I was born in the Summer of 1968, in Southeast London. The street I lived in for the first nine years of my life, was filled with widows who lost their husbands young, in WW1 & WW11.  

I was always in one of their kitchens as they baked cakes, or cooked stews.

I can still remember all of their names, there was Mrs Ewins, Mrs Patel, Mrs Rogers, Mrs Brown, Mrs Nutley, Mrs Tribes and our next door neighbour Mrs Dorothy Griggs, who everyone called Griggy.

I adored them all, but Griggy was my favorite. I was in her home more than my own. She called everyone ducks or my ducks! 

In her garden she had a large shed with an old mangle in it, she would sit on a low wooden stool carefully guiding her washing through, as I turned its long handle.

She had a rose garden filled with several species of tall fragrant blooms, it was like a forest of razor sharp thorns and I dreaded my ball landing in the middle of it, which it often did!

There was a large water butt, that collected rain water from the roof of her shed, for watering them all.

Dorothy Griggs was a very short, rotund solidly built lady, in her early sixties. On days when the rag and bone man came down our street, on his horse and cart, all the ladies would dash out with their buckets and shovels. But Griggy always got their first! Precious manure for her roses. 

Griggy was the person everyone bought their sick animals or injured birds to.  She would stitch up wounds, remove stings, thorns, splinters or lumps with tweezers or a hot poultice. Or nourish them back to health with her chicken stew. 

Her home always had a huge canteen sized cooking pot on the stove top. I watched her make it so many times. Always a whole chicken would go in, bones and skin, with potatoes, carrots & onions. I can still remember the smell and cosiness of it today.

She was the only one in the street who had gold top, from the milk man. I can remember her being fanatical to get it inside, before the birds would come and peck through the golden shiny foil tops. Hoping to steal the cream from the top of the glass bottle.

 I can remember in the winter the milk would freeze and several inches of frozen cream would burst from the bottle. With the golden foil at its tip, it looked like it was wearing a hat.

Griggy gave most of her milk to me and the hedgehogs in her garden.

She was wonderfully independent and eccentric. She caught the bus several days each week, at the bottom of our street, and went into central London to work. 

She was a char lady (her words). For many years she worked for Mrs Finney, who was Albert Finney's mother (he was a famous actor in the 60,s & in Erin Brockovich in his later years.)  

After her long working day, I often joined her.  

We would sit up on her high bed, her large TV was placed at its foot, and watch her favorite programme, crossroads. 

She would pour a can of Guinness into a small glass and roll herself a cigarette from her little tin of tobacco and her rolling machine. 

And I would have a glass of milk and two malted milk biscuits.

Her bedroom was like a treasure trove, filled with posh ornaments and trinkets that she told me were gifts from her employers. Today upon reflection I think she may have been a bit of a magpie! 

There was a huge antique china Wemyss pig, covered in large burgundy roses. Dozens of Dresden ladies in their delicate ruffled porcelain lace dresses, a few of which I broke over the years playing with. 

Her dressing table was filled with glamorous french rouge, and Estee Lauder lipsticks and a menagerie of fancy elaborate powder compacts. Solid Silver hairbrushes and a strange face mirror made out of turtleshell, and dozens of ornate silver filigree perfume bottles.

In her bathroom on the black and white checkered floor, was a large set of scales with the words Harrods written across them. She poured her milk for her tea from a colourful art deco Clarice Cliff jug.  

The living room she called the parlour and was always kept immaculate with the door closed, ready for any unexpected guests or the doctor!

She had her front wall rebuilt by the boxer Henry Cooper, (before I was born). He was the British heavyweight boxing champion for twelve years, a claim to fame I would  hear her tell all the ladies in the street. 

He was regularly on the telly when I sat with her, advertising Brut aftershave, Splash it all over!

There was a bird aviary at the end of her garden filled with brightly coloured exotic birds. 

She sometimes had help around the place with tasks she said she couldn't manage. Peter her  handsome handy man, grew up in a children's home. She adored him and always referred to him as my Barnardos boy!. 

In the mid seventies my Dad rather eccentrically decided to purchase an iconic black London cab for our family car. I remember driving around with him and everywhere we went people would stick their hands out as we drove past. 

Me and my brother loved it as we had the whole back seat and two fold down seats to ourselves.

The best bit was the glass sliding screen separating us from our parents, smoking all their cigarettes. 

Unfortunately after several years,  it broke down on the M4 at the Membury services, on our way to our Summer holiday in Somerset. Thick smoke came from under its hood, it was to be our last journey in it..

 From as young as I could remember I was absolutely obsessed with shoes, and by age six and a half, I had the same sized feet as my mum, size 4. I would wear her high heeled shoes around the house and even sneak some out to parade about with my friends at the local play park.

My mum and nan regularly took me to Woolwich, it had my favourite shoe shop called Ravel.   I was allowed to go inside and look at all the fashionable shoes. Later I would draw them and dream about all the styles I had seen. Shoes were always top of my list every year for my birthday or Christmas present. 

I was a bridesmaid several times, only agreeing in the hope I would get a new pair of shoes!

After visiting several shoe shops we would visit the market then my mum and nans favourite pie and mash shop. They would both enjoy their beloved jellied eels, as I made a huge fuss, refusing to eat them or the bright green parsley liquor, poured over lumpy mashed potato.

 One Saturday morning me and mum went to Woolwich on the number 99 bus. Mum had heard on the radio something special was going on. We saw a large crowd had gathered so we went over to see, and Ed stewpot Stewart, from the weekend radio show children's choice, was cutting a very long ribbon. 

There was a really tall man dressed as a clown wearing a curly red wig, walking around handing out badges.

It turned out to be the first ever Macdonalds restaurant to open in the UK, in 1974. I had a milkshake and french fries. We went in every time we went to Woolwich after that. I am not much of a fan today but back then it was all very exciting..

From a young age I regularly used to walk the five mile round trip from our house to my nana and grandad's house. I loved being there, it was the hub of our family life, with cousins and second cousins aunts and uncles always about. And nana Audrey was always in the kitchen cooking something tasty.

After the war my grandad George worked for the royal mint, next to the tower of London. He would melt metals in hot furnaces to make new coins. It was considered a dirty and dangerous job working alongside poisonous gases and fierce heat. 

They also made gold sovereigns and bullions. A team of Met police were permanently stationed there for security!

I can remember my grandad telling me proudly that he had many work friends who were from the west indies. They started working there around the time he started, in the 1950s, having only just arrived from Jamaica. Now referred to as the Windrush Generation.

 In 1975 the last coin was pressed at the Tower Hill mint as the site had to be expanded and relocated to Wales.

 My grandad George retired and I saw a lot more of him. He got an allotment, even though he had a large garden, probably to get some peace and quiet from everyone. He grew garlic and onions and cabbages and started to keep pet rabbits.

 The rabbits quickly multiplied, resulting in him spending many hours in his large shed making hutches and runs for them all. I can still remember the smell inside that large cedarwood shed on a hot summer's day. It was a favorite hiding spot of mine during many games of hide and seek. 

We got used to seeing dozens of rabbits in pens happily playing in their garden.

I can remember my cousin Roger and I building a go cart, naughtily taking the wheels off my nana Audrey's shopping trolley! Then spending many hours driving it up and down in the street. 

We came home and all the rabbits had gone. We were told they had gone to a farm with more space to be happier, so we didn't feel too worried.

 Later all the family sat together around my grandparents' large dining table, as my nan presented a wonderful looking pie. Everyone tucked in, I can remember saying to my nana, this pie is very nice I love it, the chicken tastes really tasty. 

Then my uncle laughs and tells us all that it is in fact rabbit pie!! 

Probably why I am vegetarian today!. 

During the heatwave in the summer of 1976, the apple tree in our back garden was covered with thousands of ladybirds, and when we visited a nearby lido the whole surface of the water was a sea of red (ladybirds)..

 1977 was a particularly memorable year. My Dad left to work in Saudi Arabia, we all went to wave him off at heathrow airport. 

I can remember the excitement of receiving letters from him, and there was always sand inside the airmail envelope. My little brother and I saved the sand that came from every letter he sent us. It filled a small glass pill bottle which we kept for many years. 

Rather romantically my mum told us that the sand must have blown inside from the windy dessert as he sat writing. Many years later I rather disappointingly learnt that my dad had placed it in the envelopes, their little joke!

We all desperately missed him,  mum was sad without him, although there were some perks. I was allowed to stay up late on the weekends, to keep her company, enjoying Starsky and Hutch.

 I developed my first crush on Starsky. I defaced my new white lace up plimsoles, writing Starsky on the rubber toe cap and Hutch on the other.

 I was desperate to have a long chunky cream and brown belted cardigan like Starsky wore in the show. My nan in Somerset had become aware of my desire to have one and kindly agreed to knit one for my 9th birthday in July.

My Dads parents used to live around the corner from us, then when I was two in 1970 they retired and moved to Somerset. 

Every Summer since we have holidayed with them in the west country. They lived in a large detached house next to some stables, they had a little wooden gate at the end of their garden that accessed woodlands.  

We would arrive after our long journey from London, to the scent of sweet warm cakes, as just around the corner from my nans lane was a cake factory, called Hales cakes. They baked for Mr Kipling and Cadburys. 

Sometimes a loud whistle blew which meant the workers could go home.

It was a very different life for my nan who was born and raised in London, my grandad Cecil's family had run a dairy company in south London, delivering milk via a horse and cart before the war. 

My nan ran a very busy cafe serving traditional cooked English breakfasts then homemade cakes and tea in the afternoons. 

Unfortunately my grandad passed away very soon after they moved so my nan was quite lonely. She had made friends with several other ladies in the lane, but we came to visit every Summer and Easter or as often as we could. 

At the end of her lane was a very old church called All Saints church, the lane was called all saints lane. Opposite the church was a tiny village school called All saints. 

Unbeknown to me then, the man I would fall in love with and marry attended this school, during the years of our  holidays and visits here..    

It was the queen's silver jubilee and a huge street party was planned on our street in June, in fact the whole of London was swept away in the frenzy of the celebrations..

Tables were set up all along the avenue and decorated with fresh flowers and everything was red white and blue. 

I can remember a huge thunderstorm took place very late at night and the cat I had talked my mum into buying us from the Woolwich market, had kittens in my wardrobe!

We were allowed to keep one and I called her muppet, after my favorite show..

After enjoying several more weekly episodes of Starsky and Hutch, I was still longing for my Starsky cardigan.

 On the morning of my birthday, almost beside myself with excitement, I unwrapped the parcel my nana had sent from Somerset.

 It was beautifully knitted, and a perfect fit, she had made it long and with a belt.. But I was heartbroken as she had tragically used red white and blue wool, to coincide with the jubilee celebrations. Oh how I sulked!!.

August came with a different challenge, my mum was a huge Elvis Presley fan to the point of being obsessed I think would be fair to say. One night she came into our bedroom just howling with tears, holding a radio to her ear, telling us Elvis had died. 

It hit her hard, especially with my Dad still away.

My nana Audrey came to sit one evening so my mum and her friend June could go and see the film Saturday Night Fever at the cinema, in the hope of cheering her up. 

Mum didn't hide the fact that she had a thing about Italian men, and often told everyone it was why my brother was named Tony!

It did the trick she was dancing around the house for several weeks after, with the bee gees blaring out.

Thankfully my dad came home for a two week visit at Christmas, after being in the desert for six months.

When he went to leave for the airport, to return to the desert for a further six months of an agreed work contract, I can remember seeing her clinging to his legs at the front door, asking him not to go back, thankfully he stayed. 

Life was good, my mum was super happy, my dad bought her an eternity ring and new dress and they had a big party at the house.

 I was delighted to get a pair of much longed for Ravel shoes, they were black patent shiny leather with little heels and an ankle strap and I loved them.. 

But my life was about to change drastically, as mum and dad decided to leave London and move to Somerset for a new life and to no doubt keep my nana company (not my favorite person after cardigan gate!)

I left dozens of friends, cousins and family, trips to Woolich and petticoat lane markets and all things London behind and started my new life in Somerset..  

At my new modern junior school, I was called the London girl and teased for having big teeth, and a funny accent. But on the whole everyone seemed nice enough.

The first friend I made at school called Della, came to call for me  on her horse!

I swapped saturday mornings at woolich market for catching newts and tadpoles in nearby streams and brooks.

My mum was disappointed at first, often telling me no one talks to you here, everyone keeps themselves to themselves, she would say. 

When my mum left school her first job was working in Oxford street C&A. She met my dad in an Italian coffee lounge, it was love at first sight.  (Good job he had olive skin and black hair!)

My dad recently told me that when he was dating my mum, they used to go out with her cousins in east London. 

My mum and all the girls would dance or chat and drink baby sham, having a wonderful time, while my dad was left with all the partners who were gangsters, hoods and villains. (His words!)

 I remember mum telling me her cousins knew the kray brothers, It wasn't unusual as they grew up in the same neighbourhood.  In the 70,s I can remember my uncle Alec, he was thick set with jet black hair, greased back, like a character from the sopranos. 

He had a boxers broken nose and always wore black trousers a crisp white shirt and a full length camel wool coat. I remember being fascinated with his huge gold ring he wore on his little finger.

Mum got a job in a busy bakery in the town, where she quickly made some new friends. She enjoyed reading local history books about the cider works, the wurzels and old glass works where the cider bottles were made.  

She took me on the bus to Bristol and to my delight there was a Ravel. This cheered me up and I chose a new pair of school shoes, they were maroon leather Mary Jane,s with a wavy chunky rubber sole. I loved them and felt the bees' knees at my new school..

The film Grease came out that Summer, You're the one that I want was number one at the time of my 10th birthday. I got my first ever LP, the soundtrack from grease and I learnt every word to every song on it..

Unfortunately by age 11 in 1979, my feet had grown to a size 8, which was a complete tragedy. Women's shoes only went up to a size 7 and I was only an 11 yr old girl!

No more shoes from Ravel. 

Clarks offered one choice, in an 8. I was so depressed about it. I started the comprehensive school, very reluctantly wearing my Clarks frumpy lace ups. They were so boring and ugly, it broke my heart.

For years I would tell everyone who knew me that one day I would open a shoe shop selling all the latest fashion shoes in a size 8. 

Fortunately a few years later by 1982 some shops started catering for girls with larger feet, including my beloved Ravel.

But not convinced enough to stock many, they would sell out very fast. It was often the case that the shoe I asked for had no size 8s left, then my second and third choice, it was still awful.. 

Around thirty years later, I ran into someone I had gone to comprehensive school with. The first thing he asked me was how my shoe shop was doing! 

After the years of bringing up my three Daughters and living life, I'd completely forgotten about my dreams of the shoe shop. It really took me back and made me smile..