The mother of all jobs
Last updated 19:32, Thursday, 28 February 2008
Jane Douglas gently lifts Courtney again for the umpteenth time of asking, grins, and coos: “Courtney, Courtney, Courtney, smiiile.” Courtney is only five months old and won’t be ordered about. In between the household chores, Jane had plenty of time to spend with her youngsters, something she reckons today’s mums and dads miss out on. Despite computers, mobile phones, e-mails and texting, families don’t connect or communicate as they used to, according to Jane.
She wants her dummy, or that teething ring over there.
Jane tries again as the photographer moves round for another angle and with unshakeable patience, she tries again to coax a grin.
It’s the patience of a mother – a great, great grandmother, to be precise.
The 79-year-old wasn’t too keen to have her photo taken but if there’s a chance to play with her first great, great grandchild, she’ll put up with any daft suggestions.
She looks like a children’s book granny – built for cuddles, with white curly hair and twinkly eyes.
She’s sitting on a sofa in her great granddaughter-in-law’s neat terraced house in Wigton.
Her daughter, Sylvia Holliday, sits next to her, beaming at Courtney as Jane gently passes the baby to her mum Caroline.
Asking all three about motherhood is like dropping sherbert into a two litre bottle of coke as thoughts and memories fountain up.
Jane has 30 great grandchildren and 16 grandchildren.
She was just 17 when she had her first baby and was at one time mother to five youngsters under the age of five.
She doesn’t deny that it was a struggle but it wasn’t hard.
Living in the country as the wife of a farm worker at Unthank, there was no electricity, only oil lamps; no cooker or kettle, just an open fire; no washing machine, just a “possie stick” and a mangle; no disposable nappies, no bathroom or indoor toilet, no central heating, no microwave, no boil-in-the-bag or oven-ready meals and no car.
But, Jane insists, the simple life helped forge a happy, loving and connected family.
And she feels sorry for modern-day mums in a ‘must-have’ world.
“It’s hard for mothers today, there’s all the pressure on them to have things and to do things,” she frowns.
“Life is for living, not worrying about what the next door neighbour has and trying to better it.
“We never had much but we had a good life.
“We didn’t feel the need for what we didn’t have.”
Courtney’s mum, Caroline, isn’t so sure about feeling the ‘pressure’ of modern-day motherhood.
She has friends who feel they have to buy all the latest gadgets but that is not for her.
“I do panic about money sometimes but what is the point in going out and buying a new flat screen television when you have got an old one that works well?
“Sometime people are just greedy.”
Sylvia, who was a mum at 19, has no doubt about the greatest modern-day contribution to motherhood: disposable nappies.
The 59-year-old mum-of-four recalled: “In 1981 I got disposable nappies for Richard.
“That was the biggest change to me, then steamers to sterilise the bottles, instead of having to boil them.
“I used to boil the nappies in a big jam pan and you would get a bad chest from the boiling because the steam would open your tubes and sometimes you would have to run outside in the cold and wet to bring the washing in and the cold would get on your chest.
“But there was nowt nicer than a lovely line of white nappies on the washing line.”
Jane nods agreement and adds: “Washing was horrendous and nappies were the biggest thing but you just go on with it and did it.
“For nappies, we just had a roll of terry cotton which we would tear off and then hem by hand.”
“We used to go on walks to spot frogspawn, newts and bird’s nests,” she explained.
“We didn’t have a telly and the radio only worked if we had the accumulator charged up but we would play football, rounders and cricket with the kids.
“We would collect rosehips and nuts, ours were never bored, they did not have time to be bored.
“Families were real families then, now they are not the same at all.
“They don’t communicate as much – parents are downstairs while kids are upstairs with their computers. We were always happy together.”
“I worry about kids nowadays, a lot of kids don’t seem to have any base,” says Sylvia.
“It is hideous the way some kids carry on. I don’t agree with hand-outs but the Government should help some mothers to be at home because kids go off the rails if they have no one to come home to.
“We always knew mother would be home. Dad would be out working but we would look forward to him coming home.
“Sometimes we would get an ice cream and dash down the field as fast as we could to where he was working before it melted.
“We would help him with the farm work, then at night we would round the ducks up!”
Although Caroline, 29, is a relative newcomer to the Holliday family, she has the same ideas and ideals as her in-laws.
For her, the best thing about being a modern mum is exactly the same as it was for Sylvia and Jane all those years ago.
“It’s looking after the kids and being at home,”she grins.
“It is hard work, and you do get tired but it is enjoyable.”
She regrets returning to work shortly after her seven-year-old twins Kate and Taylor were born.
This time, she is taking at least a couple of years out to spend with Courtney.
“I made a mistake when I had the twins, I went straight back to work and I missed out on them being young. I won’t go back to work until Courtney starts nursery and I will probably start with a couple of hours a day.”
Sylvia giggles and bubbles up with another memory: “When I had my first baby, Richard, I was still living with mum at Sebergham but it was still a struggle and I had to push the Silver Cross pram two miles to the bus stop.
“I would leave the pram in a nearby hayshed because it would not fit on the bus and would take a buggy, which I kept in the shed, on the bus.
“On the way back, I had to transfer the baby and all the shopping back onto the pram and push it back.”
Listening to the stories of motherhood down the decades, you realise how much has changed in so little time and how much of 21st century life we take for granted.
But Jane flicks away any thoughts of being envious of modern day helps for 21st century mums: “If I could start again tomorrow, I would do just the same.
“I would not take disposable nappies or anything back with me, it was all part of life.”
The closeness of the Holliday family across the generations is obvious as Jane, Sylvia, Caroline and Sylvia’s daughter Dawn all live within yards of each other.
“It is lovely to look out the window and see all the grandchildren and great grandchildren and have them popping in for biscuits,” smiles Jane.
The key to motherhood for Sylvia boils down to two simple ingredients: love and happiness.
“My kids have always come first. They might not be any great achievers but they have always been happy.
“Love and happiness come before everything else.”
Sylvia isn’t keen on families making a major event out of Mother’s Day but is expecting a steady stream of visitors to her Kirkland Avenue home.
“It is now a commercial thing, promoted by people who want to sell flowers and cards,” she says.
“Mothers should have a special day but it is enough just to have your children there and know that they are thinking about you.”
