunch. No arguments, dearest. You can pay next time, this is my treat … two coffees, please, and we’ll split one of those lovely little loaves…”

Later, at the cash register, rummaging through her purse, Lady K says, “That’s funny, I thought I’d brought my wallet with me. Do you have eighty seven cents, Angie darling? Thank you….”

RUNNING COMMENTARY

Lady L: “This soup’s good, Ethel. I wonder what she puts in it? She must get up early to get the bread baked in time. No, I won’t try the bread. Too much whole wheat keeps me awake all night…non-stop, my dear, really, I can’t take it.

“We must stop off at Bun King for some of their lovely white buns on the way home…”

SLIVER EATERS

“I just want a sliver of cake,” says Lady M.

How do we charge for a sliver?

Three cents for the paper plate, three cents for the napkin, 50 cents for the labour and 12 cents for the sliver, total of 68 cents.

“You’ve got to be the most expensive restaurant in town!” declares Lady M, shocked. “I mean, I just wanted a sliver!”

PARDON?

Lady N wants to know if the chicken is canned.

We say “yes,” so she asks for tuna …”is the tuna canned?”

No, Ma’am, we just caught it.

MOMMY GIVING DADDY A TREAT FOR HIS BIRTHDAY

Well-meaning mothers occasionally and bravely bring baby to have lunch with Daddy. Baby has fun.

CAN’T QUITE HEAR YOU?

Lady O is almost stone deaf because her hearing aid keeps slipping. She is usually accompanied by Lady P, a younger person, who is a good menu reader with a penetrating voice.
“There are TWO KINDS OF SOUP,” bellows Lady P, “SHRIMP BISQUE or CHICKEN NOODLE … NOODLE … N-0-0-D-L-E…yes, NOODLES. You don’t like noodles?

“What about SHRIMP? Or a SALAD? What’s in the salad? CABBAGE, CARROTS, CUCUMBERS, TOMATOES, LETTUCE, GREEN PEPPERS … or would you RATHER HAVE A SANDWICH? No, on a BUN. They have HAM, HAM’n'MUSTARD, HAM’N'CHEESE, CHICKEN, TUNA, TUNA’n'CHEESE … you don’t like cheese?

“How about some dessert? BLACK FOREST CAKE SOUNDS LOVELY. Chocolate pudding, real whipped cream, cherries, nuts … you’d like some? Oh, good, I’ll order it for you ….”

WAITER: “I’m sorry, we don’t have any Black Forest Cake left …”

Lady P: “Aunt Helen, they DON’T HAVE ANY BLACK FOREST CAKE TODAY … would you like an ENGLISH SCONE instead? The scones have RASPBERRY JAM and fresh cream …” and she runs through the menu again.

Everyone in the restaurant is left aching with sympathy for Aunt Helen and full of admiration for Lady P who ploughs bravely on.

THE LOVABLE ONES

This book is for The Lovable Ones who enjoy eating what we serve. They love the food. They say so out loud.

They love Tim and Diane and Eunie, and the paintings on the walls and the music.

We love to feed and cherish them.

They kindly overlook our occasional bloopers, as we kindly overlook theirs.

SOME BLOOPERS WE HAVE MADE

We once fed someone an elastic band in his salad. It hooked his back molars to his front incisors but he was very good about it.

“DINER’S TEA” – OUR VERY OWN SOUP OPERA

Don’t talk so loudly that everyone else in the restaurant can overhear your current traumas–unless you promise to come back next week and tell us what happened.

THEY DID IT IN THE MOVIES

Don’t snap your fingers to get the waitress’ attention. She’ll know you’ve been sitting up watching late night movies.

ALL ALONE?

Don’t behave as if you are the only person in the restaurant– unless you are.

TIME’S A-WASTING

“When your time is used up, you are used up,” said Walter Pitkin in his book, Life Begins at Forty. “Dead, some call it.”

Don’t keep your waiter standing at the ready when five of you haven’t decided what you’re going to order.

Don’t tell your waitress everything you don’t want to order before you tell her what you do want.

Don’t tell your waiter in the middle of the lunch-hour rush why your Aunt Ethel couldn’t come with you today.

SPLITTING

Don’t ask if you can split half a scone between you.

Try not to ask for half a sandwich on two plates.

WHAT’S IN IT? AMNESIA SOUP

Please don’t ask what’s in the soup. The cook can’t remember.

TOAST, FRENCH FRIES AND GRAVY

Don’t ask for the above. They are not on the menu and never have been on the menu and never will be on the menu …not because we don’t love them. Because we are not that kind of restaurant.

GERM WARFARE

Please don’t come to lunch if you have just caught whooping cough, measles or pink eye.

ENTERTAINMENT WHILE YOU WAIT

Please don’t amuse yourself by pouring salt into the pepper shaker, no matter how bored you are. Ask your waiter for a Rubik’s cube. He won’t have one, but he’ll get the message.

SHREDDING

Don’t shred your paper place mat just because you are hungry. You won’t be able to read the menu.

COVER-UPS

Don’t hide your cucumber slices in the teapot. Nobody minds if you don’t eat everything on your plate.

FALSE TEETH

Don’t wrap your dental plate in a table napkin while you eat. Chances are you’ll be home in bed before you remember you left your teeth on the table.

CASH OR CHEQUE?

Don’t pay for a cup of coffee with a $100 bill. We haven’t seen that much money at once in years.

And please don’t offer to pay for your lunch with a dog-eared cheque made out to you by a friend of a friend six months ago.

SO HAVING UTTERED FRIGHTFUL WARNINGS ABOUT WHAT NOT TO DO, HERE’S WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU SIT DOWN AT YOUR TABLE

• Relax. Take a deep breath. Unwind.
• Remember your waitress is a real, live human being whose feet hurt.
• Realize you may have to wait if six other people came in ahead of you.
• Try analyzing your emotional burden, tidying your purse, writing a novel or slipping into the right side of your brain while you wait.
• Remember to put the lid back on the crock pot.
• You can ask for a doggy-bag even though everyone knows you don’t have a German Shepherd at home.
• Tell your waitress if you really are in a hurry, otherwise see 3. above.
• Try to be a little inhibited, unlike the woman who bounded through the Kitchen shouting exuberantly, “I’ve had six cups of tay, I must have a pay!”
• Do tell the waiter or the cook that you enjoyed your meal – and vice versa. No one wants to eat vice versa.
• Courtesy is contagious. A waiter or waitress responds to courtesy like a plant to sunlight and they will be less likely to trip and spill your soup down your neck.
• Remember to put the lid back on the crock pot.

HOW TO SLIP OUT WITHOUT PAYING

Don’t be silly, why would we tell you that?

AND NOW….

Exeunt Omnes

FOOL IN THE KITCHEN AND MEMOIRS ARE A SET … We hope you’ve enjoyed the view from behind the crock pots and that you will never again stuff everything on the table into your empty soup bowl. Or coffee mug.

Take care, and enjoy your dedicated servers when you next dine out! Their feet hurt.

Pene

As a small child he had dreamed of wood carvings that would make him famous throughout the land of Edonia. He had dreamed of being asked to carve animals for the King’s throne, and that he, Anapa, would be invited to create such a throne.

As he grew up he spent hours watching animals in the bush, noting the long-necked giraffes, their dappled colouring, their honey-coloured eyes and long eyelashes.

He watched the elephants and the buck and the crocodiles and he learned in his soul how to carve them from wood.

A carving by Anapa came to be much prized by Edonians. He got his wish, and carved a new throne for the King, and people came from miles around to look at the throne and marvel at the delicate carvings that decorated it.

One hot morning, Anapa left his hut and took up his work under the msasa tree beside it. He was carving a large giraffe, which stood as high as his own head.

The village children crept close to look at the wooden giraffe that was coming to life under Anapa’s clever hands and knife. The giraffe was big enough for a child to sit on, and Anapa good-naturedly helped the smaller children on to the giraffe’s back, and held them as they pretended to ride it.

And so the peaceful, sunny hours passed. Wood shavings piled up at Anapa’s feet.

From a distance, you would have thought that a real giraffe stood beside Anapa’s hut, so great was his skill.

Anapa had finished the delicate detail of one eye and was about to begin carving the next eye, when Chief Gadzu came over to Anapa, as he worked outside his hut.

“I will buy that giraffe,” he told Anapa. “How much?”

“It is not for sale,” said Anapa quietly. “This is a gift for my unborn son.”

“Carve another one for your son,” growled the Chief. “I want this giraffe.”

“Very well, you may have it when it is finished,” said Anapa, turning back to his carving.

At this, Anapa’s pretty young wife burst into tears.

“How could you agree to give the giraffe away?” she sobbed. “You promised it would be for our first son!”

“Yes, and so it will,” replied Anapa.

“But you now say the Chief can have it!”

“I said he can have it when it is finished,” said Anapa. “Do not weep, my wife. It will never be finished.”

“Oh, my husband, how clever you are!” cried his young wife, running her hands over the carving of the giraffe.

“He is finished except for one eye,” said Anapa. “Our son will inherit a one-eyed giraffe.”

Now, Chief Gadzu became even more angry when he heard that Anapa had no intention of finishing the wondrous carving of the great giraffe.

How dare a mere wood carver frustrate his desires? He would have his revenge.

For some days he brooded over his plans. He would make sure that neither Anapa nor his son would possess the carving.

The villagers called the carving Mkulu, or the Big One, and every day they inspected the beautiful wooden animal that stood in the shade of the tree outside Anapa’s hut.

Being a simple man himself, Anapa never imagined that anyone would be so spiteful as to harm his beautiful creation.

Early one morning before the birds had begun calling to each other, the Chief sent one of his strong young warriors with a burning brand to set light to Mkulu, the Big One.

The warrior built a nest of dry twigs and branches around the wooden carving, and set fire to it.

The crackle and roar of the hungry fire woke the villagers, who sat up in alarm when they smelled the thick smoke. One by one they rushed out of their huts and exclaimed in dismay when they saw Mkulu burning brightly in the midst of the fire.

Anapa stumbled sleepily from his hut and gave a terrible cry. His masterpiece was on fire, blackening as the hot tongues of fire devoured it.

“Who has done this?” demanded the villagers.

“Chief Gadzu,” said Anapa sadly. “I would not sell it to him. So he has burned it.”

Anapa’s wife started to wail.

“It was a present for my baby son,” she sobbed. “Chief Gadzu is a hateful man!”

“Look!” said the villagers, pointing to the fire that now spread to the msasa tree and from there leaped to the roof of Anapa’s hut, and from his hut to the next hut, and from the next hut to the next, until the whole village was on fire.

That evening the villagers stood in the midst of the smoking ruins of their village, anger in their hearts.

“What will you do?” they asked Anapa.

“I will give him my carving,” said Anapa, picking up a small piece of charred wood that was all that was left of the one-eyed giraffe. “He wanted my carving. He shall have my carving.”

“What are you going to do?” cried his wife fearfully.

“I will make him eat it,” said Anapa.

His face as black as thunder, Anapa stalked away to find Chief Gadzu.

What happened to Anapa and Chief Gadzu? Nobody knows. Neither of them was ever seen again.

The villagers built new huts on the ashes of the old ones, and Anapa’s small son plays under an msasa tree with a little wooden carving of a giraffe, made by his sorrowing mother.

Sometimes the village children ask the boy, “Why does your giraffe only have one eye?”

“I do not know,” he replies. “I have asked my mother to finish my giraffe, but she shakes her head, thus, and smiles, so, and then she cries and tells me to go outside and play. It is something I do not understand, but I love my giraffe even though he is not finished.”

Perhaps this is why, when the moon is full, say the Talking Drums, you may see a wooden giraffe slipping quietly down to the Fula River, mysterious eye fringed with mysterious lashes.

On his way back, Mkulu, the Big One, will visit the hut of Anapa’s wife, and pause to look at a sleeping child, before once more vanishing into the night.

It is possible, say the Talking Drums, that so much love went into the carving of Mkulu that it is Anapa himself who looks down on his sleeping child.

Who can tell whether this is so, or not so?

End

Author’s note: The African bush is full of magic and we are free to believe what we please. It pleases me to think that it was Anapa himself who watched over his son.
 Pene Beavan Horton

Copyright reserved 2010

From The Drums That Would Not Stop Talking, a book of African Fairy Tales by Pene Beavan Horton

There is a

 sweetness in

friendship

like the honey taste

of pulled grass.

Warmth and growth

shared.

Years from now we’ll

remember

how it was . . .

Almost Aspen Grove,

a Sacrament of light,

high and burning

colour, autumn air,

a cricket orchestra and

Scottish thistles,

blue ones – see?

And around, all around,

the mountains

looking as if ancient fingers

folded them.

The Temple, Carma.

We almost lost it!

Then there it was,

honey and cream limestone

clean and fabled

on its own hill.

Man built Manti

God built Aspen Grove

Years from now we’ll remember

both

Temples

Shared friendship

and the many kinds

of light.

Pene Beavan Horton

© reserved 2010

To all writers, everywhere, who have no time to write – poem

Now is the time of the black and white sketch

Never a time to do oils

Now is the time of the unrhymed verse

Condensed into coils and coils of

Thought that

Go down in a hurry

Don’t worry about writing novels

No time

Now is the time

Now

Do your sketch, you poor wretch,

Write your verse, keep it terse,

Stir your soup,

Nurse the croup,

Fix the tire,

Stoke the fire,

Do your job,

Feed the mob,

Milk the cow,

Pen the sow,

Get the door,

Wash the floor,

Sew that seam,

Whip the cream,

Grate the cheese,

Shell the peas,

Count the cash,

Stir the hash,

Clean the bath,

Clear the path,

Frost the cake,

Boil the hake,

Kiss it better,

Find that sweater,

Pay that bill,

Mind the till,

But keep thinking, keep

Thinking,

Keep thinking.

© 2006 Pene Beavan Horton

roaring

with awesome noise

that puts to flight the King of Beasts.

and they?

collapse! hoarse with laughter and delight.

who had the greater fright?

my great-grandfather Thomas Hartley

and his three hunter sons,

or the tawny black-maned

brute, that runs?

the lion, of course!

fashioned, fully passioned

by the same primeval force,

men and lion switched roles.

are there men today

who’d dare, like Thomas,

to wave their hats in the air

and out yell, out stare

a lion?

or did it take a special

breed of men

born under Africa’s pouring sun

sometimes to poke fun

at it?

Thomas and his sons are dead

and long since dead the lion.

their spirit is gone from the land

they loved,

and all that is left is

a funny story.

but if it’s a funny story

why do I feel so

sad?

Pene Beavan Horton

Copyright Reserved

P.S. Thomas Hartley was our great-great-great grandfather – born 1802-1886. All the Hartleys, including this Thomas, are called a son of Thomas Hartley – but I don’t have the dates or any info on Thomas the father of Thomas …. Judging by the photographs of the three Hartley brothers, any lion would have run away from them!

 Henry Hartley, born 1815-1876, was a son of Thomas Hartley and he sailed in “Albury” in 1820. Educated at Bathurst School, married Emma, daughter of William Kidson. From 1844 he was engaged in ivory hunting. In 1865 he discovered gold in Matabeleland and later in Mashonaland. Hartley Hill was named after him by Thomas Baines. He died at Thorndale, in Magaliesberg, and was buried there.

 James Cawood, Mom’s great-grandfather (father of Susanna Alice Cawood) married Elizabeth Hartley, the daughter of Thomas Hartley in 1830. He was the son of David Cawood, and sailed in the “John” in 1820. He took part in the campaign against M’fecani in 1828. He was trading at Port Natal in 1832 and in 1849 was a Municipal Commissioner at Grahamstown. He died at Grahamstown and was buried there. 

 One Wedderburn used to deal in illicit diamonds and put them in pounds of butter, says Mom – she was just a kid and can’t remember details!

“Once upon a time . . .”

What magic lingers in the mind!

Dragons! princesses! knights and dwarfs,

maidens mythical,

apples golden,

bright enchantment webbing us willing

in

spider thrall.

Once upon a time . . .

I too was young and life sublime;

seeking after

dreams, enticed by yesterdays, beckoned

by tomorrows. So lost I all

 I might have known

of present joys

that sped away, so soon, so soon!

Once upon a time

Each day was full of flowers floating in the air

Too few tomorrows in my future now, and

so much past has passed!

No knights, no ladies fair!

 Once upon a time seems dark as night

to one who hears those fatal words

sans credence or delight.

 Pene Beavan Horton

 Copyright Reserved

“We’ll gather lilacs in the spring again . . .”

wrote Ivor Novello, during World War II, reminding us

that the dark days of war would not last forever.

Just so, we wait through freezing days ‘til once

again the lilacs bloom and

fill us with delight.

Lilacs! The very name perfumes the air and

conjures up the purple, mauve and

white

patrician blooms.

Even as they dip and sway in heaven-

scented breezes

we cannot keep the thought at bay …

How do we live without them

when they go away?

When loved ones leave how do we learn to live

without the beauty and the kindness

that we once knew?

Best fill the senses with the scents, the sights, the glory

that is Now

and burn the loving into some

safe recess of the mind.

When lilacs fade or love grows cold, we’ll always have

what we once had, and, in remembering,

look forward to more lilacs,

in some other spring.

Pene Beavan Horton

Copyright reserved

Many a bright and

beckoning

target

beseeches our

joyous aim

We watch our

gleaming arrows sink

in pillow-soft indifference

that feathers round

our heads

While the bow still

quivers

in our minds

Shall we go

on like Scott to the

white South

Pole?

Yes, and yes,

so long as targets

beckon and

we have strength to

loose just one

more

arrow

from our eager

soul.

Pene Beavan Horton

Copyright Reserved

NOTE: Internationally renowned Conductor, Antonin Waldstein, (not his real name), was unable to deliver his scheduled music lecture to residents of Sidney, because he broke his conducting leg getting off the ferry at Swartz Bay.

Maestro Czeslaw Gladyszewski, dazzling young Polish Canadian symphony orchestra Conductor, kindly stepped into the breach and delivered the lectures for his fallen colleague.

The Charlie White Theatre was packed with classical music fans as conductor Czeslaw Gladyszewski began the evening with a recording of a Bach concerto. He explained that Bach only knew one tune so he kept his instruments playing it over and over ad infinitum. Bach introduced variations, however, by encouraging some instruments to start sooner or end later than the others.

The great Polish pianist, Grieminsky, always finished later than the others because he started later. Some weeks he didn’t show up at all, so Bach finally wrote him out of the concerto.

“The concerto is different from the symphony,” explained Gladyszewski. “In the symphony all pieces are on the same side, pulling together. In the concerto the solo instruments fight it out with the rest of the orchestra.”

Gladyszewski, wearing black and his own hair, told his audience of alert listeners that Beethoven fortunately knew a few more tunes than Bach.

“When Beethoven’s themes are not competing they are collaborating, or breaking some rule or other. That is life.

“Beethoven was a great man. He seldom did what he was supposed to do. He wrote his own cadenzas into the score because he objected to just any musician putting chunks of inferior stuff into the great music he wrote.

“When violinist Yshmael Rubek found he was not allowed to do his own cadenza, he played his violin upside down to annoy Beethoven.”

Rubek would stop and oil his violin strings when they got overheated. His violin often needed new brake shoes but since violinists are underpaid and he couldn’t afford the brake shoes, he wrote a cadenza for Violin and Brake Shoes, which was fairly well received in New York, at a Beethoven Benefit Concert for the hard of hearing.

The percussion group had a field day at this concert. They found they could play as loud as they liked without disturbing anyone.

“This is where Beethoven first got his reputation for loud, unexpected noises, since the reporter covering the concert was not hard of hearing,” Gladyszewski explained.

During the first part of the second lecture, something was missing. It turned out to be the Conductor. But finally he arrived in a hand painted silk tie, canary yellow jacket, blue Pierre Cardin pants and no-name shoes.

He was in a romantic mood, which was just as well because the evening was devoted to Romanticism in Music, in Life, Death, Flowers, the Heart, the Eye, the Ear, etc.

“Romanticism,” said Gladyszewski, “did not just arrive on December tenth, eighteen hundred and thirty-four at three o’clock in the afternoon. No. It arrived, bang, at four o’clock on January fourteenth, eighteen hundred and thirty-two, so the age of feeling was in, and the age of the little boxes with all the proper movements in was out.

“Some people, like Beethoven, were farther out than others. Beethoven’s brother, Debussy, was far out also. At first Debussy’s professors would not speak to him. Later they said he was a genius. But they waited until he was half dead first. That is life.”

In all art people must be half or three-quarters dead before they are recognized, because this way starving artists sell their music for a song and their paintings for a jug of wine and it’s cheaper for the locals to get their services.

When artists have been dead for a suitable length of time, they can sell their stuff for half a million dollars. Most of them don’t bother because it’s tough to find a place to spend it where they are.

Gladyszewski told his toe-tapping audience that Mozart was alive once. That is probably when he wrote his music, except for the Dead March, a pretty piece but not lively.

Beethoven wrote his Eroica Symphony as a Salute to Napoleon. Which is queer, because, says Gladyszewski, “today we speak more of Beethoven than of Napoleon. Who is saluting Whom?

“Nobody has heard Napoleon’s salute to Beethoven, except a few unfortunates. Josephine didn’t let him finish it, so it’s called the Unfinished Symphony for Cannon and Conductor. They bring a cannon on stage and fire it at the Conductor, which stops the orchestra cold every time. Another reason why nobody’s heard Napoleon’s salute to Beethoven.

“In the early days,” explained Gladyszewski, “musicians were treated as domestics around the palace. The bassoon player’s job was to walk the dogs twice a day. The violinist was also the pastry-cook and the oboe cleaned the washrooms.”

This wealth of fascinating music lore can only be had from someone with wide ranging musical talent like our noble Conductor, who, fortunately, has never conducted Napoleon’s salute to Beethoven.

“Franz Liszt was famous for being Wagner’s father-in-law, or vice versa. He could also play the piano. All women loved him so he ended up in a monastery, which is life. He had an international heart, which shows in his Second Rhapsody Number Three Hundred and Twenty-two, because if you listen to this Hungarian music you hear a very small Indian gentleman charming a very large snake out of a wicker basket, and how much more cosmopolitan can you get than that?”

Gladyszewski explained that composers use refrains because it saves them having to think up more music. “When they get bored with the refrain they throw in a couplet. Most composers keep half a dozen or so couplets on hand.”

Paganini was so jealous of his music he never let anyone see it, which made it difficult for the orchestra to follow along. In spite of this, people cried when Paganini died.

“Tchaikovsky put his problems into his music. The more problems, the greater the music. All great composers have great problems. We do not know which come first, the problems or the music, the music or the problems.

“However, we do know that people with the worst problems are always composers, or vice versa. And they all come to a bad end, one way or another.

“They die of cholera because they don’t have a dishwasher, or they die from venereal disease or they end up in a monastery or a … but why go on? Just listen to their music, which for some reason is so much greater than the people who wrote it.”

Composers always write their own epitaphs and if they don’t die at the proper time they write another one and another until they finally write their final piece and die. That is why so much of their music is said to foretell their own deaths. They don’t trust anyone else to write something good enough to see them out, so they begin writing dirges at a very young age, the lifespan of composers being notoriously short.

“Perhaps their music kills them,” says Gladyszewski. “Who knows?”

However, we all know what killed poor Schubert. He died after one too many people asked him why he hadn’t finished his Symphony. It was left to Conductor Gladyszewski to tell the eager audience why Schubert hadn’t got around to finishing it.

“He lost interest in it after his wife made him babysit the kids all one Saturday afternoon and even though he lived for six years after this, he never quite got into the same frame of reference again. He told everybody he’d said all he wanted to say, and why not have a symphony with only two movements, or, if he was writing fast, six? Pick, pick, pick! People want so many explanations!”

At this point in the lecture, Maestro Antonin Waldstein hobbled on to the stage on crutches and demanded that Maestro Gladyszewski leave, since there were gross inaccuracies in his presentation.

Waldstein tried to whack Gladyszewski with one of his crutches, tripped and broke his other leg. The third lecture was regretfully cancelled until further notice.

Note: Czsslaw Gladyszewski (his real name) is a former conductor of the Prince Edward Island Symphony and he graciously allowed the author to pull his conducting leg.  

What’s so fascinating about a lot of ancestors who’ve been dead a long time?

People are going nuts over genealogy. It isn’t just Auntie Maisie in Victoria who’s doing it — everybody’s doing it. Thousands of Canadians and millions of researchers globally are immersing themselves in their family history.

The big question is why? What’s so fascinating about a lot of ancestors who’ve been dead a long time? You’re alive and well and living in Sidney, and Great Uncle Harry expired in 1900. What’s exciting or relevant about that?

Let’s take a look.

Genealogy is comforting. It’s the antidote to Future Shock, clones and test tube babies. Delving into your family history personalizes the terrifyingly impersonal.

Some future test tube person may trace his family tree like this: “My father was TT#1,700,689, his father was TT#898,010 and I can trace my fifth-great-grandfather back to TT#1.”

That’s all right for the future if you like that sort of thing, or read a lot of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Genealogists prefer the past. They like feeling connected to a long line of people who have contributed to who they are now.

How often have you heard someone say, “You’ve got Aunt Belinda’s nose,” or, “All the Wedderburn men went bald before they were forty,”?

It’s interesting, if disconcerting, to discover that you’ve inherited your great-grandmother’s double chins or heavy eyebrows, but gratifying to find that your artistic talent stems from a great uncle who painted miniatures in the 1800s.

Some people may do genealogy for health reasons … they want to find out if they have inherited genes that could predispose them to heart disease or Alzheimer’s or cancer … and take proactive preventive measures where possible.

Some people may do genealogy hoping to find themselves related to all the Royal Houses in Europe or to the Rockefellers, but what grabs most of us is the human interest.

“I’ve got a second-great-grandfather who had the misfortune to become an unmarried father, which ended his career in the Ministry,” recalls one man fondly.

Genealogy is a great leveller. You may turn up a cattle rustler, or, as you dig deeper, you may discover that a great-great-grandfather spent some time in jail.

As the following joke explains, the Smiths decided to compile a family history, a legacy for their children and grandchildren. They hired an author to write their story, but wanted to gloss over the fact that Great-Uncle George had left this world via the Electric Chair.

The author told them not to worry, he’d handle it.

“Great-Uncle George,” he wrote, “occupied a chair of applied electronics at an important government institution, was attached to his position by the strongest of ties, and his death came as a great shock.”

What if you do turn up some undesirable ancestors? Distance and knowing the circumstances helps you understand their actions. You may not wish to judge them too harshly. Alternatively, you could take a leaf out of the Smiths’ book and hire a creative writer to gloss over their misdeeds!

Not knowing who’s going to turn up in your family background is exciting, and researching your roots has never been easier. Internet technology has given genealogical research a major boost.

“Genealogy is one of the most popular activities on the Internet. In the next ten years all original old documents are expected to be digitalized and categorized for easy reference on the Internet, by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There are over 10 billion records,” says Dirk Yzenbrandt, local Sidney businessman.

“Members see family life as continuing beyond the grave with the same relationships as exist here on earth, so their interest in identifying their ancestors is personal and religious.”

Gillian Mead, family history expert, who lives in Sidney, has been doing genealogy for the past 30 plus years.

Why does she do it?

“It’s a life-long hobby,” Mead says. “I spend time researching my family history every day. I have on file three thousand two hundred names, including that of my great-grandfather, Thomas Lewis, who fought at Rorke’s Drift in South Africa in 1879.

“If you like mysteries and puzzles you’ll love genealogy. The hardest person to find was my maternal great-grandmother – Annie Price. I knew she was born about eighteen hundred and seventy, in London.

“It turns out there were TWO Annie Price’s living in London at the time, both in Hackney, both with a mother named Jane and both born in eighteen hundred and seventy. The problem was, which Annie was mine?

“Out of the blue I received a letter from someone claiming to be related to me. She got my name from the Rorke’s Drift web site.

“Her grandmother, Gladys, was the older sister of my grandmother, Florencia. Her Aunt had the family Bible and it recorded that Annie was the daughter of Benjamin and Elizabeth Jane Price (Hackney, London, England).

“So, through a combination of an old-fashioned Primary source, the family Bible, and the Internet, I have finally found the right Annie.”

“Be warned,” Gillian says. “Genealogy starts out as a minor hobby and almost always ends up as a major obsession!”

How to get started? Locally, visit the LDS Church’s Family History Centre at 701 Mann Avenue, Victoria, BC, which is open to the general public Monday, Friday and Saturday from 9 a.m. – 12.30 p.m. and Tuesday and Wednesday from 9 a.m. to 4.30 p.m., and 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. On Saturday afternoons, instructional classes are provided on various aspects of family history research.

The Church offers free use of computers with free access to many data bases, including http://www.familysearch.org/ , a comprehensive web site that helps you start from scratch or do in-depth research.

Gillian Mead also uses the Personal Ancestral File (PAF) program, which you can download free from this site.

You can obtain a free ‘Tracing Our Ancestors in Canada’ brochure from the National Archives, 395 Wellington Street, Ottawa, Ontario, KIA 0N3. Information on census records, births, deaths, marriages, land ownership and military records can be found at www.archives.ca.

You’ll find a great many genealogical data bases on the Internet, some free and some on a pay-for-use basis, covering many countries, ships’ passenger records, vital statistics, census records and many other useful topics. These web sites include www.ancestry.com and www.ancestry.ca .

If you don’t have your own computer, you may want to visit your local library and book time on one of their computers.

  If you like mysteries and puzzles, you’ll like genealogy. You’ll love it like peanuts. You’ll hate having to stop searching and start supper.

Why do it? Little by intriguing little you’ll discover why it’s delightful and engrossing to find out exactly where you fit on your family tree, nutty or not. In the end, it’s not your ancestors you’re searching for, it’s yourself.

 Copyright reserved

Pene Beavan Horton 2010