Converse Shoes and Happiness

When I was 13, a socially awkward and constantly miserable teenager, I had a girl crush on someone in my class. She was everything I was not – very pretty, tall and slim, and hugely popular amongst the more senior boys in the campus. While most of the girls in our class wore our uniforms – a white cotton long-sleeved polo top and a hideous fuchsia pink midi-skirt – with a pair of boring Mary Janes or unattractive leather loafers, she casually strode across the school halls in a pair of All Star Converse trainers, as though modelling on a catwalk. It was a fashion mismatch of course and very few would be able to pull it off, but in my young impressionable mind, it was those pair of shoes that gave her the air of confidence she carried around.

But even at such a tender age, I have never been deluded about what my family could and couldn’t afford, and a pair of Converse shoes, then worth a sack of rice that would have fed us for a couple of weeks, was not worth the squeeze on my mother’s modest budget. This early propensity for delayed gratification has served me well throughout the years and helped me align my material aspirations with the size of my bank account. So that goes without saying that my smart phones (older models instead of the latest versions) only get replaced every three years, I do not own a must-have iPad and my clothes, mostly bought at charity shops do not cost more than five quid. This did not mean I do not long for nice luxurious things that other people own, it's just that I have learned to wait for the right opportunity to come along.

So no, I never forgot about my longing to own a pair of Converse trainers that would cement my place amongst the ‘cool’ crowd despite my husband’s insistence that at thirty, I am now too old to wear one. It became one of those luxuries we agreed to buy when we can finally afford to splash cash around which doesn’t look likely to happen anytime soon. But for the last four years every time we pass by a shoe store with a window display of these beautiful canvas shoes, I would gently remind him of this yearning. A couple of times, he has in fact told me to just get on with it and pick up a pair but the problem with a shared bank account is that £45 for a pair of shoes can be quite a drain in our limited resources. And the practical side of me always win in the end.

That was until last Sunday, when that perfect chance finally came knocking and I went home with a nearly new pair of classic white Converse All Stars bought for £4 (this is where I hear the cymbals and drumbeats!). I had been doing my weekly rounds at the car boot sale at Hillsborough Arena on our way to the leisure centre for a swim when I found the shoes. Without showing the excitement that was bubbling inside me, I inquired for the price. Five pounds. But because I was already a bit confident in the tricks of this pop up market, I bargained to knock a couple of pounds off and eventually sealed the deal at £4.

A few days later, I'm still beaming. I don’t think I would be wearing these pair of shoes with as much satisfaction had I paid the full price for it. But there you go, true to the philosophy of deferred gratification, a pleasure delayed is indeed a pleasure enhanced!

So now on to the classic question: would you eat a chocolate now or would you hold out for two later?

Out on a Walk

It's April in Hillsborough and the park has come alive. At the back of the library, there were no more signs of the crocuses that once carpeted the grounds only to be replaced by white and yellow daffodils making their annual dance. The trees were no longer bare, leaves with a vibrant shade of green have started to come out and the lovely cherry blossoms are flowering. Elsewhere amongst the carefully maintained flower patches, the brightly coloured tulips were ready to capture our hearts. 

Every year, spring seems to take longer to arrive but it always makes the long wait worth it. Especially when the sun is out and the temperature reaches double figures (14 degrees Celsius is decent!). Yesterday was one such day and on our afternoon walk, we took some photos, listened to the birds singing and smelled the flowers!

Spring has Sprung!

As soon as the thick white fog that was hovering over the hills cleared up, we went out for our mid-morning walk today. During the weekend, the temperatures have started to reach double digits and the forecast for the rest of the week is looking bright. Spring has finally arrived! 

And there is no better proof of this than the host of golden daffodils starting to turn up all over the park, fluttering beneath the trees, to bring a smile to passers-by. We had to take photos of course but the little one wasn't very impressed when he heard the usual 'Smile' to the camera while he was busy looking around. 

Spring Walk and Baby Photos

Every morning we go out for a walk, rain or shine. There is no excuse not to, the park is just at the bottom of our road and it's a perfect exercise to start the day. 

It is for this reason that we were able to witness the magical transition of the seasons, when carpets of crocuses slowly create a spectacular show of white and purple, and occasionally some eye-popping orange yellow flowers too. They crop up almost overnight looking like tiny champagne flutes in March, to announce that daffodils and warmer days are soon to follow. 

One Monday morning, when the sun was out, we went out to take photos of these delightful bulbs. And yes, some baby photos too!

Waiting for Spring

Winter lingered long this year, an unbidden guest that has outstayed its welcome. Days after the last clumps of snow have melted on the ground, the chilly temperature dragged on bringing with it frosty mornings and thick mists hovering over the City of Seven Hills. 

It was a landscape so different from a year ago when as early as the end of February, the snowdrops have already fleeted away in hibernation and crocuses in their vibrant colours - violent, white and yellow - carpeted the grounds of Hillsborough Park. Along the pathways, rows of tulips and daffodils have sprung up, their flowers ready to unfold in a few weeks time. When we came back a month later from our extended holiday in Central Europe, they were all gone, replaced by the cherry blossoms in full bloom. 

Where autumn speaks of tragic endings, spring evokes hopeful beginnings that when it arrives, it wipes away the memories of the colourless winter days just gone. Perhaps the long wait for spring is in fact character building - it teaches you patience and gratefulness. Patience to carry on until the end of the dark tunnel and gratefulness for the light that awaits you there. 

Home No. 4: Dorothy Road

Dorothy Road in Hillsborough is a street lined up with Victorian terraced houses where workers from the city's steel industry used to live. Decades on and after the soots from the factories have cleared and the houses have changed ownership, this street is now home to professional employees with young families and a handful of pensioners. 

These houses were built to last and last they do. In Britain, and throughout the Old World, buildings such as these endure hundreds and hundreds of years. Only a re-plastering a couple of times or so every century is required to keep these buildings as good as when the first ever occupants arrived here. Solid brick and stone built, they offer a build quality that most modern concrete or glass buildings can only dream of. As they say, if Paris, Rome, Vienna, Madrid, and most of the other great old world cities were built to today's standards we would not have had the opportunity to see them as we do now. It makes you think with a certain degree of melancholy how today's flamboyant cities don't just look very generic and bland but will deteriorate much more rapidly, especially those in the 'flat pack' countries such as China and the United Arab Emirates amongst many others. False economy, a not so efficient use of resources, and not thinking long term springs to mind. 

These houses look deceptively small from the outside but is actually spacious inside usually with three bedrooms including a converted attic, a kitchen with a separate dining room, a living room with a bay window, a large bathroom and a dry cellar. At the back is a good-sized garden that gets a lot of sunlight until late in the summer evening if you have a south-facing one. 

When we came to view No. 74, I fell in love with the place. Oozing with character that most newer builds just simply lack, it ticked all my boxes. John was dubious about its size, we have previously lived in a one bedroom flat and briefly in my mother-in-law's attic but I was very adamant. I loved the space, the furnishings and the garden. So Dorothy Road became House No. 4 in just two years in Britain. 

If we were living anywhere other than this country with no huge heating bills and plenty of sunshine, it would have been a perfect house. But alas, there were those things to consider and suddenly a huge pretty house by the end of summer suddenly felt cold and empty. There was the subject of keeping it clean too, a chore that needed to be done every weekend that usually fall on my husband's shoulders. It became too big for us to manage. 

But there were still no regrets about living there. It has taught us a lot about properties and what to look out for when we would eventually buy our family home. 

One Fine Autumn Day

“I wonder what the trees must feel when the leaves start to fall.”

I was thinking out loud while my husband and I were walking through a tunnel of red, gold and orange foliage raining down and swirling around us until finally they land on the brightly carpeted ground.  It was a crisp mid-October morning with barely any clouds in the sky, a perfect day for a photo walk in the park at the bottom of our road.

“I suppose they would be glad, it must be very heavy carrying all that weight on their shoulders for at least six months,” I declared. It was ridiculous of course and John laughed, telling me that it is the branches that are heavy and not the leaves. But I argued that with the number of leaves a tree must carry, it could be very wearing and so they would probably be glad to have a seasonal break. There was no response to that, he is used to these wild contentions.

We carried on our walk, not oblivious to the crunching sound of dried leaves under our feet and the occasional squirrel running across our path as they gathered their winter stash. It was a typical weekend morning at Hillsborough Park: younger children in trolleys while older ones are playing football; dogs on their leads while their walkers are chatting with one another; and cyclists on their bikes while lovers walk hand in hand. Near the bottom of the park was a little man-made lake with squealing toddlers feeding the visiting ducks and geese.

“Britain is not all that bad you know,” I said, taking in the sights. At that moment, it felt very idyllic, the British lifestyle up North, away from the hustle and bustle of megacities (although of course Sheffield itself is a big city that has managed to keep itself suburban rather than metropolitan). Fifteen minutes on the tram and we are in the city centre, ten minutes in the car and we are in the countryside. Our community in Hillsborough is almost like a town: with a shopping district, a Methodist Church, a primary school, a college, a library, a leisure centre and more importantly, home to Sheffield Wednesday’s football ground.

“I didn’t say it was bad,” John replied. “In small doses it is beautiful. But there are better places to live in.” By that he meant warmer and he is right of course. The forecast on the Breakfast News that morning predicted days of mists hovering over the city’s skyline starting the next day, the less exciting bits of autumn was about to unfold. But at that moment, I’ve let the splashes of colours under the bright blue sky make me forget the gloomy days ahead. Yes, there are beautiful days in England but not a jolly lot of them that when you get one, it makes you block out memories of the less memorable days of the year.

The Olympic Legacy Lives On

Hillsborough Bowling Green

On Monday morning, I jumped out of bed with wobbly legs and struggled my way through the staircase. When Derek, the pensioner at the bowling green who showed us the ropes said on Sunday that we might be getting muscle pains the next day, I didn’t take him seriously (“It’s just a game that involves rolling a ball on the flat grass isn’t it?”). But someone who has played the game with John’s great grandfather would know better.

One of the familiar features of English communities, especially in the countryside, is the bowling green. And although we live only 15 minutes from the city centre on the tram, we have one right at the bottom of our road. It is a very lively place: on a weekday it is filled with pensioners whiling their time away in tournament games and on Saturdays, there are families of all generations engaged in a friendly sport.

Up until last weekend, we have only ever been on the other side of the fence looking in always promising to ourselves that we will be trying it ‘next week’ which turned into months and seasons that never came. But at last we walked in to try it out and discovered a snippet of family history too. Great Granddad John Boardman was a champion green bowler for two tournaments in a row in Hillsborough. It’s little wonder his namesake bowled his way to victory in a very competitive and tactical contest despite his first attempts looking like bowling in cricket. I didn’t do badly either scoring three in a game of 15, thanks to natural talent (?).

So no, it’s not just about rolling a ball on the flat grass. It is can be very tactical and in fact, a sport that is still played in the Commonwealth Games.

It was an hour of fun and we will definitely be coming back more often. For us, this will be the 2012 Olympic legacy in action.

Joy in Routine

 

Who said there is no joy in routine?

One of the things I look forward to during the weekend is our Saturday weekly shopping: a short walk from our street to the rows of independent stores along Middlewood Road that sells everything from meat to electrical equipment.

Just a bit further down Hillsborough Park, the road is always abuzz with life, at any day and any season. Dragging our zebra-lined shopping trolley, we rub shoulders with the rest of the local community: families with children, pensioners and groups of teenagers. Sometimes we also share the pavements with the dogs.

Food shopping, which used to be a chore has become an experience in itself. It’s a chance of getting to know other people living nearby: exchanging pleasantries with the butchers, talking about the weather with the owner of the vegetable stall and asking the fishmonger how to cook the fish. It was how I imagined England from Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple.

The great thing is we don’t even live in a far-off village like St. Mary Mead. Our neighbourhood is composed of rows of Victorian terraces which used to be homes of industrial workers during Sheffield’s heyday as the ‘City of Steel’ which has now turned into dwellings of the city’s working class, IT and medical professionals. If you hop in the yellow and blue route tram, you will be in the city centre in 10 minutes.

But the sense of local community is as alive today as it was a century ago. Residents are supporting their local traders rather than the homogenous big name retail stores that are slowly killing the small and medium enterprises elsewhere.

So every Saturday morning, we take our shopping trolley down the road, walk along the park and meet our neighbours in the local shops. Shopping has never been more satisfying and personal. This particular routine has never been joyless.