Childhood Recollections The Big Itch !
Some nights see me lying awake unable to sleep, restless and turning from side to side going over the days happenings and knowing there is something I have to do tomorrow, but what?? Dear God I pray could you just be a wee bit more lenient and leave my memory a little more intact? I can put up with the swollen feet and ankles, the need to visit the loo twice a night and all the other aches and pains that come with old age!! Like the outgoing tide my short term memories are swept away as quickly as the tide disposes the plastic bottles and other rubbish left behind on the beach. Last weeks happenings and events are as distant as the man in the moon! Already I have missed two hospital appointments, one through no fault of my own. How I envy those people with total recall, the ever alert minds remembering dates, birthdays, anniversaries and so forth. I chide myself! Surely what I do have is a much more precious gift, the ability to reach back over many years and be able to recall and relive memories of my parents, childhood and events, some happy, some sad as illustrated in my past musings “Dublin Recollections” A song, a word or some small insignificant event can open a Pandora’s box of memories that had lain dormant with the passing years and now erupt in this old mind like the touch of a switch illuminating a room.
I sat in the surgery awaiting my turn not even inclined to glance at the out of date copies of Country Life, D.I.Y. and Homes magazines. Were I to open one I was sure I would find instructions from Noah on how to build an ark! All eyes glanced up as the door opened and a young mother with two small children entered. They sat opposite me and I could not fail to notice the small boy continually scratched at the skin on his arms and fingers, they were flaked and red. Aged about four years, my heart went out to the small lad, was it impetigo, eczema or scabies I wondered? surely not the latter. Had not the advancement of medicine rid us of this horrible affliction? And thus my train of thought transported me back in time. Alas, this memory of mine lets me down once more! What year was it? I think about 1945/6 but can’t be sure. My poor old Nana was the first to show signs, scratching in the space between her fingers and eventually other parts of her body. Despite mum bathing her skin with diluted Dettol and creams, the itching continued. In no time it had spread to other family members having no respect for young or old. My mother, a scrupulously clean woman was horrified somehow blaming herself for the present condition of her family! It soon became apparent that this was nor confined to our family alone. Every family in our street of tenement houses could be seen scratching until skin was left bleeding and raw. The local chemist was making a fortune selling over the counter products in a bid to relieve the ever present itch. Day or night there was no let up; one could not sleep with the ever constant itching and scratching. “What could it be” was the question everyone was asking!
