Friday 17 April 2015

A story by Jim Gregory


Little Figaro – A Story Rediscovered

by Jim Gregory

    It was during the early stages of down-sizing – discarding so much that we had hoarded up as too good to throw away, or things that had some intrinsic use or value – that Mary discovered five pages of hand-written notes that told the story of our first pet or master, depending on how such matters are regarded.

    We were into the second year of our shared lives when the story began of an important part of our married life.  Mary had penned the caption:  An Elegy in Prose for Little Figaro.  Written by Jamie who first brought him home.

    He was very young when we first met.  He was past the stage of being a little ball of fluff, but was, as yet, still quite small.  Our meeting took place at the back door of the farm house at Gayfer’s Vineyard, near Chiltern; not many miles distant from our flat.

    On this day, although he was surrounded by his brothers and sisters, he seemed to me to be just a little lonely but it was his eyes, which captivated me – tiny orbs of the clearest blue that were to change colour as he grew older.

    That day I had been hunting the bobtail and when my walk was over I came back to where he was and it was there that I was tempted.  “Would you like one of these kittens?” I was asked.  I would, but would it be possible.  I decided to risk it.  I picked him up and off we set for home.  I was driving our first car, an 8hp Ford Anglia with a soft top.  Without anything better to put the kitten into, I had placed him inside my shirt and with his head poking out of the open neck, he was able to look about as we drove home along the highway.

    Mary liked him from the start and straight away he ate and drank with us and made himself at home in our upstairs flat.

    He was well behaved and rather quiet on his first day, whereupon Mary said, “What is the good of a cat that doesn’t play?”  How deceived she was, for then he began to gain a momentum that increased day by day.

    The big job of naming our new arrival was then tackled.  Several of my suggestions were scorned.  Then we arrived at Figaro.  Yes, he will be Figaro and this name has been with us ever since.

    Figaro was no longer just a cat, he was one of us.  He liked knitting, making the bed, bits of yarn, a cotton reel, shutting the kitchen door, Mary’s knee, Mary’s dinner, climbing the loquat tree and when Mary was standing up he liked to climb up my legs.

    At times Little Figaro sprouted horns.  He slept in our room, or I should say when he invaded our hearts so that we yielded enough to let him come in.  Once in, we spent the night wondering which of us would be the next victim of his little games with our toes, or who would receive the icy stare from the great monarch of number 97.

    There were times when I was severely reprimanded by my master, times when he would resort to brute strength and give me a well-placed cuff in the eye or on the nose, just to remind me who was boss.

    This loveable little dictator stampeded us and over powered our hearts.  There would be nothing which failed to hold his deepest interest.  He would question us on our arrival home from work, asking us where we had been and what we had been doing.  When we were not about he would sit up in the old loquat tree growing by the back door all day long, observing birds, have occasioned naps to give him energy for his nocturnal games.

    When we were all together in the kitchen, Figaro would then play with his own things, which consisted of anything to which he had taken a fancy, or perhaps it would be Mary’s knitting.  How Figaro loved Mary’s knitting.  He would take the ball of yarn in his mouth then up onto the table and over the other side, then around the table legs.  It would not normally finish there, but someone had to rescue the yarn.

    With these pranks he could make you growl, but could also melt your heart by giving you a kiss which was always administered when you came home, or at night, or when there was a family H & M session on.  This he did by reaching up and placing his nose on mine or Mary’s.  At bedtime he warmed up for some fun with me.  He would look at me to give me the signal, then off up the passage at full speed to hide in the bedroom.  My job was to find and carry him back to the kitchen.  This operation would be repeated two or three times and then he would stay quiet for a short while.  It was a quiet that didn’t last very long and when we were in bed he would then play Knick-knock with his cotton reel that dangled on a string from the bedroom door handle.

    These are just a few of the things I remember about Little Figaro and my purpose in writing them down is to help the frail human mind in its job of remembering our small friend, a part of our family that we will never forget.

    We always called him Little Figaro because he never grew up to be a big cat.  For, at the beginning of the month of May he sickened, then on Sunday May 4th at 5.00pm he left us form a happier home.

   Now there is no one to help Mary make the bed, nor to wave goodbye to me with his tiny paws, but we always remember Little Figaro.

vvv


Wednesday 15 April 2015

UCAF Report - Trip to Corowa

Our UCAF members visited the Corowa church group recently. On our arrival at Corowa  we were taken into their lovely church which contained an inspiring stained glass window entitled “The Living Tree”.

A short devotion on living things was led by Rev. David Sloane, husband of Val Sloane whom we all know. Then the co-ordinator of the Community Garden, Joan Palmer, spoke to us on the way in which this program got started. The church community gave the group the disused tennis court for the project, but it took some 2 years to get it to where it is today. With donations from the public, local businesses and Council, it became operational. It is still in the process of extending the surroundings.

In the middle of the garden is a sculpture made from recycled metal from the local Council depot. The sculpture contains a bee hive made of wood with a hole drilled for bees, and our group were very taken with the overall idea of the whole project.

The garden has been named the “Corowa Community Living Tree Garden” after the stained glass window in the church. After we inspected the garden afternoon tea was served and members were invited to take any of the produce that had been grown, for just a gold coin donation.

A very inspiring afternoon was had by all – many thanks to all our Corowa friends.



UCAF 2015 Program





Monday 6 April 2015

Darwin War Museum Quilt - Reginald Stanley Armstrong - by Barb Surrey

Reginald Stanley Armstrong was born in 1919 to a farming family in Strathbogie.  He grew up with a love of everything mechanical.  As a young man he joined the Royal Australian Airforce early in the Second World War.

Following training in Victoria, he was moved to Darwin where he worked on our Air Force fighting planes.  The threat of Japan attacking Australia was realised when their war planes flew in to bomb Darwin.  Dad was fortunate to be able to continue his work safely and was eventually moved to a very large airforce base at Tocumwal on the Murray River near Cobram.

Moves were made some ten to fifteen years ago to obtain the rank, name and serial numbers of all our servicemen who served in Darwin and their patches have been stitched into a large quilt hanging on a wall in the Darwin War Museum.

Dad and his brothers served our country well in World War 2 following on from their father, my Pop, who served in Gallipoli and the south of France in World War 1.

We are proud of them all.


Patches in the quilt showing the rank, name and serial number
of all our servicemen who served in Darwin.