SLIDES 0495-0496
Two random photographs of a budgie in a cage, obviously taken outside to enjoy the sunshine in my Grandparents' garden, sometime during 1957.
This whole budgerigar thing is a bit confusing for me because my Grandparents never really struck me as being "pets" people. They were very eager to encourage my sister's interest in horses, of course, but, as far as I know, never kept any themselves.
Equally, there have been several pictures of my Grandmother seemingly enjoying the company of other people's dogs, but I have no recollection of them ever having one of their own
Now I come to think about it, I do seem to recall mention of a cat at some point, but I think it must have been long gone before the any of the eras that the slides have been covering because it never appears in any of the pictures I've scanned.
Well pets can bugger up your holiday plans, can't they...?
Of course finding these pictures does make me suddenly aware of the advantages of insider knowledge. One Christmas, much later on in our lives, I do remember the favourite Grandchild buying my Grandmother a budgie in a cage for either a birthday or Christmas, I forget which.
Now the less-favoured Grandchild might have thought this to be a ridiculous idea at the time, and poured several vats of scorn upon the notion, especially given the "pets free" nature of their home, but also because they had never shown the slightest inclination towards the keeping of budgies as pets in my experience.
But yet... Here we find evidence that they did, and there they once were... and (as I remember it anyway), much unconfined joyfulness (of a relative kind) was imparted in the direction of the more favoured one.
Well, for a while at least...
Sometimes the advantages of being born first and gaining those extra years of insight are many... ;-)
Who's a pretty boy then?
ReplyDeleteThey were all called "Peter", the budgies, for some strange reason. You are right about the cat too, called "Sooty", by the way. I remember my Granny drowning kittens every time the poor thing got pregnant - they didn't used to spay them back then. She had a large enamel bucket in which she dropped them soon after birth. She would cover them with a plate weighted down with a one pound weight. Horrendous in my eyes, but probably kinder than lots of unwanted kittens. That's how it was back then. Not sure what the RSPCA would make of it nowadays. Worryingly, it never seemed to bother my Gran!
ReplyDelete