Storytelling Starters ~ A Moral Tale
Saturday, September 3rd, 2016
This week it’s not a poem or a legend or a myth or a folktale. What I have is a very personal tale, and one with a moral to it.
We went to fetch an elderly friend – I’ll call her Peggy – to come for tea with us in the village of Mathri where we have our Pembrokeshire house. Last time I was here, I’d mooted the idea and it proved a most happy time for all of us.
Peggy is 99 years old. She is a remarkable woman, the sister of one of my childhood ‘aunties’. But I only started getting to know her on her own account after that sister died a few years ago. One of many things I love and admire about Peggy is her remarkable memory. Another is her many little tales about people and events from both past and present. They’re part of the fabric of her conversation. On Wednesday, for instance, she was talking about Mathri fair. When she was growing up, this was the great event of the year. ‘And the chips,’ she said, ‘that was the big thing about it. Chips in newspaper with salt and vinegar.’
One tiny tale Peggy told in relation to Mathri fair was about the shop at the top of the village. Now falling into rack and ruin, it evidently used to be bursting with all kinds of stuff including men’s caps. Peggy recounted how these caps were hung in a row on pegs and how the men used to go in and try them on. ‘And one man,’ she said, ‘left his old cap on the peg and went out in the new one.’ (more…)