Snapshot: Mum’s home haircuts and my wonky fringe

We didn’t have a lot of money when I was growing up and so Mum had to trim my fringe herself. When we look back through the photos and reminisce, she assures me she started off well.

“One side always ended up shorter than the other, so I tried to even things up,” she says.

When I point out that her idea of evening things up is a little different from mine, we both burst out laughing. Sometimes my fringe would end up so high on my forehead it didn’t need cutting for months.

Occasionally, and I mean occasionally, my mother would get it more or less right, but this then earned me the nickname of Bully Beef. At the time, all the children were reading the Dandy or the Beano. In the Dandy there was a character called Bully Beef. He had a fringe, which looked like his mother had stuck a bowl on his head and then trimmed round it. As Bully Beef wasn’t a particularly nice character and as I had long hair, I thought the comparison was rather unfair. Added to that was the fact that Bully Beef’s fringe covered his eyes, and thanks to my mother’s “skills” with the scissors, mine never did. But that was school and so the nickname stuck.

In my teens I tried growing my fringe out, but being impatient (aren’t all teens?), I soon gave up. As a treat, my mother took me to a hair salon, where they advised to keep a fringe. “Her forehead’s too big not to have a fringe. It’d look awful.” The hairdresser’s words were devastating to a teenager, as if I wasn’t there.

Though I wasn’t the only one to come under attack. “Hmm,” he said looking intently at my fringe, “it looks as if someone has attacked her fringe with a knife and fork.”

My mother had the grace to blush and mumbled something along the lines of, “Oh, does it?”

Still, it made her think that perhaps it wasn’t such a good idea for her to cut my fringe any more and so I became a regular at the hairdresser’s.

When I had my own daughter, I must admit, I subjected her to the sins of the fringe, but as I have inherited my mother’s hairdressing prowess, my daughter soon defected to the hairdresser’s. A few years ago, she decided to grow her fringe out. I’m sure seeing the photos of me as a child had nothing to do with it!

Esther Newton

Playlist: A satirical song that was still serious for us

Part of the Union by the Strawbs

“You don’t get me, I’m part of the union … Until the day I die, until the day I die”

Family Saturdays in the 70s started with a breakfast cooked by Dad while listening to Ed “Stewpot” Stewart’s Saturday breakfast show. When Dad died suddenly we wanted to choose music from this period to play at his funeral. One particular tune, Part of the Union by the Strawbs, became my earworm.

Written to parody trade unions, this song was adopted by them instead. Our dad sung the chorus at full volume. He was a vociferous shop steward and always fired up about the latest cause. At mealtimes there was much talk of the strikes that peppered our growing up. His politics inspired me to be a socialist and feminist. We were encouraged to question authority and to stand up to those in power.   

Something more sombre was chosen to mark his funeral but this will always be the song that makes me so proud of my dad, irrespective of the lyricist’s intention.

Sue Gyde

We love to eat: My father-in-law’s fruity fumble

Ingredients

Fresh or tinned fruit – gooseberries, rhubarb, plums, blackberries, blackcurrants, apples, raspberries or frozen berries, or a combination
Fruit juice, ginger beer or wine
Something creamy – yoghurt, quark, tinned custard, rice pudding or the soya equivalent to any of these, or tofu
Biscuits

Top and tail or peel fresh fruit as required. Chop rhubarb or apples, if using, into pieces. Stew fruit in a small amount of juice until softish. Don’t add any sugar or honey and remember that soft fruit will not need cooking. When cool, mix the fruit into whatever creamy substance you have. If using tofu instead of dairy, you will need to blend some of the fruit juice with it, blitzing all tofu lumps, before adding the rest of the fruit. 

Whack the biscuits with a rolling pin, wooden spoon or can of beans, leaving plenty of big lumps. Stir most of the crumbs into the fruit and cream mixture. Chill the mixture in the fridge for at least 15 minutes, or ideally overnight. Serve with extra crumbs, and toasted flaked almonds or coconut.

It all started one hot day many summers ago. We’d been given a bag of gooseberries, and my in-laws were coming for tea at short notice. To me, gooseberries mean crumble or fool. It was too hot for crumble, but I had neither custard nor cream for a fool. What I did have was half a pot of Greek yoghurt and some ginger biscuits. 

As we gorged ourselves on this goosegog confection, half way between a fool and a crumble, my father-in law, with a cheeky smile, suggested we should name it fumble! 

We’ve since made it many times, using gluten-free biscuits for a coeliac relation, coconut ones for my niece who hates ginger, tofu for a vegan. It is always delicious – so much so that my mum-in-law, a keen baker and Women’s Institute member, asked for the recipe for their next WI gathering. It reminds me of my husband’s late, lovely parents and that scrumptious first pudding.

Just be careful who you tell that you like a nice fruity fumble – not everyone is as cheeky as my father-in-law was.

Wendy Ely

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