Homes and families

Albert House is being renovated. The house, place of my birth and my home for twenty-five years, is being brought into the 21st century. And with it the past is being chipped away. The garden has already been destroyed. The apple trees, my mother's pride and joy, are gone as is the orange blossom that she planted so I could carry some of this most traditional flower on my wedding day. She didn't live to see that day but I did carry orange blossom in my bouquet and I left for the church from this my home.

The destruction being wrought made me think back, to remember

It took the builders three days to knock through the wall of my bedroom to put in a window. Day after day, they chipped and hammered and swore until the hole in the four foot thick wall was big enough to let in the sun, but bigger than the view of Polly Garter next-door’s garden deserved. 

With my great-gran on the steps of Albert House

My bedroom was at the back of the house in the part that had already withstood eight generations. In my great-great-great-grandfather’s day it had been a public house. Years later, when it was finally rid of the smell of ale and gin, my great-grandmother wanted the front, which at that time still bore the legend, ‘Albert Inn’, fashionably pebble-dashed. The work had scarcely begun before the local bigwig, Harry Libby, came thundering to the door, ‘What are you doing, woman? This is sheer vandalism, destroying the heritage of the village.’ My great-grandmother didn’t give birth to twelve and raise eight children to be told what she could or couldn’t do with her own home — especially not by an upstart village boy — and she told him so.

That house, the stands in the middle of a terrace in the heart of the village. It was a matriarchal household: throughout my childhood there were four generations of women living there. My grandfather was a quiet gentle man, content to sit in his chair by the window, listening to the wireless and smoking his cigarettes, and my father, well, he was a character in one of my library books. On the rare occasions when I felt well-disposed towards him, he was the heroic Mr March away at war; most times he was the unseen parent who packed his daughter off to boarding school and sold her pony the moment she’d gone.

My great-grandfather, the man occupying centre stage

My great-grandfather, on the other hand, had died the year before I was born leaving a legacy of legend. He – almost single-handedly if family history is to be believed - had built Ford’s first factories in America. When the hiraeth became too strong, and he returned home to Wales, Henry Ford himself – again, the stuff of family myth - came to our village and begged him to return, offering to transport the whole family back to the States. But the women wouldn’t go and a good thing too else my story would be completely different.

As I said, my great-grandmother had eight surviving children and her presence in my growing-up home meant a constant flow of visitors. The encompassing of me within this extended family provided a shelter, the walls of which were stronger than bricks and mortar, and it was easy to ignore the non-existence of one person, to have only a vague awareness that something was missing but that it didn’t really matter much. I was surrounded with love and its Welsh synonym, good home cooking. When there were lots of us, the family, there for dinner we would pull out the table and I would squeeze onto the bench next to the wall. This was my favourite place, where the bricks I leaned against were warmed by Mr Shires next door’s fire. I sat quietly in the glow of conversation and knew that here I was safe. 


In 1964 I passed my eleven plus and the door to the another world, to Glanmor Grammar School, a more precarious world of Latin and physics, was opened to me. There was one other fatherless girl in the class but her father had had the decency to die. I explained to those who wanted to know that my father worked abroad. The summer of love was still to come and, in any case, free love only applied to the beautiful people out there, not the parents of good grammar school girls in South Wales.

My French teacher was called Miss George. She was soft-spoken with a gentle face and greying uncontrollable hair. In her lesson she asks around the class the question, Est ce que faites votre pere? Thirty three girls sitting in rows waiting for their turn, or in my case, praying for the bell to ring, please, before Miss George gets to me, please don’t let her ask me. Shall I lie, make up an answer? Il est un medecin. Tres bien, where does he work? No, I’d blush, stutter, be caught out. Mon pere est mort. Convenient but they all know. The bell rings, the problem goes away for today, and I go home to steak and kidney pie and rice pudding.

Some of that extended family on the steps

So was that it? The worst I had to bear? It stands out in my memory but when I stop and think, try as I might, I cannot recall one unkind comment, not one slur on my parentage through the whole of my childhood and adolescence. If that was as bad as it got, then surely the family did its job well. 




When I enter the house that is now my home, I breathe in the same sense of security that my first home gave me; I hope my children feel it too. 

Since it was sold out of the family, Albert House has come on the market several times. Each time one or other member of the family views it with barely-concealed desire. But it’s never really suitable: too big, too small, no garage, no garden. 

I was the last of the family to be born in Albert House and I linger over the link with the past. I’ve looked on old maps, tried to locate the public house that was to become my home. I’ve never been able to find it. 

Women Centre Stage but not me

Last year I took part in a Women Centre Stage event where I read a monologue. If you were reading my blog last year you may remember that my toilet humour was very tame compared to the singer praising her girlfriend in very Old English terms and the poet enraptured by Sheela-na-gigs (carvings on old churches of the exposed genitalia of women).

Well, when the new Dylan Thomas brochure arrived last week, I noticed that there was another Women Centre Stage happening this year. (Obviously someone had forgotten to tell me about it ...) I quickly emailed the organisers asking if they wanted me to perform again (it had obviously slipped their minds how good I was ...)

Yesterday I had a reply. 'Thank you so much, dear, but our draft programme is full. May I put you on the reserve list?'

I'm tempted to tell them what to do with their reserve list. But I won't. I'll say, pathetically gratefully, yes, please, and thank you.

Last night

The event is due to start at 7. I'm running late.

At 6.29 I decide I'd better go to the loo before I set off. As I rush I trip thereby discovering that the trousers I bought today in the Debenhams sale are too long. At 6.30 I discover there's still a large label stuck on said trousers. I'm glad I spot this before I stand in front of an audience.

At 6.40, in the car on my way, I find out that the manufacturers of the trousers have kindly supplied me with spare studs. I'm not sure where they're supposed to go but I know where there are now: inside my trousers, half-way down my thigh, digging into my leg.

At 6.50 I arrive with time to spare.

I spot someone I know (slightly) and when I tell her I'm on my own she invites me to join her table. Phew.

I am down on the programme to appear fourth. The first 3 acts perform and, dry-mouthed and heart-thumping, I wait for my name to be called. 'Next we have Bea reading some poetry.' What? That's not me.

Bea reads and the next performer is announced: Brid.

I grab the compere as she passes and stage-whisper. 'Have you forgotten me?'

'Are you Liz? You're not here.'

I don't want to argue as this is a distinct possibility. The compere comes back and says I'm on next.

Well, fans, I was wonderful. The audience laughed. A lot. Loads of them came up to me afterwards and said how wonderful it was and had it been published and I should make an audiobook. I explained that, according to the BBC and publishers, nobody is interested in monologues these days. Unless your name is Alan Bennett.

(I like the idea of an audio-book. People commented that I read it well and most monologues are better listened to than read. Sean has previously suggested recording monologues as there is the equipment available at Zac's; I will have to look into this further.)

(You notice I had to wear my glasses? It was either that or make the print so large it would have taken me half a ream of paper to print.)

With it being called Women Centre Stage, and with all the acts being female, and the event being in aid of women co-operatives in Liberia, you're obviously going to get some women, both in the audience and performing, who live alternative lifestyles.

One of the singers sang three of her own songs and they were all lovely but especially the last one, which was a love song to her girlfriend. I spoke to them both afterwards and the singer explained that her girlfriend was her muse for all her songs, and that she was 'going to take her home and f*** her now.'

'Oh, good,' I squeaked, smiling sweetly, while my brain was rushing round screaming, 'Purlease! We don't say that things like that where I come from.' I feel another monologue coming on!

The woman who was on stage before me showed us three of her paintings of, and read us some of her poetry about, Sheela-na-gigs. I don't know if you've heard of these; I hadn't. And quite frankly I won't mind if I never do again. You wouldn't think it was possible to use the word 'vulva' 23 times in 10 minutes, would you?

They might be from ancient Celtic tradition and they might adorn the walls of very old churches, but if I never again see a carving of a woman with exposed genitalia, it won't bother me. I can't bring myself to put an image on here but if you'd like to find out more about sheela-na-gigs or vulva-woman, go here.

xx

Cue stage left

Having spent the morning in the hairdresser's I'm now rehearsing the monologue I will read this evening at the Women Centre Stage event at the Dylan Thomas Centre. There's nothing quite like the thought of an audience watching you to make a girl aware of her grey roots! Vanity thy name is ...

The performers are each allowed 10 minutes so I've had to cut bits out of my mono. It was very difficult because each word is vital obviously! I think I've got it down to 9 minutes and 43 seconds. I do hope the audience laugh. Last time I read a section of it to an, albeit small, audience, it barely raised a titter. There should be a large crowd tonight and I know it's funny (I wrote it on my Masters course and it was highly praised and appreciated by tutors and audience alike) so I really hope they laugh aloud from early on otherwise my confidence will fade faster than my voice.

I haven't told anyone I'm taking part in this event. Apart from you of course! So I'll be a Lizzie No-Mates as well.