Reminiscences of Mrs. Harris’s Days
It was quite early in the morning, even earlier than when the nightbird begins to sing his lonely song. I was wide awake, though I kept telling myself to close my eyes and go back to sleep. I tossed and I turned, tossed and turned, and tossed once more, but to no avail. I picked up my book and tried to read; I could not concentrate. Finally, I picked up my cellphone. Ah! My friend Linda in London had sent me an article about Prince Harry and his wife Meghan and all the havoc they are causing the royals in Buckingham Palace. I decided to reply. When I did, instead of texting, she phoned me. Before long we were happily chatting away. She told me that she is writing about food, and I told her that I am going through a terribly dry spell. I could not form a single sentence! She told me that when she got stuck she used trigger phrases. ‘For instance, I think of all the houses I have lived in,’ she said.
I chuckled. ‘As a group, us Iraqi Jews have certainly lived in quite a few, the world over.’
With that, she opened the floodgates of my memory. Suddenly I was transported to the student that I used to be sixty-plus years ago. On a whim, my father had decided to send my sister Nora and me to boarding school in England. He was on a business trip in Europe at that point in time. He telegraphed my mother to tell her that he had enrolled their two older daughters at St. James’ College, in Malvern, Worcestershire. In my mother’s mind, she imagined a scene from a recent movie she had seen where healthy, happy girls in shorts and tanned legs ran across fields with their ponytails swaying behind them. In her thoughts, the sun was shining down upon this happy group of girls. She was enchanted by the thought. She cheerfully packed us up and sent us along our way! All was well and good until the Christmas holidays approached. Our headmistress, Miss Anstruther, or Tante, as she was affectionately called, wanted to know where we were to spend the holidays. But Papa hadn’t thought that far ahead. Between his friend, Uncle Isaac, his distant cousins, Uncle Bertie, Auntie Moselle, and their venerable aged mother, Auntie Hannah, they came up with a plan. We were to stay with Auntie Hannah and Auntie Moselle for the Christmas holidays. Uncle Bertie and Uncle Isaac were to oversee things. As an adult, now, I feel deep affection and a great debt for these wonderful people, and that’s putting it mildly. Without hesitation and any questions, they took loving care of two girls they did not know. There are no words to express the love I feel towards all of them. Nothing I can say or do will suffice for their over-generous hearts. In a corner of my being, I will always have a very special place for them. Always! Always!
Easter holidays saw us happily ensconced at number 9 Sheffield Terrace, off Church Street, Kensington, London. Mrs. Harris was a widow. She lived in a spacious three-story pied-à-terre with living quarters and kitchen in the basement where she and Bessie, her housekeeper, resided. Mrs. Harris was a cheerful, kindly woman. She was matronly with salt-and-pepper hair and a face that showed wrinkles of a happy and contented nature. On the other hand, Bessie looked as if she had gone through many hardships. Her expression was always grim. She never smiled in all the years we stayed there for the holidays. Her facial skin was as thin as the outer layer of an onion skin and just as brittle. One felt that if she smiled, her face might crack and disintegrate. It was of a pale hue as if she lived in constant shadows just like a mushroom. She always made us girls feel as if we had done something wrong. We tried to avoid her as much as possible. I did not like her then, but now I realize that she could not have had an easy nor a happy life, and I feel regret for how I felt towards her then. Besides Mrs. Harris and Bessie, ‘the family’ consisted of Mrs. Harris’ daughters, Meg and Pat, and her sons-in-law. They often came to visit and sometimes stayed overnight. They were in their early twenties and always cheerful and fun.
As you entered the house from the main entrance, you climbed up a short flight of outside stairs. These led to the solid, glossy black door with a brass knocker and a brass number nine hanging above it. You entered the vestibule which led into a huge center hall. On the left was the wide winding staircase that led to the two floors above and a narrower set of stairs that led to the lower floor. At the opposite side of the hall, a table stood against the wall, with an ornate mirror over it. That was where everyone’s mail was placed. As one climbed up the stairs, before each story going up, there was a landing on which there were two ladies’ chairs and a side table. It was obvious that had been Mrs. Harris’ home. Perhaps when her husband passed away, she was obliged to take in the boarding school girls to make ends meet. The bedrooms on each floor were used as semi-private dormitories for us girls. My sister Nora and I shared a bedroom. Very little heat was provided during winter. There was an electric heater that we constantly fed with coins to heat the room up. Our beds were covered with several layers of blankets and a thick eiderdown in winter, otherwise we would freeze. We dressed warmly all winter long. Heat was not wasted.
On the main floors was the salon. The room was bright. There were tall windows and French doors that looked out to a park-like expanse of manicured lawn. All the houses shared the grounds. On the right side of the room there was a large fireplace. Arranged in front of it was a long antique wood and glass-topped table surrounded by a sofa and armchairs into which one sank luxuriously. They were upholstered in a cabbage rose-patterned, thick floral linen, which I loved. The hues were soft and inviting. I loved to feast my eyes on them. It felt as if I had walked into a room filled with a soft pastel-coloured garden. The furniture invited me to please sink into it. On the other side of the room there was a curio cabinet and another old-fashioned cabinet that housed the radio and gramophone. There also was another seating arrangement in the same style as the one by the fireplace.
But the only time I recall that room being truly used was during the Christmas holidays. Mrs. Harris’ daughters and sons-in-law would spend Christmas Eve to Boxing Day there. At that time the room was decorated with a lavishly trimmed Christmas tree which stood by the French door. The fireplace was filled with blazing logs that crackled and swayed as the flames flirted with the brick wall in the back of the fireplace. It gracefully danced to and fro in sinuous motion. In the warmth of the fire, the tree exuded the delicious aroma of the pine needles. On Christmas Eve, on the side table, there were bottles of apple cider and other delicacies to nibble on before the main meal. On Boxing Day the side table would be laden with leftovers from the Christmas feast of the day before. By the Christmas tree there were carefully folded wrapping paper and boxes that would later be stored for use in future Christmases. The gifts had been opened and exchanged the morning before. Everyone had overindulged during this time. Now we all lounged about the room or sat in front of the fire in a lethargic and sated attitude. Mrs. Harris was very kind to us girls. She treated us like an extension of her family.
There were six of us girls living there during the years I was there. We all came from the same boarding school my sister and I had first gone to. There were the two cousins, Jeanette and Minou; there was Patty, my sister Nora, and me. We all came from Tehran. Then there was Souad. She came from Baghdad. At times there would be others, but we were the permanent ones at that time, and we bonded, since we were all from the same boarding school. Mrs. Harris kept a sharp eye on us. In the mornings we trooped down to the basement for breakfast. In the dining room, Mrs. Harris would sit at the head of the long table as Bessie served us. Mostly we got kippers and beans on toast and tea. Sometimes we got porridge or eggs, buttered toast, and jam. It was the 1950s. There still was rationing, a lingering effect from the devastation of WWII. Everything was appreciated and not taken for granted, unlike the carelessness and wastefulness of present times.
We were free to come and go as we pleased, within reason. She did not provide lunch. I remember going to Woolworth. In the back of the store they had an area where they served food. I remember going there with Nora often and sitting on high stools at the counter and ordering cream of tomato soup. That was my favourite meal there. Sometimes we went to Lyons. I loved their salads. At Selfridges I loved their teas with clotted cream, jam, and scones and their cucumber sandwiches. We would wander down to Kensington High Street into the department stores there. We would go to Marble Arch. On weekends artists displayed their artwork on the sidewalks there. I bought a watercolour that still hangs on my wall. It travelled with me through three continents and nearly a lifetime. I find it soothing and reassuring, just like a comfortable old friend. In summers we would sit in Hyde Park and watch teams of young men racing along the Serpentine. Mama would ask us to buy her clothes, so we strolled up and down Bond Street and Oxford Street, peering into shop windows to see what would suit her. Sometimes we walked to Notting Hill Gate to go to the cinema there.
Dinnertime, it was back to Mrs. Harris. On special occasions they served roast beef with Yorkshire pudding or partridges. Mostly we were served things like shepherd’s pie, Cornish pasties, or some such thing, and boiled cabbage and mashed potatoes. Always cabbage and potatoes! For dessert we would be served fruit pies swimming in custard. After dinner all of us girls would cuddle with Mrs. Harris and her cat on her bed watching television. We would try to get as close as we could to her, vying with one another to see who could get the closest to her. After Bessie cleared up in the dining room and the kitchen, she would come join us with an exhausted sigh.
It would happen there would be days that all six of us girls would happen to stay in for some reason. I remember one such day fondly. South Pacific, the movie, was showing at the West End. We had all seen it. We had all loved it. That day, in the centre hall, we formed a line, with our arms on each other’s shoulders, kicking our legs up into the air and singing with gusto, ‘I’m gonna wash that man right out of my hair!’ We would then bend down and pretend to wash the man out of our hair. With a lot of boisterousness and gleeful laughter we continued for hours on end. The present me wonders how Mrs. Harris and Bessie were able to tolerate that. She must have walked out of the house for a reprieve, and poor Bessie must have hidden in a closet on the top floor to keep her sanity.
A lifetime has passed since then. As I lean back on my chair, reading what I wrote, I smile to myself. What a rich life I have led, filled with such meaningful experiences. If my friend Linda had not nudged my memory, I might have never remembered this part of my life. I am done writing now. I lean back into my chair and listen to the classical music flowing out of the radio. Memories, so many memories…