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Mam

28/11/2012

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I didn't post a blog last week. I'd gone to visit my mother in Wales. She was in hospital after suffering a fall in her home. I was warned that she'd lost some weight but I was really shocked when I saw the amount. My wife and I had spent four days with her in September and each day we'd accompanied her on a daily walk of a couple of miles. The person lying in that hospital bed couldn't have managed two steps.

I've always visited regularly but twelve or so years ago Mam had a bout of flu that really set her back. I stayed with her for a week until she was well enough to get back on her feet, but I felt she hadn't been taking care of herself as well as she might have done. I made a pact with her: she had to promise to look after herself, and if she did this, I'd visit (whenever humanly possible) every six weeks for three or four days. I'm very lucky that I have an understanding wife who never once complained about the garden being neglected or rooms not getting decorated because of these journeys. She loved my mother too and often spoke of her as being like a second mother to her. My son Tom visited his grandmother regularly and often shared the drive with me to pick her up for Christmas and bring her to our home and then return her afterwards.

My mother passed away on Tuesday 20 November at 8.40 am. I was with her when she died. She was tiny and frail but she gripped my hand tightly right to the last. Her speech was mostly incoherent. It was not easy for her. I don't think she suffered much pain, but she became agitated at times, and was frustrated and sometimes distressed by the long drawn-out process of dying. She was desperately trying to let go but she was a survivor by temperament and her body even in this weakened state still put up a fight.

I was grateful that I could be there just to hold her hand. She would have done the same for me.
Mair Johnson

16 April 1924 - 20 November 2012

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She was born at her grandparents' house in Meirion Street Aberdare, South Wales, the only child of George Martin Thomas and Gwenllian Wigley. Her father and mother met shortly after the Great War in which her father had served on the Somme. They married late for their generation and Mair's mother was thirty-five years old when she gave birth to her.

Mair was a sickly child. In her later years she used to joke about being 'very delicate'. At eighteen months she was diagnosed with meningitis and the local doctor told her parents that she would not be with them by the morning. Back in those times every community relied on 'folk medicine' and her 'Bopa' Sarah (Bopa being Valleys dialect for aunty) said to her parents, "Bring her over to me, we'll see what can be done for her" and together with her mother Gwen they applied poultices to the baby's feet every fifteen minutes throughout the night. Mair liked to tell the story of how the doctor (who liked to swear apparently) said to Bopa Sarah the next day, "You've done something to this bloody baby, haven't you?"and she particularly relished re-telling the part where Bopa Sarah shook her head and said with a look of choirgirl innocence, "Nothing at all doctor!" "Well," he said, "I know you've done something, and I take off my hat to you!"

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The sea air at Porthcawl on the Glamorganshire coast was prescribed by the same GP for Mair's health and she was often taken there for holidays to build up her strength. There are many photographs, her father being a keen amateur photographer, of the skinny-limbed Mair walking along the Porthcawl promenade with a Fulgoni's ice cream cornet in her hand. Perhaps it's why as an adult she had to, "Really feel like an ice-cream."

Until she went to school at five Mair spoke only Welsh. Her parents occasionally lapsed into French, which they both spoke, if they didn't want her to know what they were talking about. Unfortunately, Mair lost the ability to speak her native tongue confidently after beginning school. The Thomas family adopted Ebeneser chapel in Trecynon as their spiritual home. Her father was a deacon in the chapel, in those days the congregation was large, and he produced dozens of amateur theatrical productions, either put on in their vestry or at Aberdare Coliseum. As Mair grew older she became very interested in one particular boy who generally took the main part in her father's productions. She told me often how she might nonchalantly inquire when her father was casting a new play, "So who's playing the lead then, Dad?" and feel a flutter in her breast at his reply, "Oh, Danny Johnson of course!"

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Mair started courting this boy from the chapel, Daniel Gwynfryn Johnson, who was two years her senior, at the age of fourteen. He was the only man there ever was in her life and she always described him, with his naturally wavy, sandy-coloured hair as 'handsome'. They were thoroughly devoted to each other. The only time they were separated for any length of time was during World War II when Danny served in India with the RAF. They wrote a letter to each other every day for two and a half years. Often these letters to each other finished with the words 'Have faith always'. Mair spent most of the war at a factory testing shell casings. Towards the end of the war Mair's parents bought a small general stores in Llandeilo, Carmarthenshire, and this was where Danny headed as soon as he returned home after VJ day in 1946. They were married in 1947 and their first son, Ian was born in 1948. They had very little money in those early years together and Mair said Danny's first wage packet was five shillings - twenty-five pence!

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They attended Ebeneser where Danny was made a deacon shortly after his return. He was a modest man and she said that when his name was put forward he immediately got to his feet and proclaimed that he was too young to be made a deacon. The chapel however didn't agree, they made him a deacon and shortly afterwards he became their secretary too, from 1948 - 1960. They were both very involved in the activities of the local community. Mair loved to sing in the chorus of the Aberdare Operatic Society and took part in many of their productions like The King and I, Chou Chin Chow, Annie Get Your Gun etcetera. I was born in 1955.

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Danny, who was fully bi-lingual, took a job at Ty John Penry Press in Swansea and in 1960 the family moved west. We shared our home with Mam's parents and her great aunt 'Bopa' Mary after they'd retired from their shop. Mair and Danny worked diligently and selflessly at caring for their elderly relatives. As time went on they became proud, devoted grandparents and happily exploitable baby-sitters. They took their eldest grandchildren with them on their first package holidays abroad. Our son Tom, almost a decade younger than his 'first cousins', used to pack his case on the first day of his school holidays and expect us to deliver him from our home in East Sussex to South Wales to spend the summer with 'Gramma' and 'Dycu'.

In 1995, my father tragically died of a perforated ulcer which had been mis-diagnosed. Mair found herself a widow at the age of seventy-one. She put enormous effort into finding hobbies and interests to fill the void that now existed in her life. She took up art and calligraphy classes and made full use of her bus pass by visiting friends and relatives in Aberdare on quite often a weekly basis. She went out for lunch several days a week to pass the time. Unfortunately, as she got older she began to suffer with glaucoma and cataracts and it became harder and harder for her to see, which made art increasingly difficult. Mair had three great grandchildren.

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In 2010 she suffered a fall at her local shop which resulted in a hip replacement and after this she became increasingly dependent. My wife researched local sheltered housing and a place was found for her. Mam liked her little flat and often said she thought of it as an extension of her beloved bungalow.

Mam had a quirky way of looking at the world and could express herself in ways that often amused those in her company. On the subject of age and the prospect of getting older, she'd say with a deadpan expression, "I don't think much of this old age business! I won't be joining again!"

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She didn't enjoy the increased dependency that age brought and it was possibly this thought more than anything else that brought her to the final pages of her life at Gorseinon Hospital following a fall at her flat.

She is no longer suffering the many hours of desperate loneliness she often felt in her last years and is, I believe, happily reunited with her Danny, "The best pal I ever had," as she would have put it.


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Horror Stories are just Fairytales for Big Kids!

14/11/2012

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PictureBaba Yaga (puppet courtesy of Tom Johnson)
Hey! I just had a great idea for a horror story! How about:
 
Two children in a time of economic recession are abandoned deep in a forest by their parents, mainly because of the promptings of their hateful stepmother. However, they don't die as anticipated but come upon a house made of biodegradable foodstuffs. They start to eat, but unbeknown to them, the house belongs to a cannibalistic old woman...
 
Wait just a moment! This is beginning to sound awfully
familiar!
 
Horror is about evoking emotions - fear, apprehension and dread. I imagine that as a child when my mother told me the story of Hansel and Gretel I felt pretty darn scared- good thing I was cuddled up to her, all snug and safe. As a teenager I read Bram Stoker's Dracula tucked up in bed before going off to sleep (with some difficulty, I hasten to add!). In the second chapter after quite a lot of bulging eyeballs and suggestive genuflection from peasants, which the story's hero has dismissed as nothing more than bucolic superstition, he finally arrives at You Know Who’s Castle! When the Count implores Jonathan Harker to cross over his threshold with "Welcome to my house! Enter freely of your own free will" - I was shaking my pimply adolescent head with deep foreboding. Yet, while my common sense was yelling "Don't be a fool! Go back!" - at exactly the same time another part of me was urging him on. Let's face it, it wouldn't have made a very good book if Jonathan Harker had given himself a sound talking to at this point.  Imagine if he'd said to himself, "Blimey! Don't care for the cut of this chap's jib. That's the dodgiest cove I ever did see! Think I'd best make myself scarce!"
 
In real life the last thing anyone in their right mind would do is enter that castle!
 
However, as the main protagonist in a horror story, it is Jonathan Harker's duty to do just that! He would have been letting countless generations of readers down if he hadn't entered that castle. Imagine how dreadful it would have been to have been spared from hearing the Count utter, once he's entered his lair, that most chilling of lines, "... and leave something of the happiness you bring." Which I have to say even after all these years still makes my hair feel a bit funny! 
 
I'm  pretty certain that we human beings have been sitting around telling each other creepy tales since speech was invented. I suspect it may even be important in some way to a child's development to be frightened whilst at the same time feeling safe and nurtured. The need seems to continue as we grow older - particularly through adolescence. Are the Hannibal Lecter books dark psychological thrillers or are they horror stories? Is Alien sci-fi or is it horror? I reckon we used to sit around the campfire outside the communal cave telling tales to scare the pants off each other (or bearskin perhaps?). When a Niedermayer & Hart reader has got in touch with me to say how much they enjoyed the book but that they found they could only read it in the daytime - my chest expands with pride!
 
So what is the difference between a so called fairy story and a horror  story?
 
I honestly don't know.
 
Quite possibly just the fact that it would be deemed unusual to be found on your mum's knee whilst reading a horror story? Unless of course, you'd been brought up by a woman who was extremely possessive and never allowed you to grow up. Who knows, perhaps she didn't let you to mix with other children - especially with girls. Possibly the only strangers you ever really saw were the occasional visitors who arrived at your small backwoods motel... 
 
This is beginning to sound awfully familiar again!

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My own ripping yarn with horror/thriller elements Niedermayer & Hart will be available in most formats at a special low price ($0.99 - approx 63p) over at Smashwords this coming weekend (Friday 16 November - Monday 19 November). All you have to do to claim your discount is present the coupon code from the About Me page of this website at their checkout!

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A Cinematic Smorgasbord!

7/11/2012

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It's been an interesting week for us Johnsons since I posted my last blog. On Thursday the wife and I went to see The National Theatre of Great Britain's production of Timon of Athens at our local Odeon cinema in the NT Live season. Timon of Athens is probably Shakespeare's least performed play, and because of this I was especially keen to see it. Shakespeare wrote it in collaboration with Thomas Middleton and it's likely that it was never performed in Shakespeare's lifetime. The work is fragmentary in parts and certainly not the kind of complete, polished work we expect from either of these illustrious names. The other great attraction was an opportunity to watch Simon Russell Beale - a truly superb actor. We were not to be disappointed, either by Beale's tour de force performance, the excellent supporting cast, or by the production which was directed by Nicholas Hytner. Hytner had done marvellous things with the text through judicious editing and I believe some poaching from other pieces of the writers' works. The play was set in a contemporary City of London with the emphasis on its worst excesses that have of course been widely reported throughout the media in recent days. The play is a moral fable, about money, greed, corruption amidst an abiding culture of self-congratulatory smugness. Sadly, if you missed this production, you will not get another opportunity to see it, as this broadcast was also its final live performance. If you love great theatre I implore you, wherever you live (these productions are shown in literally hundreds of cinemas right across the globe!), to check out your local NT Live venue.

On Friday, I raised myself bleary-eyed from bed for a day working as a kind (cheap and sub-standard) of removals-man. My son and his girlfriend have just bought their first house together. Both sets of parents lent a hand and in the evening we all piled into cars and came over to our house for a meal. Anyone who's ever bought a house will know the kind of angst you have to go through! They are in! The house is theirs! I guess they'll be living out of cardboard boxes for a while, but they're young, together and I know they'll enjoy the adventure. They have our love and very best wishes.

On Saturday, we went to see the new Bond film, Skyfall. A bit of a departure from the usual Bond template and at times I have to say it felt more like I was watching John Le Carre (or possibly Len Deighton) than Ian Fleming. I know the critics have applauded it, but I'm not entirely sure that I want to see James Bond harassed by dark psychological hang-ups from a damaged childhood. We all know that JB doesn't give two hoots for that sort of thing! Isn't that why we love him? Because he's decisive, untroubled by self-doubts - not in the teensiest least bit screwed-up like the rest of us! I have always been a Judi Dench fan ever since I saw her play Viola in Twelfth Night at Stratford on a school trip there when I was fourteen. However, I must say I thought her character had too much prominence in this film, and when she started reciting Tennyson on a very slim pretext, it felt like the producers had thought, 'Let's give Judi some poetry to recite so we can enjoy her marvellous delivery.' At times watching the film it felt like 'M' might have stood for 'Mummy'! Still, there was a lot of enjoyable stuff too, but I don't personally believe this came close to being a classic Bond film. I did wonder too (no factual basis for saying this - merely a thought I had!) whether the role played by Albert Finney was conceived with Sean Connery in mind? If so, and if he'd agreed to appear this would have been a quite a coup and might have put a whole new complexion on the film. Not that there was anything at all wrong with Albert Finney, but imagine the impact of the first Bond appearing in the latest Bond fifty years on!

PictureThe Sheik (1921)
On Sunday, we went to Salomons, which is a unique local venue, to see George Melford's The Sheik, starring Rudolph Valentino and Agnes Ayres. It was accompanied on the Welte Philharmonic Organ by Donald Mackenzie. He is the house organist at the Odeon Leicester Square and has performed all over the world. When he is not performing in concerts he specialises in the accompaniment of silent films and now has over twenty films in his repertoire.

PictureDonald Mackenzie and Welte Organ
I saw him with my son at the same venue a couple of years back accompanying Nosferatu (appropriately on Halloween!) and we were enthralled by the experience. The great art and skilfulness of the musical accompaniment totally brought what was happening up on the screen to life! The Sheik was not a disappointment either. Valentino's acting might seem a little predictable today but he was incredibly handsome and it's not hard to imagine the fluttering hearts of many a gal (and perhaps a few lads too!) back in 1921. The film had all the ingredients: romance, action, smouldering sexual passion, a dastardly villain etc. I couldn't help thinking of my grandparents, who married extremely late for their generation (both well over 30), possibly watching this film whilst they courted. I think this movie may well have affected the birth rate!

And now, back to writing! The delightful Brinda @Wilovebooks invited me to take part in a blog interview recently (my first!) which she posted yesterday. Here's the link to Wilove Books if you'd care to take a look. 


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