Words for Wednesday (on Thursday)

Words for Wednesday is a weekly meme with words or picture prompts given
Bloggers are encouraged to make what they can of them

This month (May) Elephant’s Child is providing the prompts on behalf of a friend
This is how I used them this week

Off one’s rocker – Hit the sack

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Family Memories 

Where did you find it? Joe asked
Tucked right up the back of one of the drawers.
It must have been there for years – look at the dress Grandma’s wearing!
All the rage back then replied Susie. Mum said she called it a Sack!

Joe went off to find his sax, happy to be spending an evening with his mates playing old rock and roll numbers at the community centre while Susie made herself comfortable on the old chair and reopened the exercise book she’d discovered earlier in the day.

She and Joe had been sharing a house and like most youngsters never said no to ‘free things’ especially serviceable furniture. The latest being an old chest of drawers from Grandma’s old house.

‘Dear Diary’ were the first words she read – what followed were pages and pages of what seemed like happy memories of a fun loving family. There were lots of girlish day to day writings, school, boys, music, trivial to some but obviously important to Grandma. Then there were later thoughts and recollections some of which Susie had never heard before.

“Dad worked hard at the fodder shop, trying to earn enough to allow me and Tommy to get a good education. I’d shown him some pictures in the papers of Mods and Rockers over in England and he reminded me I’d need good marks to get a good job to allow me to travel”

Just before I showed him the picture of one of the girls in a ‘sack dress’ (sort of like a straight up and down shift) the shop cat had been nosing around some of the empty sacks so Dad was sorting them out – shaking and hitting them to make sure they were empty. Last thing we need round here is vermin he’d say.

When I told him how much I’d love to have a dress like that, he laughed and jokingly said, Tell you what, give me a hand and I’ll give you a sack to make a dress out of”. That was Dad, he knew how much I wanted one and thought he was doing me a favour. When I finally made it to England, each time I had a sack of coal delivered or saw a sack of potatoes my mind returned to that day in the feed shop”

Oh, this must be about Grandad thought Susie when she turned the page

” My dearest Johnny would sometimes pop into the shop – on the pretext of having a yarn with Dad but later I discovered it was with the hope of seeing me – he’d just begun his motor mechanics apprenticeship and was forever talking it over with Dad.

Rockers, he said one day, I’ve been learning about rockers.

Trying to keep a straight face Dad teased him and asked if he meant rock and rolling rockers – no, not them a very earnest Johnny replied. Rockers on cars. Did you know there are rocker arms, rocker covers, rocker panels and roller rockers? We’ve spent all day taking them off and putting them back on again.”

Susie closed the book, smiling as she remembered her Grandad’s love of cars, then getting up out of the comfy chair she looked down at the wooden rockers and wondered how many hours Grandma had rocked away while nursing her and Joe’s Mum.

You still up? Joe yelled.
Yes, I’m going to read a bit more. There’s something here about meeting up with Grandad in London. Want to hear about it?

You’ve got to be joking, I’ve got a plane to catch in the morning.
Come on, it’s time to HIT THE SACK

You’ve really got to be OFF YOUR ROCKER to think I’m staying up to listen to that.

Make it into a Vlog and post it on your blog – then I can listen to you reading it after I’ve been to the car show in London