wendy house

wendy: I talked to dad on the phone last night

mumzie: yes, I was here darling, I heard

wendy: that’s a first! we don’t normally actually talk to each other on the phone

mumzie: I know dear, he normally says “that’ll be wendy, you answer it” and hands me the phone

wendy:……

Luckily, I learnt in my teenage years that talking with dad is only warranted if there is valuable knowledge to be shared. Talking to me is not something high on his list of priorities – why would he want to do that?!

Today I called because mum’s brother-in-law has just died. Mumsie talks to move her feelings around, sometimes I wonder how on earth they ended up together, strangely, they fit together extremely well. Dads silence and mums chatter.

wendy: Dad? There’s too much Margret Thatcher everywhere. To try and keep my spirits up I’ve been listening to Tony Benn interviews. How are you?

Dad: He was active in the electricity industry you know, if it wasn’t for Tony Benn Britain wouldn’t have a nuclear power industry.

Dad still wouldn’t tell me which way he votes, or voted, rather we compared fundamental beliefs and values. Unsurprisingly, our beliefs are very similar, so I don’t need to know which way he votes if what we want is fundamentally the same. I love Dad, he has such a strong and grounded perspective on things.

One of the breakfast rituals that has evolved at mum and dad’s home is loading-up their daily pill portions to ensure they take the right pills at the right times and can be confident that they haven’t misremembered taking them.

This is dad’s personal container after it’s been loaded. He knows what each pill is for, what it’s called and has a system for the pill-case division. He proudly talks me through it’s contents while mum chips in occasionally with a cheerful ’I take that one too“. They go on to compare their different pill regimes for me, why mum takes aspirin to thin her blood while dad takes warfarin, pronounced by dad as “wool for in”.

We’re competing for who takes the most, different, pills

They’re like a couple of kiddies comparing toy collections. I smile and tease them about the drug names. The size and mix of drugs in this daily dose to keep an 80 year old on track for longer life surprised me.

This year Mumsie’s suffered 2 strokes. They have mainly affected her ability to access word meaning. Only slightly, but noticeably so. She’s scared, both her parents and one elder sibling died of strokes. I’m scared. A little example of the minimum longer term impact of the strokes in a conversation with mumsie this weekend:

Mumsie: dad’s bought one of those things like a computer with no keyboard, I don’t know what it’s called, but if you say it I’ll recognise it

wendy: I-pad?

Mumsie: No

wendy: Tablet?

mumsie: Yes! A tablet

Both strokes happened while mum was doing crosswords, she loves crosswords. It was so sad to hear her say that she could see all the words but they didn’t make sense, she could hear dad talking but it didn’t make sense. She’s on all sorts of drugs, fingers crossed there wont be another Stroke soon and the modern drugs will keep her on top of the crosswords.

Mum has a Policeman’s heel.

Dad has a Baker’s cyst.

I’m seeking a central heating engineer, Archibald “Harry” Tuttle would do nicely please.

mumsie: have you got some books on film with pictures of Ginger Rogers’ dresses in them?

wendy: Um, possibly, but there’ll be lots of pictures on the internet that are easier to find

I put my laptop and mouse on the dining room table in front of mum. She pulled out her glasses and watched me type in search terms then helped me to change them. Mum learned about searching images while focussed on the actual images. She got very excited about how quick and easy it was to find the sort of thing she wanted. Her natural description of navigating the page focussed on the movement of the images, the focus of her interest, rather than the movement of the generic tool component (browser scroll bar):

mum “make the pictures go up” = wendy “scroll down the page“

Later that evening dad put mum’s own, ne’er used, laptop on his personal laptop table.  Mum put on her glasses and sat next to him. They both searched for images of Ginger Rogers dancing. Mum didn’t touch the laptop but she effectively controlled it through conversation with Dad. Her language had changed. Mum had shifted to using directional language that mapped to the movement of the scroll-bar rather than the images. During our conversation she’d picked up a little of how I speak about things and incorporated it into her instructions to dad:

mum “move it down” = wendy “scroll down the page“

Mum and Dad were terribly cute discussing the dress design and it’s properties for dancing. They both love to research things….

Dad told me of his cunning Christmas present for mumsie

Mumsie said not to get her anything electronic for Christmas so I’ve got her an e-book for her kindle, and I’ve already put it on her kindle so I can show it to her on Christmas day

Indeed, mum was really pleased with her present once she’d made sure that the new book on her kindle hadn’t replaced the book she was currently reading. Once she’d grasped that 2 books could co-exist on the Kindle an earnest enthusiasm for last year’s present (the kindle) began to show.

The book? A biography of George, Duke of Clarence  (1449-1478).

When I got to work I found the door kicked-in and half a dozen laptops stolen. Booo!

The desktop computer I was planning to use wasn’t stolen. Phew!

When I turned it on this frustrating black message showed-up.  Disbelievingly I rebooted the computer 3 x. Just incase. It didn’t make any difference.  Poo!

Our IT department had a super-hero taking-out the hard drive and getting my stuff on a working (Apple) hard drive, in less than 30 minutes.  Though I suspect that actually having an external boot disc for the computer would have been much quicker.  But who uses external boot CD’s these days?!

After such a dramatic ‘where’s my computer gone’ day at work I was relieved to be home.  The Cupboard had other ideas. She was considering a sympathy suicide. She leapt to the floor. Bollocks. She may have shown me a blue screen of death, but all I can remember was this monochrome thing when I attempted a reboot to fix it.   She’s defintiely passed away.

Dad has always claimed that I have special powers over electrical equipment. He’s an electrician, he knows these things. He says I can break electrical goods by merely looking at them.  I was never allowed to go near electrical equipment as a child.  At least it was for a good reason, not like -  ‘you can’t do that you’re a girl’. My life experience suggests that dad was onto something.

I need a new computer….. oooooeererrr.

Hooray!  New toy!

What should I get? ipad? Chrome thingy? Surface thingy?

Remember wendums, your mother grew up in the 1950s – when they invented invisible germs. Evil things that must be killed. Sometimes we should clean things that don’t need cleaning because the thought of germs can really upset mumsie

Dad was 15yrs when he went to the 1948 London Olympics. A train to blitz damaged london, walk up to Wembley stadium and buy a ticket on the door. The Games were a sign of hope of recovery. We didn’t think London would be able to host them. We had humility and hope.

Dad’s a spritely 80yr old. He walks the 4 miles to the local Post Office to pick up his pension. He’s webmaster for 3 websites, one for:

• his village.
• a group of retired engineering professionals.
• an engineering historical society.

Dad’s built computers and can program in many languages.  He’s no technical pansey, he likes to try things out. Dad’s always insisted that all his children have to be Engineers.  Engineering skills are fundamental survival skills and they bring joy – solving problems elegantly, beautifully. Obviously I’m biased, but I agree with dad.

Dad wont be going to the London 2012 Olympics. Not because

• he’s old
• London is difficult to get to
• he’s lost interest in sport

Dad’s not going because of the ‘Hoohah’ around the sale of the tickets and the whole organisation of the affair.  In their current form the Olympic games have  lost their beauty of celebrating athletic prowism. This beauty may still be there but sight of it is lost amongst all the other dross it’s dressed in.

Dad did start to try and buy tickets but was too annoyed by the lack of common sense in the process the ticket sales people had put in place. It lacked the wisdom of simple engineering. I too gave up in the process. One thing shines through for me

I love my dad

And like him I’m disappointed in how the London version of the Olympics have evolved since 1948

Mumsie: what would you like us to get you for your 18th Birthday present?

Wendy: A motorbike

Mumsie: No

Wendy: I’ll save to buy the protective clothing – Helmet, jacket, trousers, boots

Mumsie: No, nothing electrical for your 18th

Wendy: The Gibson Les Paul you got Bros 62 is an electric guitar

Mumsie: That’s different

Wendy: What if I buy the bike and you can give me a full set of leather gear and a helmet for my 18th?

Mumsie: No

Wendy: Why not?

Mumsie: No clothes for your 18th

Wendy: What can I have?

Mumsie: I thought a nice Diamond and Topaz ring

Wendy: If that’s what I’m allowed, I’ll take it… … can I pawn it for money towards a motorcycle?

Mum and Dad rarely rowed. Later that year they rowed about my getting a motorbike. Dad sided with me, placating mumsie with a promise to make sure that I looked after the bike properly. The morning before Dad took this photograph he carried a comfy chair into the garage while I laid out the large tent groundsheet on the garage floor between my bike and his comfy chair. Dad opened the Haynes manual.

Gradually I deconstructed the engine and lay each piece out in neat chronological order on the groundsheet. When the engine was in pieces we took a break to clean up and eat Sunday lunch.  Then, slowly, peace by piece, I rebuilt the engine. When I got confused, Dad showed me the relevant Haynes manual picture and pushed me to make a decision. He helped listen to the sound quality when adjusting the timer.

I felt so proud of myself once I’d finished.  Dad let me wear my favourite of his jumpers for this celebratory photograph.

The bike lasted just over a year before I sold it on for a profit.

My diamond and topaz ring, worn less than 6 times in 30 years,  reminds me that mum and dad love me and the responsibility and freedom of motorcycling…

Watch as a narcisistic Goldcrest headbutts the window trying to connect with the reflection of himself in my elderly parents bungalow

He’s so focussed on his own image he doesn’t notice the cat…

Dad shot the video and edited the photographs into this piece. He can be a whiz with modern technology when it doesn’t involve using the phone.

If you were at a Swedish speaking school you would swear in Finnish or German. Often the language at school was different from the language at home. At home you could have a conversation where one sentence would switch between languages, Finnish, Swedish German (Dad)

Dad had a multilingual upbringing in Finland, Sweden and  Hull (England). I had a monolingual upbringing, English was the only language spoken at home.

Dad did make sure we had many connections with his family history through music (Sibelius), decorations such as Dalacarlian horses, personal and published stories. Dad arranged the weekly trip to the Library to swap our story books. A big family event, such fun. Noggin the Nog and Tove Jannsen‘s Moomin’s (Muumi in original Finnish) were fond favourites of my early life. Like Dad, Tove was a Swedish speaking Finn. Little my is an occassional character in the Moomins, based on Tove.

The soundtrack for the TV series sounds almost Cajun….

Watch and listen to a Moomin episode in original musical Finnish

While wandering around the internets I stumbled upon the fabulous Finnish Immigration services website

As you do

I am eligible for Finnish citizenship because my father is a Finnish citizen and was married to my mother at the time of my birth. It looks like the only formality is for Dad to register my birth with a Finnish registry office, at the moment Finland doesn’t officially know that I exist. Dad explained that he didn’t register any of his children in Finland because that made them eligible for Finnish military service and he didn’t want us to be obliged to go through that, despite his fond memories of being stationed on the Åland Islands during his own National service

lady: does anyone know what Ludlow’s like?

wendy: its cute and its got a Castle, my dad was evacuated there as a child during World War 2. When we were children he took us to visit to see where he used to live and play.

 OMD sang Electricity

OMD quickly earned a favoured position in my teenage heart when I first heard Electricity. This song reminds me of home, of warmth and comfort. Most of all reminds me of Dad getting excited about Pylons, happily ethusing.  His excitement is contagious.

Dad started work for an electricity supply company in the early 1950′s.  Exciting times for an Engineer specialising in supplying electricity to the UK.  Building infrastructure, planning routes to lay cables and overhead lines. Dad is still passionate about the details of the tools of his trade.  He has photograph albums dedicated to Pylons.

He’s recently returned from a trip to China. He treated us to the holiday photo’s on the family TV. Amongst the photographs of temples, rivers, mountains, village streets were numerous photographs of pylons. 

Whenever I see a Pylon, transformer, dam, or insulator I think fondly of Dad.  How his face lights up and he starts talking about what’s interesting about this particular thing, its age, its construction process, its location or ability to withstand high winds.

Not only is his excitment contagious,

I now find myself taking photographs of Pylons whenever I go on holiday.

Norwegian man in Reading pub: there’s not many girls that know about assessing political risk

Wendy: I’m an ingenjör

Norwegian: what type of engineer?

Wendy: Social ingenjör

Norweigian: I find the English girls are very…..         errrrr….       how do you say ……’old fashioned’

Wendy:   Yeah,  I find the English girls are very old fashioned too,   that’s why my Finnish dad wanted to marry an English girl.                  But  look at these boots!      I’m not an old fashioned girl. I’m an ingenjör with SENSIBLE footwear.   Functionally well engineered,   good experience, easthetically funky    footwear   I blame Dad.

Norweigian: I’m sorry?.

Mumzie drives to another town to pick-up the only Rye crisp-bread that Dad considers to be like real Finnish Rye bread.

The myriad of  quirky little things my parents do for each other shows they are still in love, 52 years after getting married.

The TV remote isn’t working….

No, Wait.    it’s the  TV that isn’t working…

Oh,   actually its the socket that isn’t working….

Hang on,   its the ring-ciruit that isn’t working.  

Ah,   the fuse flipped while I was out.   Probably some freak lightening storm over the Wendy House.   Wish I’d seen that!  

During the diagnostic process I discover that the Wendy House has at least two separate electric rings in the front room alone!    

BANG!   the fuse flips again.   No lightening storm in range.   Odd.    I flip the fuse  back on  

BANG the fuse flips again.    Darn, its clearly broken and not fixing itself.   I call dad who walks me through a cunning diagnostic process that includes sniffing sockets and plugs,   switching various things on and off.   Using dad’s excellent problem-sourcing strategy I find the wiring of one socket is causing the banging.  

With  a message left on an electricians answer machine I’m about to discover the joys of having my sockets seen to.   I’m rather looking forward to it,   aren’t you?

My plan for choosing ‘A’ level’s was to pick topics where I got the best results.   Unfortunately my selection strategy didn’t work.   My results were the same in all topics.   Straight B grades.   I needed another strategy for deciding what to study for ‘A’ levels.   Mum and dad had clear guidance

Parents:   ‘you can’t go wrong with maths and physics,   you can become an engineer,   you can learn how to solve practical problems and look after yourself and your home properly’

Wendy: but I really enjoy Art, English Literature and History

Parents:  You can study Art, English literature and History  in your spare time,   you’ll be motivated to do it.   You probably wont study maths and physics in your spare time

This made sense to me.  

I talked to my English teacher.   He was furious,   I had a talent  that I should nurture,  he would never speak to me again if I chose Math’s over English.   I chose Maths, Physics and History.   He never spoke to me again.   Complying with emotional blackmail is not a personal strength.     History covered literature (Nietzsche) and art (Futurism, Cubism).    

Since that fateful decision I’ve played with writing, painting, sketching, and plagued you with my laxadaisical spelling and grammar.

Dad:   you can make elecronics stop working just by walking into a room
Wendy:   I thought I was being paranoid
Dad: No.   Not Paranoid. You have a talent for disrupting electronics
Wendy: thanks dad,  its good to know I’m not paranoid
Neverland:.

Wendy:   I accidentally pulled the bathroom light fitting on the ceiling,     today I picked up a newer sealed light fitting.

Dad:   Do you want me to bring me tools?

Wendy:   Not really,   [brothers' name]‘s  coming round with his tools,  advice,   and innovative home-improvement books on Wednesday.   I’d rather he climbed the ladder than you or I.

Dad: Yes, I do get a bit dizzy when my feet leave the ground.

Shipping (air or land) frieght to the UK requires that the owner  have a valid passport at all points when the freight will be moved.   Frieght moval times are unpredictable because of seasonal and weather variations and because frieght,   especially home-frieght,  is very low priority.   Remember by ditsy person’s annual passport?   It’s due for renewal this autumn…   …while the Wendy House is in transit….   Apart from guffaws of laughter this is what dad had to say when I asked him if I could hand-carry some stuff over to his home and leave it there ready for when I arrive,   just to be sure it would actually get there…

Mum says that will be OK…         …Passports and Passport timings are highly critical factors in travel – at least it is not as bad as in war time when you had to bring your Ration books with you if you were going out of the country – these had to be checked and if you had used next weeks rations woe betide you! That still applied the first time I came to England after the war – I nearly was not allowed to leave!

I should have guessed that it was worse during WW2.     I’m lucky that Britain and the US prefer peacekeeping to war or I’d probably have to live in a bunker at the bottom of the garden.

1977.     In  Helsinki mum, dad, and  both brothers were  visiting dad’s family.

Dad took us all into  the Kalnuun Puukko shop and we spent the afternoon each choosing a Puukko.   After Puukko’s were purchased we went off into the woods around Helsinki to find fallen wood to wittle.   We wittled together.   All good family fun.   Result?   Lots of pointy small sticks left in the woods.   My psyche was forever scarred by this experience and I’m now totally undatable.

When asked for some clarifying points on this ”knife’ aquiring experience  Dad described the social-cultural significance of a Puukko beyond my constrained concept of a ‘knife’:

Knife in Finnish is veitsi – You should never call a puukko a knife – it is much more than that – it is the basic survival tool that you should have when you venture into the forest or into nature at wintertime or summertime. Its very name is associated with its prime use puu is tree or wood and kko implies a thing associated with the former – a woodworking tool. With it you can build a shelter in the forest, make a spear for spearing fish, use as an ice pick to drag yourself out of broken ice and much more. It does not weigh you down – it is essential in hunting and fishing. The original puukko had handle made of tightly woven young birch bark which often had a spell written on it before it was applied. This had to be replaced regularly – the modern puukko often has a solid handle often simulating the old type. Taken into cities and suburbia it becomes a weapon rather than a tool and it loses its basic character. In the Finnish – English dictionary the puukko is described as a sheath-knife as English does not have a separate word for a woodworking knife . It can and is used for stabbing by roughs and the verb puukottaa means stab with a puukko and the stab (noun) is puukonisku. The blade of the puukko is puukonterä. The man who makes it is a puukonseppä ( a smith) A true puukko should be bought from the man who makes it and you should visit him so that he can choose the right blade for you – However mass production does not allow for these old niceties and a tourist shops in the city is the source nowadays.

I wonder what equivalent stories with socio-cultural significance will be handed down to our next generations…

my father once mentioned that he has second sight.   Apparently  it runs in our family

“How do you know?” …he did not  reply with…

‘how do you not know?’   …or question his  role as my biological father…

He told me a story of how, as a teenager, he shook hands with a girl and foresaw her death.   This had disturbed him so much that he avoided using his second sight,   except, of course, in his job  for divining.

Before retirement my father was responsible for the  overhead and underground lines of a  regional Electricity group  before Thatcher sold them all  off.   Dad used his divining skills to pinpoint the location of underground electricity lines or other obstacles  such as sewers when directing digging for repairs etc.   Dad kept his divining rods in the house.   As a child (5yrs, 1968) I would test him at the weekends.   A fun game.    The test involved him using his rods to find a single  tuppeny bit hidden under reams of    used computer paper I had liberally strewn across the  living room floor.    Dad used his divining rods to find the coin.   I watched him intently to make sure he wasn’t feeling the coin with his feet through the paper or using some other cunning strategy.

Dad  normally found the coin

then giggled

I see their heads, a pair of pinballs bouncing  in the distance, as they scan the hall between the taller, faster-moving, arrivals.   Dad’s thick heavy straight hair has a glass-fibre-optic luminance that is  easily held in  view.

Heading towards them, restraining the impulse to  run,  my strides extend.   I’m bound to fall over if I run amongst unsuspecting normal people.   A quick glance around confirms that   adults don’t run in arrivals lounges.   I’m an adult now.  I walk, like the other arrrivals around my parents,  very very very fast.  

After the 200yrd dash I manage to approach dad head-on and get both arms around his shoulders before he’d recognised me.   His shoulders?   I don’t remember ever having been able to reach his shoulders before now.    He kisses my cheek in front of my ear.    He can no longer reach my forehead.    Standing upright with his familiar cheshire cattish grin while  Mum joins the hug simultaneously giggling and chattering.   They had, they explained, ‘seen’ me but not recognised me…..

I hug-herd them to the luggage reclaimation rack while mother spills the first few lines of  this story,  then that,  then the other,  and another.   I barely have time to savour the images she draws before being pulled to the next story.   Dad grins silently,   keeping his sparkly dark blue eyes trained on the baggage go-round,   going round.   In  this moment of our  studying the baggage go round,   unobserved  chattering mother wanders off,   disappearing into the crowd,   giggling and chatting to herself as she goes.

Is  this how toddlers’ parents feel when they realise they can no longer see or hear their their toddler?

I’ll never know.

pre-teenage Wendy to Mum and Dad:

not ANOTHER castle,   please no.   No more Castles.   Look, Castles are made of stone,   have dungeons and halls and lots of spiral staircases and are generally falling apart.   Once you’ve seen one or two Castle’s you’ve pretty much got the Castle thing covered.   Can we go to the beach instead?   Please… please….   …or a tin mine?    

After 6 years living inn the USA,  during a visit to Mum and Dad’s home last year….

Let’s go on a day trip to a Castle or a Stately home,   or somewhere maintained by British Heritage,   please,   anywhere on your list of old places to visit?

Mum and Dad arrive in Seattle tomorrow for a week long holiday.   Holy Vacuum Cleaners!   Parental cleanliness standards are beyond my comprehension.   This means I’ll be spending Satruday blitzing the cat-fluff.   There are no Castle’s nearby so  I’m going to spring Teatro Zinzanni  on them,    wish me luck…