Shaking off the chains
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The CBB -> Ste Therese's House
#1: Shaking off the chains Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:12 pm
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This follows on 3 and a bit years after the end of my last drabble (but hopefully won't go on as long!), so just under 2 years after "Prefects" Very Happy .

“Well, there’s nothing even remotely interesting in all that lot!” Eugen von und zu Wertheim remarked to his wife as he finished skimming through his share of the large pile of post that had been delivered to his Tyrolean castle earlier on what was promising to be a bright spring day. “How about yours? Did I see a letter with a British stamp on it in there?”

“It’s from Madge Russell,” Marie said. “Not good news, I’m afraid. Jem’s had an accident in the car. It’s nothing serious, but he won’t be up to travelling very far for the next couple of weeks so he’s having to pull out of the conference. It really is bad luck about the timing: if the conference had been a week later he’d probably have been all right to attend. What a shame! The main thing is that he isn’t too badly hurt, obviously; but I was really looking forward to seeing them both. Having the place taken over by sanatorium doctors for four days wouldn’t be nearly so bad if there were some old friends amongst them!”

Eugen looked at her anxiously. “You don’t really mind the Schloss being used as a conference centre, do you? I know that it’s an inconvenience, but I don’t know how we’d manage otherwise, the amount it costs to run a place this size these days.”

Marie shook her head. “You know I don’t mind. I’m just disappointed about the Russells; that’s all. Your American cousin coming up with the idea of using the place for conferences has been a godsend: we’d probably have had to sell up by now otherwise. And it’s not as if we have to cope with organising everything: Rudi Braun does a brilliant job of that. Really the only thing I need to sort out is the dinner dance on the night before they all leave, and holding that was my idea anyway.

She looked thoughtful for a moment. “Actually, I might also see if any of the wives who’re accompanying the delegates fancy a couple of shopping trips to Innsbruck, and maybe Salzburg too if we can get there and back in a day without having to set off too early. They’re not going to have much to do whilst their husbands are attending the lectures and whatever else they do at these things otherwise, and it’s not easy finding your way about here if you don’t know the area.

“It won’t be the same without Madge here though. I wonder who’ll take Jem’s place. Mind you, I don’t know any of the other doctors who’re at his San in Wales these days. I’m surprised that David hasn’t joined his father there by now: Jem must be well into his sixties and I don’t suppose he wants to carry on working for ever, and if David’s going to take over from him then you’d think he’d want to start learning the ropes there as soon as possible.”

“I suppose the bright lights of London hold a lot more attractions for a young single man than living out in the countryside does,” Eugen laughed. “He’ll move to the San some time over the next few years though, I suppose. And as for the conference, there will be some members of the Russell family here – well, sort of. I’m sure Rudi said that one of the doctors coming from the Gornetz Platz San – they’re sending two of the younger doctors seeing as Jack Maynard’s too busy to get away himself, and they’re both bringing their wives with them - is a Herr Doktor Rosomon. Now isn’t he the one who’s married to one of the Russells’ nieces? I tend to lose track of all Madge and Joey’s relations, but the name Rosomon definitely sounded familiar.”

Marie nodded eagerly. “He’ll be talking about Laurie Rosomon – who’s married to Daisy Venables, whose mother was Jem’s sister. Oh good: I didn’t know that they’d be coming. It’ll be nice to see Daisy again: she’s the most lovely cheerful, friendly girl! Well, I say “girl”: she must be … well, she’s eight or nine years younger than I am, so she must be about thirty-four. Oh I am pleased that she’ll be here. I’m sure she’ll enjoy seeing all the new shops that’ve opened up in Innsbruck and Salzburg over the last few years, and she’ll be able to tell me all the latest gossip from the Gornetz Platz!

"Now, I’d better reply to Madge’s letter, and then I really must decide on the final menu for this end-of-conference dinner. Do you know, I think I’m actually quite looking forward to it all!”

Last edited by Alison H on Sun Mar 11, 2007 9:02 am; edited 54 times in total
#2:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:42 pm
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YAY! The new Alison drabble has Arrived!

*happy dances*

Poor Jem, I hope he has a good recovery.
#3:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:16 pm
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Excellent - I like this universe.


Thanks Alison. Laughing
#4:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:40 pm
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Ooh, nice! Thanks Alison, more soon please!
#5:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:46 pm
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Oh great! I love Marie, and this is a new slant on their lives. Looking forward to the next post.
#6:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 9:33 pm
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OOOOOoooh I love this universe and this looks to be a brilliantly promising start. I'm thinking Reg and Len will be there?
#7:  Author: Alice, Location: London, England PostPosted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 11:58 pm
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Lovely, another Alison drabble. I wonder where this one is going...
#8:  Author: macyrose, Location: Great White North (Canada) PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 1:11 am
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Can someone please give me a link to Alison H's other drabble that she mentioned? I'm enjoying this one and would like to read any others of hers. I always felt Marie got shafted in the books after she left school. We hear a lot about Frieda and Simone's lives and families but very little about Marie's.
#9:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 7:15 am
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Happy Days are here again Laughing Laughing Laughing Laughing I'm so glad to see another drabble by you again. Yippee!!! (Picture me jumping up and down in excitement and SLOC looking at me as though I'm mad. Not a new occurence!)
#10:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 10:11 am
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Yay! A new Alison drabble!

Will we get to see how Gretchen is getting on?
#11:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 10:25 am
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Happy to see this
Wonder whether Marie will be disappointe about Daisy wanting to see the shops, maybe she will also take part in the conference, in fact, wondering whether there was not some confusion and it is Daisy who is coming
#12:  Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 11:02 am
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Looking forward to this. Some news of Josefa would be nice. I always wonder why she disappeared after Three Go.
#13:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 12:26 pm
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Oh good - I very much enjoyed this one's predecessor, and am looking forward to reading this! Keep it coming, please, Alison!
#14:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 2:01 pm
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Lovely to see a new Alison drabble!
#15:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 2:41 pm
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Hooray! It's great to see another drabble from you, Alison! Very Happy
#16:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:15 pm
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Thanks for the comments: everyone on here's so lovely! Some of the people mentioned will be turning up, but not all, although it might change as it goes along Very Happy ! Here's the next bit.

“How I let you sweet-talk me into agreeing to go to this party thing at the Schloss Wertheim I do not know!” Karen muttered to her husband, as she tidied up their sitting room at the end of a busy day at the hotel in Mayrhofen that the two of them had been running for the past six and a half years. “Ah, that’s where that went!” She retrieved a small wooden train from behind the curtains and put it firmly away in the cupboard reserved for their five-year-old twins’ toys. “The last time I was there I was doing the cooking, and I’d feel much more comfortable doing that again than sitting through an evening with a load of snooty doctors and their even snootier wives. And I thought you didn’t approve of all these private sanatoriums? You always say that it’s not right that so many of the best doctors and facilities are at places that most people needing treatment can’t afford to pay for.”

“It’s not right; but they do do a lot of important research and that’s what this conference is mostly going to be about,” Rudi said peaceably. “As for the dinner dance, the Countess said that she’d be very pleased if we could go seeing as I’m organising the conference; and she’s a very nice lady and I wouldn’t like to risk offending her by saying no - although if you really don’t want to go then I suppose we could say that we couldn’t get a babysitter for that evening.”

“I didn’t say that we shouldn’t go! It’d be a horrible shame to offend the Countess: she was lovely to me when I worked for her for those few days. And she and the Count came to our wedding.”

“And it’d also be a horrible shame for you not to get to wear that new dress now that you’ve got it,” Rudi teased. “Come and sit down: everywhere looks immaculate to me!” He stood up and put his hands on her shoulders, and guided her gently towards the settee. “And it’d be an even bigger shame for us to turn down the chance of going back to the Schloss Wertheim together, seeing as that’s where we found each other again.”

Karen smiled sentimentally. “That as well. Can you believe that it was seven years ago?” She sat down and snuggled up to him. “All right, I admit that I’m looking forward to seeing the place again: I know you’ve been there since then but I haven’t. And I suppose that the doctors and their wives can’t be that bad! Not that I see why their wives have to come to the conference with them at all – but then I suppose that most of them don’t work and that they’ve got people to help them look after their homes and families, so they thought they might as well come along and make a little holiday of it! What are they going to do all day, though?”

“I’ve made a list of interesting places within easy reach of the Schloss for anyone who fancies sightseeing, and the Countess has been talking about organising shopping trips to Innsbruck and maybe Salzburg. She said that she was going to discuss it with the lady who’s married to … oh, what’s he called? The doctor who’s just been appointed deputy head at the place where Gretchen works? I only added him to the list the other day when Gretchen rang and asked if it was all right to book an extra place at such a late date, but I’ve somehow managed to forget his name now!”

“Herr Doktor Mensch,” Karen said. “Married to the first ever head girl of the Chalet School! Now, he’s actually related to the Countess, you know. His sister – the elder of his two sisters, I mean, not his younger sister whose husband used to be a doctor at the Sonnalpe before the War but now works in a bank in Switzerland – is married to the Countess’s elder brother. And his wife’s sister used to work for the Maynards at one time, so Anna knows her quite well. And she – Frau Doktor Mensch, not her sister – was very friendly with the Countess’s elder sister at school, and so was Herr Doktor Mensch’s sister – the elder one again, not the younger one - …”

Rudi held up his hands in mock horror. “Aaagghh! Stop! I got lost about a third of the way through that! It never ceases to amaze me the way you and Anna can remember who all these people are and how they’re all related to each other. It sounds like they live in a little Chalet School world all of their own!”

“Actually, it was never really like that back in the days when Frau Doktor Mensch and her sister-in-law were pupils, when the School was in Briesau,” Karen said thoughtfully. “But now, on the Gornetz Platz – well, that genuinely is a world on its own. I don’t think some of the people there see anyone who isn’t connected with either the School or the San from one day to the next sometimes. It’s a strange sort of life when you think about it, really.”
#17:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:50 pm
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Love Rudi's horror at trying to work out the different relationships! Laughing


Fabulous, Alison.
#18:  Author: kimothy, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:53 pm
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thanks Alison!

i loved karens description of the relationships between the mensch/marani/von eschenau clan.... not that i understood half of it of course Laughing
#19:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 9:09 pm
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Brilliant, Alison!

I'm not sure how I've managed this, but I don't think I've read very much that you've written. I'm going to go and rectify that right now. Depending how much you've written, this may take some time... Very Happy

Oooh, a new Chalet story! Set in a castle! Hurrah!! More soon please!
#20:  Author: Alice, Location: London, England PostPosted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 10:22 pm
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Lizzie wrote:
Brilliant, Alison!

I'm not sure how I've managed this, but I don't think I've read very much that you've written. I'm going to go and rectify that right now. Depending how much you've written, this may take some time... Very Happy

Oooh, a new Chalet story! Set in a castle! Hurrah!! More soon please!


All of Alison's drabbles are highly recommended Lizzie!
#21:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 8:22 am
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I think I've worked out who Karen was talking about there!

Thanks, Alison Very Happy
#22:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 10:32 am
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This is fabulous. Thanks
#23:  Author: Identity Hunt, Location: UK PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 10:34 am
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This is super; I am so glad to see this back again !
Thank you !
#24:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:37 pm
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Well I'm thoroughly confused!

Thanks Alison.
#25:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 6:56 pm
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“It does sound like a rather insular set-up,” Rudi agreed. “And, speaking of the Gornetz Platz San, two of the doctors from there are coming to the conference too. Herr Doktor Courvoisier and Herr Doktor Rosomon, they’re called – do you know them? And please don’t tell me that either of them are married to the Countess’s tenth cousin twelve times removed – both their wives are coming with them, by the way - or I’ll get even more confused than I am already!”

“It’s all right: they’re not,” Karen laughed. “Herr Doktor Courvoisier is married to Biddy O’Ryan, who used to stay with the Russells in the holidays sometimes – both her parents died when she was young - and who was a pupil at the School and later came back there for several years as a history teacher. You’ve heard me mention her: she’s the one who accidentally spilt oven blacking all over the kitchen floor the term before I left. It was a complete accident but Fraulein Annersley blamed me for it! And Herr Doktor Rosomon is married to another Chalet School Old Girl - Daisy Venables, whose uncle is Sir James Russell.”

Rudi raised his eyebrows. “Are any of the Gornetz Platz doctors not married to people connected with the Chalet School? I see what you mean about it being a world on its own! I hadn’t realised that this Herr Doktor Rosomon was related to the Russells, though.”

Karen nodded. “She’s a nice girl, Daisy, from what I remember. Very intelligent too – she’s a qualified doctor herself, and when she went to medical school it would’ve been just after the War when there were even fewer female doctors than there are now.”

“Really? Now that’s strange, because the letter from the Gornetz Platz San definitely said that they only wanted two places for the actual conference itself. At least, I thought it did. I’d better check.”

“Oh no, she doesn’t practise any more,” Karen said. “Which really is a terrible shame, because she must have been excellent at what she did: she won all sorts of awards from various medical institutions.”

“It is a shame,” Rudi agreed. “There are hardly any women amongst the conference delegates at all, which is ridiculous really. Apart from anything else, I’m sure plenty of women would actually prefer to see a female doctor. What happened – did she give it up to get married and have a family?”

Karen nodded. “The usual story. This is why Gretchen keeps insisting that she doesn’t want to get married: she says that after she’s worked so hard to get where she is she’s got no intention of giving it all up permanently and that she can’t imagine finding a man who’d accept that. I keep telling her that she should at least give some of the young men she meets a chance, but it doesn’t seem to be doing any good!

“As for Daisy Rosomon, though, I suppose that different women want different things. She made her choice, and maybe she’s very happy as she is. She’s got a home and a husband and three children, and, with being a Chalet School Old Girl and being related to the Maynards, living on the Gornetz Platz may well suit her down to the ground. I do very much hope that she’s happy, anyway.” She buried her face in her husband’s chest. “Like I am.”

He kissed the top of her head. “And like I am too.”
#26:  Author: Sandra, Location: Oxfordshire PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 7:17 pm
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This is lovely and I'm now off to find the previous drable to find out who Rudi actually is.
#27:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 7:28 pm
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Oh I'm so happy you've written another installment Allison.
#28:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 8:34 pm
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That's nice - it is a shame about Daisy though - a great pity that she had to give up her career.


Thanks Alison.
#29:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 8:54 pm
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Not just, Daisy, Lesley - they all seem to have done it. But then that was the norm then, no matter how heartbreaking if they had worked hard to get where they were.

Karen seems very happy, Alison. Wink
#30: Re: Shaking off the chains - updated 18/01/07, p2 Author: Woofter,  PostPosted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:16 pm
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Alison H wrote:
This follows on 3 and a bit years after the end of my last drabble (but hopefully won't go on as long!), so just under 2 years after "Prefects" Very Happy .


Alison, what was your last drabble called?

This is great!
#31:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:08 am
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I was highly tickled by all the complex relationships - just like Wales!

It will be great to meet all these people again. I wonder if Daisy will change at all? It does seem a waste. I'm sure that, as usual, you'll make us all think and react, Alison!
#32:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:44 am
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Glad Rudi's brain was as broken as mine by trying to work out the different relationships!

This is great Alison, tho like other people I would have loved to see Laurie-the-husband accomanying Daisy-the-doctor to the conference!
#33:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 4:37 am
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But how lovely it must have been to marry someone who could support you in the style in which you were accustomed and let you leave work and stay with your children while they're growing up, instead of having to work all hours to make ends meet and farming the kids out on some babysitter.

Thanks Alison.
#34:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 7:47 am
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Fatima wrote:
But how lovely it must have been to marry someone who could support you in the style in which you were accustomed and let you leave work and stay with your children while they're growing up, instead of having to work all hours to make ends meet and farming the kids out on some babysitter.


Yes, that's fine, if it's what you want to do - both my sisters-in-law made the decision to be full time mothers and were lucky that my brothers' jobs were enough to ensure they could do that. But back in the sixties and earlier many women stopped working because it was expected - they didn't have a choice about it.
#35:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:19 am
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We never hear that Daisy and co were not happy to do just that, though!
#36:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:48 am
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I think it's the fact that there was no choice, no attempt to consider that the woman might wish to continue in their chosen career. It's not just Daisy - another that truly rankles is Julie Lucy who had planned to be a barrister. As I said, if it's a person's choice I've no problem with it - but it wasn't a choice. In fact the only person that managed to combine having a family and a career was Joey herself - EBD's heroine.
#37:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:51 am
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I think I'm getting a glimmer of what the title might be about.


Or I could be completely wrong Laughing

Thanks, Alison
#38:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:42 pm
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Thanks for the update, Alison. I am thoroughly enjoying this. Thank goodness for internet access at work!
#39:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 1:35 pm
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Am really enjoying this. I love hearing about everyone again
#40:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:49 pm
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Thanks for the comments Very Happy . I know that very few CS girls carried on working after marriage, and that that was the norm at the time, but I do find the treatment of Daisy rather bizarre. She's the first CS girl to enter the mega-hallowed Wink profession of medicine - or indeed, with the possible exception of Stacie, any traditionally male-dominated profession. On top of that, we're told that she wins all sorts of prizes/awards. We even see Carola Johnstone and Jean Ackroyd being quite over-awed when they find themselves in her presence Laughing . Then she's married off, at a much younger age than various other people - e.g. Madge, Biddy, Gillian Linton - are, and after that she's only mentioned a few times, and then only really in connection with either her kids or her relationship to the Richardsons. Anyway, enough waffle Embarassed .

Dr Daisy Rosomon glanced through the paperwork that Laurie had been sent for the conference one more time, just to check if there was anything they might need to take that she hadn’t thought of. Most of it related to the conference itself, of course, or else to the best way of reaching the Schloss Wertheim by various different forms of transport; but tucked in amongst the rest of the papers was the formally-worded invitation to the dinner-dance to be held on the last night of the event, hosted by the owners of the Schloss themselves.

“The Count and Countess von und zu Wertheim would be delighted if Dr and Mrs Laurence Rosomon would join them …”

It wasn’t that she wasn’t used to invitations - and for that matter all sorts of other items of post - being addressed to “Dr and Mrs Rosomon”, even when the senders were people like Marie and Eugen von und zu Wertheim whom she’d known for years and who knew very well – if they hadn’t forgotten by now – that she was just as much a qualified doctor as her husband was; but seeing the words there on the elegant little card in black and white grated on her all the same.

Having said which, it wasn’t as if she practised medicine any more, was it? All those years of training, all the swotting for exams, all the long hours walking the wards; and then the sense that every minute of it had been worth it when she’d won that coveted position at the Encliffe Children’s Hospital, where she’d truly felt that she was doing some good in the world - and then she’d given up her career before she’d even turned twenty-five.

She even felt guilty about it sometimes. It was easier for women to qualify as doctors in Britain now that it had been when she’d left school: following the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948, all medical schools now admitted women as well as men, which hadn’t been the case in her day. But even now some of them still operated quota systems restricting the proportion of places offered to women, sometimes to as low as twenty per cent or so, and the usual justification given was that it wasn’t worth giving female students all that expensive training when sooner or later they’d just give up their work to marry and have babies. And she, who’d been the top student in her year, had turned out to be a prime example of exactly why such views were still so widely held.

It wasn’t that even for a moment she regretted marrying Laurie: he and their three children were the most important things in the world to her and always would be. And it wasn’t as if he’d talked her into giving up her career against her own wishes. They hadn’t really talked about it at all: it had just been taken for granted that that was what she’d do. Women didn’t work once they were married and had children, unless their financial situation dictated that they absolutely had to. Did they?

Primula had been delighted to give up her office job when she’d married Nick Garden. And Beth had hot-footed it away from Freudesheim almost as soon as she and Noel Atherton had set the date – and that was ironic, really, because the main reason that Beth had been at Freudesheim in the first place was that Joey Maynard was one of the few women in their world who did successfully manage to combine having a career with having a husband and children.

So often these days she found herself envying Joey, and she felt bad about that when Joey had always been such a good friend to her. When the conference at the Schloss Wertheim had first been mentioned, Joey had immediately suggested – although doubtless Anna and Rosli would be the ones taking most of the responsibility – that Tony, Peter and Mary stay with her and Jack for a fortnight, so that Daisy and Laurie could make a proper holiday of their visit to Tyrol.

She hadn’t been sure at first; but she’d come round to the idea, and Laurie had been keen on it from the start. They could think of it as a second honeymoon, he’d said, given that it would be their tenth wedding anniversary in a few months’ time. He’d even insisted that, after they left the Schloss Wertheim, they stay at a hotel rather than at Die Blumen - so that she could “have a proper rest”, as he’d put it. She hadn’t seemed quite herself lately and hopefully a holiday would do her good, he’d said. Well, in one respect that was certainly true – much as she was going to miss the children, she couldn’t wait to get away from the goldfish bowl that was the Gornetz Platz, even if it was just for a couple of weeks. Why had she ever thought that coming to live out here would be such a good idea?

Was this really how her life had been meant to turn out?
#41:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2007 9:17 pm
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I wondered if this could be about Daisy - can fully understand why she feels as she does.


Thanks Alison - looking forward to seeing how this pans out.
#42:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 12:08 am
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Oh, this will be interesting. I totally agree with Lesley that it's the ability to choose that's important. When I was a young Mum, it was totally expected that I'd stay at home for ever after and, although I would have chosen to have those early years with my small children, there was no thought of what came later. My d-in-l, on the other hand, is going to have to return to work to help pay the mortgage, and that's sad.

For Daisy,it hasn't been a decision, any more than it was for me
Quote:
They hadn’t really talked about it at all: it had just been taken for granted that that was what she’d do.
I'll be fascinated to see how it works out.

Thanks, Alison, your drabbles are always so thought-provoking.
#43:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 5:00 am
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Poor Daisy doesn't sound happy with her lot. Mind you, living on the Platz would be rather like living in a goldfish bowl, and that wouldn't be much fun.

Thanks Alison.
#44:  Author: kimothy, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 9:44 am
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Thanks alison, i have always wondered about Daisy giving up medicine. and it was so sad to see her all but losing her place in the storyline.
#45:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 10:51 am
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Thanks Alison, I'm really enjoying this!

More soon please!
#46:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 11:24 am
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It sounds like, even if Daisy had made a conscious decision to give up medicine, it would be the right time for her to return if she chose to do so.

Thanks, Alison Very Happy
#47:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 4:08 pm
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Very promising!
I do think the organizers wouldn't require much arm-twisting to fit Daisy into the medical part of the program. Mr. Green Then if she decides she's still happier at home with the children getting older, fine....
#48:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 5:44 pm
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Coming to live on the Gornetz Platz had seemed like such a wonderful idea at first. Then again, going to live in Devon had seemed like such a wonderful idea at first. Their own little house in the country. She’d been so overcome with joy at the prospect of living there with Laurie, so determined to make it a happy home for the two of them and for the children that they’d hoped to have. He’d known that it meant a lot to her, having a home of her own, but even he hadn’t even come close to understanding just how much it meant to her.

No-one had - not even Primula, because Primula, thank God, had been too young to have any memories of their life in Australia – their father coming home night after night in a drunken rage; their mother’s anguish; the deaths, only a few weeks after Primula’s birth, of the three brothers who’d come between them in age; and then, finally, the death of their father and the guilt she’d felt that she hadn’t even wanted to cry, that all she’d felt had been a sense of relief that he wouldn’t be able to hurt Mummy any more. Then they’d gone to live with Nurse Rickards, who’d been so kind to them and who’d told her to call her Auntie Nellie, but who’d caught flu and died only a few months later.

And then, just when they’d just got settled in Tyrol and finally it had seemed that everything was going to be all right, they’d had to leave the country, the day after that terrifying riot in Spartz about which she’d had nightmares for years, and start yet again in Guernsey … from where, one day, she and Primula had sent away, and only allowed to return weeks later, to be told that now their mother was dead too. Uncle Jem had explained that Mummy had wanted them to remember her as she’d been before her final illness, but that hadn’t made up for not being able to say goodbye to her. And he’d said that he and Auntie Madge would always take care of them – and they had done, both in Guernsey and later in Armishire; and they’d seen the two of them through their education and made sure that neither of them ever wanted for anything … but they’d been shunted between the Russells and the Maynards and, kind though both families had been to them both, they’d never really been able to feel that they had a home of their own.

Until she and Laurie had found that lovely little house, in a little village where he was one of two partners in the local medical practice, and Primula could stay with them in the holidays. She’d been so wrapped up in the idea of it all, and in the plans for the wedding, that she couldn’t even recall giving that much thought to what giving up her work would mean. She’d just been thinking about the life that lay ahead, and it had seemed like it would be a sort of earthly heaven.

Only it hadn’t been. Used to the busy life of a junior doctor in a children’s hospital, she’d soon grown bored with her new life; and, much as she adored her sons, their arrival less than two years apart had made even leaving the house to go to the village shop seem like a military operation. And after a few years Laurie had started to say, more and more frequently, that maybe the life of a country G.P. wasn’t for him after all, and that he couldn’t help wondering where he’d be by now if he hadn’t given up his hospital position.

But his getting back into hospital work after being away from it for several years had seemed an impossibility – until just after Mary had been born, when Jack Maynard, presumably at the instigation of Joey to whom Daisy had once or twice mentioned Laurie’s oft-voiced regrets about moving from hospital medicine into general practice, had taken them both by surprise by writing to suggest that Laurie apply for a position that had fallen vacant at the San at the Gornetz Platz.

When Laurie had duly been offered the position, he’d jumped at the chance, and Daisy had been delighted at the prospect of moving to a new home where she’d be amongst so many people whom she already knew. Only she hadn’t realised just how stuffy and enclosed an environment the Gornetz Platz was. There was so little there – so few shops, no cinema nearby, not even a library apart from the one at the School. There weren’t even the sort of women’s groups or charitable committees that Auntie Madge was involved with. Life just seemed to revolve around two institutions – the San and the School. And especially the School. To hear people talk, you’d think that the highlights of the entire calendar were the School Nativity Play, the St Mildred’s pantomime, the School Sports Day and the School Sale. Which, given the lack of anything else much ever happening up there, they probably were.

And even thinking about schools, any sort of schools, upset her at the moment, because Tony was now seven, old enough to start at prep school in the summer, and with no English- speaking boys’ school nearby they’d made the painful decision to send him back to England during term-time. She felt tearful every time she thought about it; and in another year Peter would be going too. At least having the Chalet School nearby meant that Mary wouldn’t have to be sent away – although, now that Mary was nearly old enough to start going to the Chalet School kindergarten, the house was going to feel very empty during the day, and what she was going to do with her time then she didn’t know.

She wondered if any of the doctors attending the conference would be female. Probably not. Doubtless they’d all be men – all accompanied by loyal wives, trying to amuse themselves whilst their husbands attended lectures and discussions, and wondering what to wear for dinner. It was a shame that Auntie Madge wasn’t going to be there: she’d been to these sorts of things countless times before and could probably have told her exactly what to expect.

She wondered if whoever was coming from the Welsh San in Uncle Jem’s place would be anyone she knew.
#49:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 6:41 pm
    —
Poor Daisy. Crying or Very sad


I must say that sending her away when her mother was dying wasn't right - bet it wouldn't have happened had the School been open - Miss Annersley wouldn't have allowed it.



Thanks Alison.
#50:  Author: Alex, Location: Cambs, UK PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 11:20 pm
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I bet Jem would've overuled Hilda - Doctor knows best, after all.
#51:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 11:29 pm
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Lesley wrote:
I must say that sending her away when her mother was dying wasn't right - bet it wouldn't have happened had the School been open - Miss Annersley wouldn't have allowed it.

Certainly not, after what happened with her own mother! And she'd be right, in my opinion. But looking at the discussions of how and how much to tell whom in my own family this week, I can see how it happened.

Very realistic and perceptive description of Daisy's path to date. No wonder she made the decisions she did.

But now -- I look forward to seeing Daisy discuss things with Karen & Rudi. Very Happy And Marie, for that matter.
#52:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 7:59 am
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But in their defence Margot didn't want her girls around. She wanted her daughters to remember her being well and how hard would it have been to deny your dying sister her last wishes. Personally I think they should have told the girls it would be their last chance to say good-bye before they left, not when they came back. Having see so many people die in my job I would not want any child to go through watching their Mother die or having the emotional strain of continually saying your last good-bye every day until she finally does, especially at their ages
#53:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 10:20 am
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Good point - having seen the same I would agree. But Daisy, at least, should have had the opportunity to say goodbye knowing it was the last time. She was twelve years old - more than old enough
#54:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 10:30 am
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I hope Daisy's going to make some nice friends at this conference.

Thanks, Alison
#55:  Author: kimothy, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 10:47 am
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thanks alison

Daisy always came across as such a lovely person, i tended to forget what a horrible life she had had
#56:  Author: Connie,  PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 12:15 pm
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Lesley wrote:
I must say that sending her away when her mother was dying wasn't right - bet it wouldn't have happened had the School been open - Miss Annersley wouldn't have allowed it.


What we must remember is that EBD as part of her plot obviously wanted the girls away from her mother, and this would have happened whatever the circumstances. In this case there was no school, so they were sent away. If the school had been open they would have been away from home, and would they have been sent back if Margot didn't want it? Ultimately in the books it was made Margot's decision and nothing whatsoever to do with Miss Annersley.

Sometimes I do think we judge the book too severely by modern standards. Things were different then, and it was what was expected, and no one seems dreadfully unhappy by their choices. But of course as the books end, society is changing rapidly, so it is good to see how the women would have coped with the growing awareness that they could do more things with their lives.

Great story Alison and its dragged me out of lurkdom.
#57:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 2:30 pm
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Of course it was the plot - but if we ignore the fact it is fiction and look on it solely as a history then EBD was not consistent (again! Rolling Eyes). She made a point of showing how, in New Chalet School, that it was such a terrible thing that the children, Maria and Mario Balbini, knew nothing of their mother's illness and were not available to see her before she died. She also has Miss Annersley pleading with the children's father to tell them - saying how dreadful it was for her when she went through something similar. We also see the consequences of them not knowing - and they were younger than Daisy.

Then, in Exile, EBD seems to dismiss all of that and has Daisy and Primula shunted off to England and not told until after the fact that their mother has died.

I should imagine that Dasiy in particular was deeply affected by that.
#58:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 5:00 pm
    —
Welcome out of lurkdom, Connie Very Happy .

Ruth B wrote:

Will we get to see how Gretchen is getting on?


Yes, here she is Very Happy !

Gretchen Monier looked up as the telephone on her crowded desk pealed out loudly, and groaned. She had an absolute mountain of work to get through today: a large pile of purchase order forms and cheque request vouchers had to be processed so that either Herr Doktor Maier, the Head of the Sonnalpe Sanatorium, or his recently-appointed deputy Herr Doktor Mensch would have time to sign them before they took themselves off to this conference at the Schloss Wertheim. Reluctantly she picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

“Sorry for disturbing you, Fraulein Monier: I know you said you had a lot to do today,” Silke Kroner, the San’s receptionist, said apologetically. Most of the staff at the San got on well and wouldn’t have dreamt of addressing one another other than by their first names out of working hours, but at work the formalities were generally observed - especially in front of guests, of whom one had just arrived in the reception area unexpectedly. “It’s just that there’s a gentleman here to see you.” She lowered her voice. “There’s nothing in the diary for you this morning, so I assume that you’re not expecting him. Shall I tell him that you’re not available?”

“A gentleman?” Gretchen frowned, puzzled. “I’m not expecting anyone in particular. He doesn’t look as if he might be trying to sell something, does he?”

“Oh no, nothing like that,” the receptionist assured her. “He’s an English doctor. I suppose he must be in Tyrol for this conference that Herr Doktor Maier and Herr Doktor Mensch’re going to. He definitely asked for you, though. He said that his name was Russell.”

“Russell?” Gretchen was rather taken aback. Hadn’t Sir James had to pull out of the conference because he’d been involved in a car accident? Oh well, maybe he’d recovered quicker than expected. Why on earth would he be coming to see her, though? Unless maybe he’d mentioned to her parents that he was planning to visit his old stamping ground at the Sonnalpe and they’d asked him to bring a parcel or something for her. Yes, that made sense.

“All right, would you ask him to come though, please?” she said. “No, there’s no need to bother with coffee, thanks. With any luck he won’t stay long!” Replacing the receiver on the handset, she hastily shuffled the loose papers on her desk into a tidy pile, pulled her jacket on even though it was a warm day, and sat up straight-backed in her chair. There – hopefully she looked suitably organised and professional! Not that it really mattered what her parents’ employer – or “master”, as he no doubt thought of himself as being - thought of her, she supposed; but she’d heard both him and plenty of others like him make dismissive remarks about the abilities of people who, like herself, hadn’t had the privileged education that they and their children had had, and she couldn’t help wanting him to see that she’d proved herself quite capable of holding down the sort of responsible job that it’d taken her years of hard work to get.

A few moments there was a knock at the door and, rather enjoying the idea of him having to knock to request admission to her office, she called out “Come in, Sir James,” and fixed a polite smile on her face.

“Wrong Dr Russell, I’m afraid! Sir James is very much at home in Wales, confined to barracks for at least another week.” A young man with dark curly hair was standing in the doorway with a wide grin on his face. “Sorry to disappoint you!”

“David!” Completely forgetting her dignity, she jumped up out of her chair with such force that she nearly knocked it over as she did so, and went running round to the other side of the desk to share a warm hug with the childhood playmate she hadn’t seen for well over two years. Although Sir James and Lady Russell hadn’t encouraged the continuance of the childhood friendships between their children and their domestic staff’s children once they all grew older, she and Sybil remained close friends and she’d always been on good terms with David, a couple of years older, as well.

“What are you doing here?” she asked in delighted surprise. “I’ve had letters from both Mum and Sybil this week and neither of them said a word about you coming to Tyrol! Are you here on holiday or is it something to do with work? How long are you here for? And are you staying at the Tiernsee or somewhere else?”

“One question at a time!” David Russell laughed. “Let me at least sit down first! If that’s all right? Sorry, I should have rung first rather than just turning up like this: I can see that you’ve got a lot on.”

Glancing round the office, he could see that she obviously had a very busy job indeed: here was quite clearly the hub of the administrative side of the Sonnalpe Sanatorium, founded by his father thirty years earlier. Gretchen was obviously making a success of her life here, and he was delighted for her. He just wished that his life was going as well – but then she’d had the courage to make some difficult decisions and take control of her own destiny; and he, so far, hadn’t.
#59:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 5:10 pm
    —
Oh ho! David none too happy with how his life has been planned? And why should he seek out Gretchen?


Thanks Alison - intriguing!


(Welcome from lurkdom, Connie! Laughing )
#60:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 9:15 pm
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Alison, I'm presently engaged in the rather long-term task of reading all the Marie/Karen stories you've written. I may be here until next Christmas! Very Happy

Loving this story too, it's ace!
#61:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 10:13 pm
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Does this mean there is going to be a bit of an attraction between Gretchen and David? Wink Really enjoying this thanks
#62:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sun Jan 21, 2007 11:17 pm
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I'd almost forgotten about Daisy's ghastly early life. No wonder she wants to make a secure and loving home for her children above all else. But now they're growing older, perhaps she's wondering where her life is going.
David is clearly wondering just that himself. Wonder what's making him unhappy, and glad that he's sought Gretchen out.
Gretchen sounds so very competent and in charge - she's really found her niche.
#63:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 8:36 am
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Nice to see Gretchen again Very Happy

Thanks, Alison
#64:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 11:22 am
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Just caught up on all of this and ooooh it looks so promising. I'm left pondering how Madge and Jem, Marie and Andreas would react to a romance between David and Gretchen and what would happen if Daisy did go back to work.

Thanks, Alison!
#65:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 1:37 pm
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Lovely to see Gretchen back.
#66:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 9:05 pm
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“Oh, there’s nothing that won’t wait a few minutes!” Gretchen said. “Let me just shift that file off the spare chair so you’ve got somewhere to sit: there, that’s better. Now come on – I want to know why you’re in Tyrol and why no-one told me you were coming!”

David laughed. “Yes, Fraulein Monier! It was all arranged at the last minute, to be honest. D’you know about this medical conference at the Schloss Wertheim? Oh of course you do: your bosses are both going, aren’t they? Well, Dad was meant to be delivering a lecture at it, but he’s laid up and so he suggested that I come and give the lecture for him. I just hope that no-one asks me any questions about the stuff he’s written!

“He said that no-one from the San could take his place at short notice: I’m not convinced about that, especially as he kept going on and on about how he was sure I’d find a conference about private sanatoriums very interesting … but anyway. I might not have agreed normally, but I was due some time off and I’d been thinking of coming to Tyrol for a break, so I asked at the hospital if I could go to the conference and take some holiday time afterwards and they agreed.”

“Oh – you’re here for a while then?” Gretchen asked. She’d noticed a frown on his face when he'd been speaking about his father and wondered about the reasons for it, but decided that it might be best not to ask. Other people’s relations with their families could be complicated, and she didn’t want him to think that she was prying.

He nodded. “I got here yesterday and I’m staying for a couple of weeks. At the Schloss Wertheim. Auntie Marie insisted that I stay with her and Uncle Eugen for the full fortnight. I know that we’ve got Die Blumen here, but it’s all shut up and it didn’t seem worth opening it up just for me - Daisy and Laurie are also coming to the conference, and they’re coming on to the Tiernsee afterwards so I thought that they’d be staying there, but it turned out that they’d decided to go to the Kron Prinz Karl. Incidentally, I believe that it’s under new management?”

“The Kron Prinz Karl? Yes, it is, sort of. It was all becoming a bit too much for old Herr and Frau Braun: they must both be getting on for eighty. I think they were hoping that Auntie Karen and Rudi – you know that my Auntie Karen’s married to their younger son? - would move down here and put in a manager at their Mayrhofen hotel, but they didn’t want to. They’re settled in Mayrhofen, and their children are settled there, and anyway Herr and Frau Braun senior wanted to carry on living at the Kron Prinz Karl and I don’t think that having the two of them and Auntie Karen and Rudi all under one roof would have worked out very well. So Rudi’s niece Gretchen and her husband have moved here from Kufstein to run the place. Oh – excuse me a minute.”

The phone on her desk had started to ring again, and she lifted the receiver with an apologetic smile at David. “Hello? Oh sorry, I haven’t, I’m afraid. Not yet. There’s a lot to get through with both of them about to go off on this conference. I’ll definitely have it done by the end of the day, though. Is that all right? Thanks. I’ll let you know as soon as it’s done. Bye now.”

David stood up as soon as she’d put the phone down. “Sorry: it wasn’t very thoughtful of me to roll up here whilst you were working, was it? Er – tell you what, feel free to say no if you’d rather not or if you’ve got something planned, but would you like to come out for something to eat later, so that we can have a proper catch-up? Auntie Marie and Uncle Eugen are invited out for dinner so I’ve told them to go anyway and not worry about me, and I’ve said that I wouldn’t expect their cook to start making something just for me – I was expecting Wolfram to be around but I’d forgotten that he works in Vienna these days, and Josefa’s just started a job there as well – so I’m kind of at a loose end as regards this evening. I don’t suppose you fancy saving me from my own company, do you?”

“How could I turn down an invitation phrased as beautifully as that?” Gretchen laughed. “Honestly, David Russell, it’s a good job I’m an old friend and not some girl you’ve just met and’re trying to impress, isn’t it? I’m not doing anything tonight, as it so happens, and I would love to go out because I’m probably going to end up working an hour or so late and I really won’t feel like cooking after that. There’s not much choice around the Tiernsee, though: it’s still a bit early in the year for some of the summer places to be open.”

“You’ll come? Wonderful! And I’ve hired a car whilst I’m here, so we can go into Spartz, or even into Innsbruck if you’d prefer. You choose and let me know where: you know this neck of the woods much better than I do, after all! Would around half past seven be all right?”

Gretchen nodded. “I’ll write down my address for you. It’s fairly easy to find. I’ll see you later, then.”

“You certainly will!” David said, smiling at her. “I’ll look forward to it. We’ll have a nice long chat.”
#67:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 9:30 pm
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Hmmm, looks like Jem is trying to force David to come to the San - and David doesn't want it.


Thanks Alison.
#68:  Author: Elle, Location: Peterborough PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 10:00 pm
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Why do I always miss the beginning of Alison's drabbles and arrive half way through?


Thanks Alison, this is looking fab.
#69:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 10:03 pm
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Is that romance on the horizon I smell?

Thanks, Alison
#70:  Author: Alice, Location: London, England PostPosted: Mon Jan 22, 2007 11:50 pm
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Hmm, this looks exciting! Thanks Alison.
#71:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 8:41 am
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Lovely Very Happy

Thanks, Alison
#72:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 4:52 pm
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Alison H wrote:
“Honestly, David Russell, it’s a good job I’m an old friend and not some girl you’ve just met and’re trying to impress, isn’t it?..."


Give it a couple of days...

Thanks Alison!
#73:  Author: kimothy, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 5:17 pm
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thanks alison
#74:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 7:39 pm
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Thanks for the comments Very Happy . I think they're just good friends though ...

“I haven’t been in here for months, but the food’s usually pretty good and so’s the service,” Gretchen said, once she and David had ordered from the menu of the quiet restaurant just off Spartz’s main street. “I don’t eat out much, apart from at Grandma’s – she insists that I go round there for my tea at least one night a week so that she can feed me up!”

“You haven’t found a nice young man at the San to take you out, then?” David enquired with a grin.

Gretchen kicked his foot under the table. “I don’t need “taking” anywhere, thank you very much. And you sound just like my Grandma! She’s determined to get me, my aunt Marta – Mum’s youngest sister, who’s only a bit older than me – and my cousin Sabine all married off. Actually, Marta’s got quite a serious boyfriend, but Sabine and I are both quite happy as we are. I’ve worked very hard to get this job and I’ve got no intention of packing it in to end up chained to the kitchen sink.”

David raised his eyebrows. “Is that what you think finding yourself a young man would mean? Sorry: I really do sound like someone’s grandma now, don’t I?” He shook his head and laughed. “Seriously, though – is that the way you see things?”

“Well, take your cousin Daisy as an example,” Gretchen said. “All that hard work to qualify as a doctor, and an extremely good doctor at that; and then she only ever practised for a few years. And what about Josette? You always said yourself that she was the cleverest of the six of you – no offence! - and yet she ended up never even finishing her degree because she got married so young.”

“That was Josette’s own decision, though,” David pointed out. “No-one forced her to give up university. Look at Len - I think Reg Entwistle would much rather that she’d scrapped her plans to go to Oxford once they’d got engaged, but she insisted that she was getting her degree and that’s what she’s doing; and I think she plans to teach even after they’re married.”

“Even if she does, I bet she’ll give up once she’s got children, like Biddy O’Ryan did.”

“Well, some women go back to work once their children are a little bit older – although Daisy hasn’t,” David said. He frowned slightly: Primula had mentioned to him that she was worried about Daisy, that from the tone of her recent letters she didn’t sound very happy. “And Sybil’s carrying on with her art needlework from home. She seems really happy, doesn’t she? Has she sent you a photo of the baby?”

Gretchen nodded. “He’s the image of you!”

“Everyone says that. Poor little chap! I’d love to be able to go out there and see him, but there’s not much chance of that at the moment. Still, at least I’m away from London for a couple of weeks. I can’t tell you how much I’m looking forward to relaxing for a change once this conference is out of the way.”

“Do you work really long hours at the hospital?” Gretchen asked sympathetically.

“Yes; but I don’t mind that. What I mean is, it’s not really the long hours that I mind. The trouble is … well, I don’t really want to be working in a hospital. I’d rather be in general practice, truth be told. Somewhere where I’m part of a local community.”

“Really?” Gretchen looked at him in surprise. “I’m not criticising – I think that that’d be a wonderful thing to do – but I always thought that the idea was for you to go and work at the San.”

“Oh, it is. Believe me, it is. But it’s Mum and Dad’s idea, not mine. Don’t get me wrong - I’ve always wanted to be a doctor; they didn’t push me into it. But not the sort of doctor that they’ve got in mind. Even if I did want to work in a hospital, in a private sanatorium, I wouldn’t want to be at Dad’s San as Dr David-son-of-Sir-James Russell; and, as it is, I don’t want to work somewhere like that at all. And I’ve got the feeling that sooner or later, probably sooner, it’s going to make things extremely awkward.”
#75:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 7:49 pm
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Poor David, with all Jem and Madge's expectations upon him.

Thanks Alison
#76:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Tue Jan 23, 2007 11:39 pm
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I do hope they love him enough to let him do what he wants with his life.
Gretchen sounds a very sensible and mature young woman!
#77:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 12:02 am
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This is great and I love David's perspective on things. Glad he's acknowledged that some women don't want to work after they're married or after they have kids
#78:  Author: alicat, Location: Wiltshire PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 12:47 pm
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wonder how long this egalitarinism would last if it was HIS wife and HIS kids???

tho then again if it was, at least they would presumably be well enuf off for heer to afford a nanny and servants so the impact on the lord and master would not be too terrible.

thanks for writing this drabble Alison, I really like your characters.
#79:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 1:31 pm
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I'm glad David can talk to Gretchen about how he's feeling.
#80:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 6:38 pm
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“There’s always something, isn’t there?” Gretchen said sympathetically. “When I was offered the job at the San it was like everything’d all come together for me at last, and I can’t tell you how excited I was; but then at the same time I was upset because I knew it’d mean being thousands of miles away from Mum and Dad and everyone else, and I knew that telling them was going to be really hard for all of us. All the way back on the train and the ferry I was driving myself mad thinking what I was going to say and how I was going to cope with however they reacted.”

She paused for a moment to take a sip of her drink. “Once they’d got over the shock, though, they were pleased for me, because they knew that it was what I wanted. I still felt a bit guilty because I knew that they didn’t really want me to move so far away, but I knew that they were glad that I was doing what was right for me.”

“I feel horribly guilty,” David confessed. “Dad’s worked so hard over the years, building up the San and its reputation – and he had to start all over again, not even just once but twice, because of the war. Obviously he wasn’t just doing that because he wanted to pass the place on to me, but it has always been understood that I’d take over and I know that that means a lot to him. And I can’t help feeling that he’s going to feel that he’s offering me his life’s work and I’m throwing it back in his face.

“It’s ironic really: even when I was still at Winchester and I was talking about applying for med school, I was getting snide remarks from some of the fellows about how I was going to have it all handed to me on a plate, and yet now I don’t want it. But it’s not a case of trying to rebel against anything Dad’s done – I think that what he’s achieved in his career’s amazing, how could I not? – nor even a case of just wanting to do my own thing. It’s just that working in that sort of set-up isn’t the right thing for me to do.”

He shook his head. “What makes it worse is that I’ve always gone along with this idea that I’d take over at the San. When I was at school I used to look at Dad and Uncle Jack and think what brilliant doctors they were and wish that I could be like them, and so because they both worked at the San that was what I saw myself doing too. And I’ve kept on and on putting off the decision … and now it’s getting to the point where Dad’s getting towards retirement age, and I know that he won’t want to retire unless I’m at least at the San, even if I’m not in charge of it. I don’t think he’s ever doubted that it’s what I want to do: he thinks that it’s just a case of waiting until I’ve grown up enough to want to stop living it up in London, as he sees it, and come home and settle down. And lately he’s been dropping more and more hints about it all, and Mum has too. That’s one reason I wanted a holiday, so that I could have some time to myself to think.”

“Well, I know it’s difficult, but the longer you leave it the worse it’s going to get, I’m afraid,” Gretchen said. “And in the meantime you’re carrying on working at this hospital in London, where you’ve just said you really don’t want to be; and that’s not doing either you or your parents any good.” She looked at him intently for a moment. "You are going to tell them, aren’t you?”

David nodded. “That much I am sure of. I’m not going to end up at the San. It’s just a case of when I tell them, and how … and what happens when I do. And I’m not looking forward to it: I’ll tell you that for nothing. And I’m not exactly looking forward to this conference either. Four days with a load of San doctors is really not what I need at the moment!”

“Oh, try looking on the bright side: it should be quite fun, being at the Schloss Wertheim! I wish I got to go on some of these sorts of conferences: I’m lucky if I get to go on the odd one-day course in Innsbruck with coffee and biscuits provided, never mind four days in a castle with three meals a day thrown in! There’s even some fancy dinner dance on the last night, isn’t there? Ah!” A waiter was approaching their table. “This looks like ours. Good: I’m starving!”
#81:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 6:45 pm
    —
Well obviously Gretchen will be too busy to go to the whole conference but there's always the dinner dance! *nudges David*
#82:  Author: kimothy, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 6:59 pm
    —
thanks alison
#83:  Author: Karoline, Location: Leeds, West Yorkshire PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 7:02 pm
    —
Thanks Alison, lovely to have Gretchen back
#84:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 7:31 pm
    —
Love the update, though am curious we have Daisy and David both obviusly going to 'shake off the chains' am wondering if there is anyone else?

Last edited by Fiona Mc on Thu Jan 25, 2007 5:39 am; edited 1 time in total
#85:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Wed Jan 24, 2007 11:03 pm
    —
I do like and respect both Gretchen and David's understanding of and sensitivity to what their following their own plans for their lives means for their parents. It's definitely not mindless rebellion, but a very thoughtful - and regretful - weighing up of all that's involved.
#86:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 8:38 am
    —
Alison H wrote:
“I’m lucky if I get to go on the odd one-day course in Innsbruck with coffee and biscuits provided


I wouldn't mind a one-day course in Innsbruck Wink

Thanks, Alison
#87:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 3:15 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison - a great sequel!
#88:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 5:55 pm
    —
“Ooh, this is delicious!” David said enthusiastically as they both tucked into the generous portions of Tyroler Gröstl placed before them by the smiling waiter. “In London I eat a load of rubbish most of the time, I have to admit. I don’t half miss your mum’s cooking! Getting some decent food was always one of the things I most looked forward to about coming home for the holidays: the stuff we got at school never seemed to be up to much. I always got very jealous when the girls raved about the stuff your Auntie Karen used to make at their school! By the way, it’s Karen’s husband who’s organising this conference, I gather?”

Gretchen nodded. “His American business partner’s the Count’s cousin: I won’t bore you with all the details! The Countess is organising the dinner dance, though.”

David nodded. “I know. She’s quite excited about it. I think she misses all the big parties they used to have before the War.” A thought occurred to him suddenly, and he took a deep breath, hoping that she’d take his suggestion the way it was intended and that he wasn’t about to give the wrong impression, cause offence or make a fool of himself.

“Gretchen?” He smiled at her as she looked up at him. “Listen - would you like to come to the dinner dance, as my guest? Most of the conference delegates’ll have their wives with them, but of course I’m here on my own – er, and I haven’t got a wife anyway, obviously. Only if you want to, of course. But you’d be doing an old mate a very big favour, because I don’t really want to go on my own.” He shook his head and grinned ruefully. “Sorry, I’ve just put all that about as badly as I possibly could have done! What I meant is that we’re invited to take a guest along, and it would be lovely if you’d be mine. My guest, I mean.”

Gretchen looked startled. “Oh David, I wasn’t hinting, honestly! When I said that I wished I could go to some of these things I didn’t mean that I was angling for an invite!”

“I know you weren’t.” He started to laugh at her embarrassed expression. “Really, I didn’t think that at all. Oh dear, you should see your face! Come on, think of me sitting there all my ownsome – now you wouldn’t wish that on me, would you? And it’ll be a good do, you know. Please?”

Gretchen put her knife and fork down and looked down at the table for a minute, not quite sure what to say. She’d rejected various invitations of evenings out from several different young men at the San in the three years that she’d been there, and she rarely got asked any more: word had probably gone round that she always said that she didn’t think it was a good idea to start getting involved with anyone she worked with. But she’d never agreed to more than an occasional date with any of the other young men, usually friends of her numerous relations, whom she’d met since coming back to live in Tyrol either. It wasn’t that she particularly preferred being single, but she’d seen and heard of so many young women abandoning their jobs for marriage and she really didn’t want to set off on any path that might lead her into having to make a choice between a man and her career.

This was hardly going to be a date, though. This was David: she’d known him since before she could remember, and he was her parents’ “master and mistress”’s son and heir! And he was only asking her, as an old friend, to be his guest for one evening, whilst he was briefly in the local area.

Then again, other people might not see it like that and she didn’t particularly fancy being stared at and talked about all evening.

“Are you sure it wouldn’t be a bit – er, weird?” she asked doubtfully. “It’s really nice of you to ask me, David: don’t think that I don’t appreciate it. And I’ve always wanted to see inside the Schloss Wertheim, as it so happens: I’d enjoy seeing the place. As well as having the pleasure of an evening of your company, of course! But … well, I should imagine that the von und zu Wertheims and the Rosomons and the Mensches’ll be gossiping away all evening if you and I turn up there together, old mates or no.”

David started to laugh again. “Gretchen Monier, I really wouldn’t have expected you to be so worried about what anyone else might say, especially over something like who’s going to a party with whom! Queen Victoria’s been dead for nearly sixty years, you know! Come on: it’ll be fun!”

Gretchen laughed too. “Go on then! Well, as long as I can find something to wear.” She smiled at the thought: she didn’t get to dress up too often these days. Maybe it was time she started to enjoy herself a bit more, instead of letting her social life be ruled about worries about what might or might not ever happen a long way down the line.

David was smiling too. He and Gretchen were just old friends; they both knew that; but even so he had a horrible feeling that, had he not been on holiday and starting to feel relaxed for the first time in a long time, he probably wouldn’t have asked her to accompany him to a formal function at which relatives and family friends were going to be present – purely out of concern about how both his parents and hers might react. Well, maybe it was time that he finally stopped worrying so much about what other people expected, and started doing what was best for him.
#89:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 6:00 pm
    —
Yay! I hope they have a lovely time Very Happy

*makes plans to sneak into the ball to admire the frocks*
#90:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 6:17 pm
    —
Good for David - pleased he and Gretchen will go to the dance. Who is representing the San from Switzerland?


Thanks Alison
#91:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Jan 25, 2007 11:28 pm
    —
Quote:
Well, maybe it was time that he finally stopped worrying so much about what other people expected

Absolutely. If Queen Victoria is dead for Gretchen's attitudes to accepting the invitation, she certanly is for any residual class barriers either set of parents might feel. Go, David!
#92:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 2:44 am
    —
That was interesting - and David is being very honest about himself here, isn't he?
#93:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 4:19 am
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I hope they have a lovely time at the Schloss!

Thanks Alison.
#94:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 8:33 am
    —
Lesley wrote:
Good for David - pleased he and Gretchen will go to the dance. Who is representing the San from Switzerland?


Laurie, for one Very Happy
#95:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 10:13 am
    —
Yay! *Offers to go dress shopping with Gretchen*
#96:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 3:06 pm
    —
“Who are we sitting with?” Gretchen craned her head to look at the seating plan over the press of doctors and their guests doing the same thing. “Oh good – we’re on the same table as Auntie Karen and Rudi.” It had completely slipped her mind that the Brauns had said that they’d be at the Schloss Wertheim this evening and she’d been quite surprised to see them there – although possibly not as surprised as Auntie Karen had been to see her with David, when the four of them had bumped into each other in the reception area, she thought with a grin.

“Who else? Neither of my bosses, I hope! No – thank goodness for that! We’re with the Rosomons, and Herr and Frau Doktor E Courvoisier … now that name rings a bell from somewhere. Oh of course, that’s Biddy O’Ryan and her husband, isn’t it? Why didn’t you tell me they were here? I haven’t seen Biddy for years.”

She’d always rather looked up to Biddy, who’d spent most of her holidays with the Russells before going on to study at Oxford, and had seemed like living proof of what someone who didn’t come from a privileged background could achieve. Except that Biddy, once she’d returned from her adventures in Australia, had, after following the traditional Chalet School girl path of becoming a teacher at the school, married one of the Gornetz Platz doctors and given up her job to be a full time wife and mother. Although, from what Cousin Anna said, Biddy seemed quite happy with her life.

“They’re just here for the conference: they’re going back to Switzerland tomorrow,” David said. “Their kids are with their neighbour … oh, what’s her name? The one who was Head Girl that last year in Tyrol.”

“Hilary Burn, you mean,” Gretchen said. “ Yet another one who went back to teach and then packed it in to marry a doctor! Right – shall we go and sit down?”

David smiled. He was relieved that the conference was over, although it had all gone off very well. Karen’s husband had done a grand job of organising things, and if Auntie Marie and Uncle Eugen resented having all these strangers in their home then no-one would ever have guessed it by their manner. And, much to his relief, no-one had asked him any questions he hadn’t been able to answer about his father’s paper. He was even rather looking forward to this dinner dance, now he knew that he and Gretchen would be sitting with the people they knew and that he wouldn’t have to spend the evening smiling politely as people he’d never seen until this week told him what a pleasure it was to be in the company of Sir James Russell’s son.

They duly went over to take their seats at their table, where they were soon joined by the other six. Both Gretchen and Karen were feeling slightly awkward and hoping fervently that the conversation over dinner wasn’t going to be too stilted, but for the most part it went much better than either of them had expected. Most of the group found plenty to chat about.

Laurie Rosomon mentioned that he and Daisy would be staying at the Kron Prinz Karl for the next week and a half and that David had told him about the recent change of management there, and Biddy suddenly exclaimed that she and Gretchen Braun had been in the same form at the Chalet School before the war and that she’d had no idea about her being in Briesau. She eagerly starting asking Rudi all about his niece’s husband and children, and said that she and Eugen would have to call in at the Kron Prinz Karl on their way home and see if her old schoolfriend remembered her. And whilst they were there she’d be able to show Eugen all the places he’d heard so much about but never seen, she added, turning to Gretchen to chat about what Briesau and the rest of the Tiernsee area was like these days.

Eugen, who was very keen on winter sports, asked Karen and Rudi what the ski-ing conditions were usually like in Mayrhofen during the winter season, and both of them insisted that it got the best conditions of any of the Austrian resorts. “We might be biased though, of course,” Rudi laughed.

“It sounds great,” David said. “I must mention it to my cousin Maeve. She’s working for one of the big travel companies and she was saying that she wouldn’t mind doing a season in one of the winter sports resorts. So long as it was nowhere in the Bernese Oberland or she’d have Auntie Joey breathing down her neck and trying to pair her off with one of the doctors from the San, she said! You and she would get on well, Gretchen: she’s another one who says she has no intention of packing in her job and spending her days keeping house, and that she definitely doesn’t intend to end up at the Gornetz Platz like Len’s going to! No offence to those of you who do live there!”

Everyone laughed - apart from Daisy Rosomon, who’d hardly said a word to anyone all evening.
#97:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 3:20 pm
    —
(((Daisy)))

For a minute I got my Gretchens mixed up there! Embarassed
#98:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 3:24 pm
    —
Ruth B wrote:


For a minute I got my Gretchens mixed up there! Embarassed


I got a bit confused myself! I don't think EBD knew a lot of German names because some of them seem to be used umpteen times - Frieda's mum was Gretchen too, and so was one of Frieda's daughters, and I think one of Bernhilda's (or was it Gisela's?) daughters too. There seem to be an awful lot of Maries and Marias as well Rolling Eyes .
#99:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 3:34 pm
    —
Poor Daisy, she seems so utterly miserable. I hope she finds something she can do to make herself happier soon.

Thanks Alison.
#100:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 5:09 pm
    —
Just caught up on the last few installments. Thanks, Alison, this is ace!
#101:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 5:18 pm
    —
So which Gretchen is this?? I am getting horribly confused ...

Poor Daisy, she can probably understand how Maeve and Gretchen feel.
#102:  Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 5:38 pm
    —
Poor Daisy Sad

Thanks, Alison
#103:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 7:20 pm
    —
Really feel for Daisy there.


Thanks Alison.
#104:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 11:00 pm
    —
She doesn't fit into either camp, does she. The others, whatever their choices, seem contented with their lives; she obviously isn't.
Looking forward to Daisy becoming happier - she's always been a favourite of mine.
#105:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 12:23 am
    —
Goodness, that dinner dance came quickly! Can we thank Auntie Marie for the table arrangements?

Thank you, Alison. Smile

Alison H wrote:
I don't think EBD knew a lot of German names because some of them seem to be used umpteen times - Frieda's mum was Gretchen too, and so was one of Frieda's daughters, and I think one of Bernhilda's (or was it Gisela's?) daughters too. There seem to be an awful lot of Maries and Marias as well Rolling Eyes .

Since Gretchen as a diminutive of Margarethe you could just interpret it as part of EBD's love of the name "Margaret" in all its many forms. Of course, to be fair, it was a very common name in real life, and as for Marie/Maria, in some Roman Catholic areas it was traditional for EVERY girl to have a name including it somewhere. Even when I was young, if you didn't have one already, you were expected to take some form of Mary at Confirmation.
#106:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 4:17 am
    —
Poor Daisy - I suspect she's very unhappy.

Tan, the Gretchen Braun referred to as having been in Biddy's form at the CS before the war, was the grand-daughter of Herr Braun at the Kron Prinz Karl. She's mentioned in Exploits.
#107:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 9:23 am
    —
Thanks Cath!. So is this Gretchen the daughter of Madge's maid (whose name escapes me)?
#108:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 2:13 pm
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Marie. She married Jem's man servant André/Andreas (depending which book you read). If you haven't read it, I strongly recommend finding In The Presence Of Fate in the archive, which is also by Alison and is fabulous!
#109:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 4:19 pm
    —
Thanks for the comments. Hopefully there'll only be one Gretchen in this from now on Laughing Laughing !

David looked over at Daisy apologetically, hoping that his joke about life on the Gornetz Platz hadn’t somehow upset her; but she was looking down at the table and he couldn’t tell whether she was upset or not. He’d tried to talk to her several times over the past few days, to find out what was troubling her, but he’d never succeeded in getting much beyond exchanges of family news or just general comments about how warm it was for the time of year and how nice it was to be back in Tyrol.

He’d got the distinct impression that she wasn’t happy with her life in Switzerland, but he was no closer now to finding out exactly why than he’d been when the Rosomons had first arrived at the Schloss Wertheim. Nor did he think that she was likely to say any more to him than she’d done already. She was a very intelligent woman and he was sure she’d guessed, correctly, that Primula had asked him to speak to her, and that was quite possibly why she wouldn’t open up to him: she probably thought that he’d report anything she said back to her sister, and maybe to his parents and the Maynards as well.

Maybe he should just mind his own business, but he didn’t like seeing her so obviously unhappy. Perhaps he should ask one of the other women present to try to speak to her, he thought, pondering on the matter during the lull between the end of the meal and the start of the dancing. They’d all tried to draw her into the conversation, without much success, but maybe if one of them could speak to her alone they might do better than he’d done. But Biddy was very much part of his Auntie Joey’s circle on the Gornetz Platz and Daisy might be wary of saying too much to her, and both Gretchen and Karen led very different lives to her and she might feel that they wouldn't be able to relate to whatever the problem was. Anyway, he couldn't very well just draw one of them aside and ask if they’d mind asking his cousin to discuss all her personal business with them.

“David! Wake up!”

“Sorry, Gretchen,” he said apologetically. Whatever, if anything, she’d just been saying to him, he hadn’t heard a word of it. “I was miles away.”

“So I noticed! I was just saying that one of my bosses and his wife seem to be heading our way: I assume it’s you they’re coming to speak to. Here they are now.”

David stood up and smiled as the Mensches arrived at their table: they were a lovely couple and he’d known them since he’d been a baby. “Good evening, Auntie Gisela, Uncle Gottfried!” he said warmly. “Would you like to sit down, Auntie Gisela?”

Gisela shook her head. “I’m fine, thank you.” She smiled at all the others at the table, asking Karen how she was and remarking how lovely all four ladies’ dresses were, then turned back to David. “Sometimes I seem to have a memory like a sieve these days! I’ve kept meaning to ask you to let me have Peggy’s new address for Natalie, and then kept forgetting. Would you mind writing it down for me? I’ve got a pen and paper here.”

“No problem!” David took the pen and paper and carefully wrote down the address of the Wintertons’ new home, hoping that he’d remembered it correctly. Whilst he and Gisela were talking, Gottfried moved round the table to chat to Laurie Rosomon, with whom he’d earlier been discussing some new equipment recently installed at the Sonnalpe San. “Daisy, you don’t mind if I go for a look round the Sonnalpe San tomorrow, do you?” Laurie asked a few minutes later. “I’ve just been asking Mensch here if it’d be all right for me to go and see round the place and he says that he doesn’t see why not. You’ll be all right for a few hours, won’t you?”

“Well … well, yes, I suppose so,” Daisy said. I don’t seem to have much choice, do I, she thought crossly. The conference hadn’t been as bad as she’d thought it might be – most of the other doctors’ wives had proved to be very pleasant, and their excursions to Innsbruck and Salzburg had passed the time and, including visits to the main sights as well as the shops, been quite interesting - but it had still all served as a reminder of the career that had meant so much to her and that she’d given up, and she’d been looking forward to getting well away from all matters sanatorium-related and trying to enjoy what was meant to be their second honeymoon. Now Laurie wanted to spend the first day of their holiday looking round another flaming San - but she could hardly say that actually, yes, she did mind, when they were in a room full of people.

Gisela saw the look on the younger woman’s face and felt sorry for her. “You would be very welcome to come to me whilst your husband looks round the San, unless you have other plans,” she said quietly. “Gottfried and I are back at Das Pferd, you know. You can tell me all the latest news from the Gornetz Platz: I used to hear everything that was going on when Maria was with the Maynards, but now most of what I hear comes second hand via Frieda and I’m sure that there are all sorts of things that she forgets to tell me or that Joey forgets to tell her.”

Did people think that that was all she had to talk about, Gornetz Platz gossip, Daisy wondered bitterly. Still, she’d always liked Gisela Mensch and didn’t want to offend her by refusing the invitation, and it wasn’t as if she was going to have much else to do anyway. “Thank you,” she said, smiling politely. “I’d like that.”

Last edited by Alison H on Sun Jan 28, 2007 8:08 pm; edited 1 time in total
#110:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 4:43 pm
    —
Poor Daisy. And Lawrence is being a bit of an insensitive clod, isn't he? Has he even noticed that Dasiy is upset? Rolling Eyes


Thanks Alison
#111:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 5:38 pm
    —
I hope it helps Daisy to talk to Gisela. She was always a very good listener and very good at giving helpful advice, too, if I remember rightly. Thanks Alison.
#112:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 5:44 pm
    —
Fatima wrote:
I hope it helps Daisy to talk to Gisela. She was always a very good listener and very good at giving helpful advice, too, if I remember rightly.


I was just thinking that! I hope Gisela can help Daisy, she was another of EBD's lovely and fairly underused characters.

Thanks Alison, this is great, and David is so lovely. If you don't have romantic plans for him, can I have him? Very Happy
#113:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 8:56 pm
    —
Poor Daisy! Something has to give....

Thank you, Alison.
#114:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 9:31 pm
    —
I have great faith in Gisela's powers of understanding and empathy.
Which is more than I can say for Lawrie!
#115:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sat Jan 27, 2007 11:58 pm
    —
Daisy is a doctor..didn't it occur to anyone that she might like to look around the san as well?

Thanks Alison
#116:  Author: Sandra, Location: Oxfordshire PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 3:23 pm
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I'm another one with great faith in Gisela. Let's hope that she can help.
#117:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 3:29 pm
    —
Gisela maybe able to help Daisy, but the men honestly seem to believe that a woman's brain ups and leaves once she has children.
#118:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 4:42 pm
    —
The dancing started soon afterwards; and Biddy and Eugen, who were thoroughly enjoying this last evening of their visit to Tyrol, danced almost every dance. They were both generally content with their lives on the Gornetz Platz, but they freely admitted to each other that the average social event there – afternoon tea chez the Maynards – didn’t really stand up very well by comparison with something like this. Not that they would have dreamt of saying so in front of Joey, of course. “We really must try to entertain more,” Biddy sighed. She thought of mentioning it to Daisy, but decided that it might be better not to bother, given the - quite understandable - black look that had been on Daisy’s face ever since Laurie had announced that he wanted to spend the first day of their holiday looking round the Sonnalpe San.

Karen and Rudi, who between their work and looking after the twins didn’t get many nights out together, were also enjoying themselves. They danced most of the dances as well, although they did slip outside for a short while to stand and look out over the mountains together, as they’d done on the night of another Schloss Wertheim ball seven years earlier. “I’m so glad you convinced me we should come,” Karen whispered as they walked back into the ballroom. “It’s been lovely.”

Rudi smiled at her affectionately, and led her back on to the dance floor just as the band began playing a Viennese waltz. David and Gretchen were also amongst the waltzers: David had kept insisting that he couldn’t dance, but Gretchen had protested that she hadn’t agreed to accompany him to a big do like this, not to mention buying a new dress, just to sit at the table and drink coffee all evening; and after the first couple of dances he’d given in.

Many of those who’d come from abroad or from other parts of Austria had early starts in the morning, to catch trains or planes, and so Marie had arranged for the dinner dance to start and finish earlier than it would have done otherwise. That suited the Brauns, who had to drive all the way back to Mayrhofen and then be up early the next morning to see to the hotel breakfasts. They were also taking Gretchen home, to save David having to make a special journey to the Tiernsee and back: she’d offered to make her own way back home on the night service bus but all three of them had been horrified at the idea, and Gretchen herself was quite relieved at not having to get home on her own in the dark.

“Thanks for inviting me, David: it’s been a really good evening,” Gretchen said, kissing him on the cheek. We’re just going to say goodbye and thank you to the Count and Countess now, and then we’ll be off.”

“Thank you for coming!” David said warmly. He followed Gretchen and the Brauns out into the Schloss parking area when they left, and waved to them as Rudi’s car headed off into the distance. Gretchen had been quite right, he thought: it had been a really good evening. Well - apart from his concerns about Daisy. He could have thumped Laurie when he’d come up with that stupid idea about going to look round the San: surely anyone could have seen that Daisy hadn’t been happy it. Having said which, from the look on Laurie’s face after the Mensches had left the table, he’d got the impression that Laurie had belatedly realised that he’d done the wrong thing. Oh well, it would only be for one day – and maybe spending some time with Gisela Mensch would do Daisy good. Auntie Gisela was a very sensible and understanding person, from what Mum and Auntie Joey said: maybe Daisy’d open up to her.

In the meantime, whilst most of the others who’d been at the conference would be heading home tomorrow, he now had plenty of time in which to relax and enjoy himself! Including a day out with Gretchen on Saturday, which they’d arranged earlier on.
#119:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:29 pm
    —
Glad others have noticed what a plonker Lawrie was - hope he's started to have an inkling as to why Daisy is upset- before she thumps him! Laughing


Thanks Alison.
#120:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:39 pm
    —
Oh dear, I've always really liked Laurie. Poor Daisy. And lovely David for noticing. Is he going to be another lovely, sensitive boy for me to sigh over? Very Happy (this will have to suffice as a swooning face...)

Thanks Alison!
#121:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:41 pm
    —
Actually, I'd quite like to see Daisy thump Laurie!

Thanks Alison.
#122:  Author: dorian, Location: Dublin PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 7:03 pm
    —
I've just started reading this - after its predecessors, of course (which I loved) - and I'm loving it too.

I think Daisy needs to bump into Gretchen at some point, at which stage Gretchen will encourage Daisy to get back into medicine - or at least, out of the house some way. Please?
#123:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 11:26 pm
    —
Cath V-P wrote:
Daisy is a doctor..didn't it occur to anyone that she might like to look around the san as well?

Hear, hear.
#124:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Jan 28, 2007 11:35 pm
    —
I'm so pleased the evening went so well - and that other people were unimpressed with Laurie's acceptance of that offer.
#125:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 11:34 am
    —
It's the old taking for granted syndrome. What I'd really like is for a child to be admitted to the San, and the wonderful doctors there to be absolutely and completely flummoxed by the case, and for Daisy to know what it is, given her experience in Paediatrics, and for her to waltz in and be able to cure the child.
#126:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 6:30 pm
    —
Thanks for the updates. I didn't read the previous drabble so will hunt that up when I have some time.

I really feel for Daisy, and I hope Jennie's suggestion might bear some fruit. I also look forward to seeing more of Gisela, it was such a shame she faded into the background in the original books.
#127:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 6:58 pm
    —
It had been good to see Biddy again, Gretchen thought in the car on the way home, but she hadn’t half changed. All she’d really talked about had been her children, the Chalet School and the other people on the Gornetz Platz, and from the sound of it the only people she was really friendly with these days were either Chalet School mistresses or doctors’ wives. As for Daisy, she remembered her as being such a happy, cheerful, lively person, but now she just seemed quiet and unhappy. Well, if that was what getting married did for you, then she was definitely staying single!

Then again, her own mother wasn’t like that. Nor was Auntie Karen. Nor was Sybil, for that matter. Maybe it wasn’t so much getting married that was the problem, but giving up work and living somewhere like the Gornetz Platz: it was no wonder that Maeve Bettany had told David that she was steering well clear of the place! But then Biddy seemed quite happy: it was only Daisy who didn’t. It was all very confusing, really.

“Gretchen! Not fallen asleep, have you? We’re here!” Rudi’s voice suddenly broke into her thoughts, and she hastily picked her handbag up off the seat and rummaged inside it for her keys as he got out of the car and opened the door for her. “Thank you both so much for bringing me home,” she said. “I know it’s out of your way.”

“You’re very welcome,” Karen said warmly. “Now you look after yourself - and is there any chance of us seeing you in Mayrhofen any time soon? You know we always love having you round, and Anneliese and Alexander keep asking after you.”

“Do they? That’s really sweet! Will you give them my love, and tell them that I promise that I’ll come and see them soon? Actually, David was saying that he’d never been to the Zillerthal and that he’d heard other members of the family raving about it - so we thought that we might come over to Mayrhofen on Saturday when I’m off. I said that I’d show him round. I was going to ask you if it was all right for us to call into the hotel: I hadn’t realised that we were at my house already!”

“That’d be lovely: call in any time,” Karen said. “Do you – ah, plan on seeing a lot of David Russell whilst he’s here?”

Gretchen burst out laughing. “Auntie Karen! He’s just an old friend: I’ve known him since I was born! And he’s one of the Russells; and he lives in England and he’ll be going back there the week after next.” She giggled. “All the same, I’d love to see Sir James and Lady Russell’s faces when they find out that he took me to the von und zu Wertheims’ party!”

Karen smiled, although she said nothing more except to bid Gretchen goodnight. Although she didn’t really think that there was anything “going on” between her goddaughter and David Russell, it was good to hear Gretchen giggling like that, and talking about planning a day out at the weekend, just as it had been good to see her enjoying herself at the dinner dance. It worried her sometimes that Gretchen seemed so set on concentrating on her job to the exclusion of anything else.

No, that wasn’t fair: she knew that Gretchen often went out and enjoyed herself with her cousin Sabine and her other female friends. And she knew that Gretchen was quite old enough to make her own choices. It just seemed a shame that she was so dead set against the idea of marriage, at least for the foreseeable future, that she seemed determined not even to give any of the young men she met a chance. Oh well, given his remarks about the Gornetz Platz, maybe David Russell, whom Gretchen seemed quite happy to spend time with on the grounds that he was an old friend, might just show her that not all young men thought that young women ought to be chained to the kitchen sink!

“See you both on Saturday, then,” Gretchen, having finally found her keys amid all the other many and varied contents of her handbag, said cheerfully as she made her way up the path. It had been a very pleasant evening, all in all, she thought.

It was just a shame that Daisy Rosomon so obviously hadn’t enjoyed it.
#128:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 7:39 pm
    —
Glad Gretchen is so happy. Poor Daisy. Crying or Very sad


Thanks Alison.
#129:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 10:45 pm
    —
Good to see that Gretchen enjoyed herself, but oh, poor Daisy.
#130:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Mon Jan 29, 2007 11:10 pm
    —
Poor Biddy, too. Such a shame that such a vibrant charcacter has been swamped by domesticity and the miasma of the Platz!

Lovely to hear Gretchen giggling and being young. She has a bit of carefreeness to make up on.
#131:  Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:36 am
    —
With Daisy, the fact that she was in the same profession as her husband would probably make it worse. She is reminded daily of what she gave up when she got married, particularly on the Platz where the social life for the ex-pats would be dominated by the Sanatorium. Like at the conference where she is continually reminded that she is there as a doctor's wife, not as a doctor, in spite of her own credentials.

I bet correspondence comes to Dr and Mrs Laurie Rosonom, too, rather than Dr and Dr.
#132:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 1:23 pm
    —
Poor Daisy. I feel really sorry for her.
#133:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 1:56 pm
    —
I'm glad Grechen is happy with her life, she certainly deserves to be. I only hope we can see Daisy as contented.
#134:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:04 pm
    —
Laurie wasn’t sure if Daisy was asleep or, as he was, just pretending to be asleep, but he decided that it might be best not to speak in case she really was sleeping and he woke her up. He could have kicked himself for arranging to go and see the new equipment at the Sonnalpe San on what was supposed to be the first proper day of his and Daisy’s second honeymoon. He’d realised almost at once that it had been a ridiculously thoughtless thing to do, and wished now that he’d had the guts to cancel the arrangement, instead of worrying that doing so might have offended Gottfried Mensch who doubtless had far better things to do than showing visitors round the place anyway.

It had just, like a lot of other things he’d done in his life, seemed like a good idea at the time. He’d heard Gottfried Mensch talking about some new state-of-the-art equipment that had recently been installed at the Sonnalpe San and it had occurred to him that seeing it might enable him to make some valuable suggestions when he went back to the Gornetz Platz. Being selected, along with Eugen Courvoisier, to represent the San at this conference had been quite an honour. He was sure that some of the doctors who’d been there for longer than he had, and had far more relevant experience than he had, felt that he’d only been chosen because he was married to Jack Maynard’s brother-in-law’s niece; and so he was desperate to make a good impression when he returned and show that he really had been the right choice after all.

That was a big part of the trouble with the Gornetz Platz. Everyone lived in everyone else’s pockets, everyone knew everyone else’s business, and so sometimes it was hard not to feel that everyone was talking about you, whether it was at work or away from work. And he sometimes felt that other people at the San viewed him with a certain amount of suspicion because he had that family connection to the boss … through his wife, Daisy, the amazing, compassionate, hard-working, intelligent, beautiful girl he’d met in the highly unromantic surroundings of an antiseptic-smelling hospital ward all those years ago.

He smiled a little sadly to himself, remembering that first meeting. He’d been amazed when he’d found out that the new young doctor at the hospital, Dr M C Venables, with a string of research awards and prizes won to her name, was a woman - and even more amazed when he’d actually met her and found that she couldn’t be any more different from the standard image of female doctors as being either the classic bluestocking type or else loud and mannish.

He’d admired her from the start, as a person, as a doctor and as a woman; and he’d admired her even more when he’d got to know her better and learned that she’d lost her father and three brothers before she’d been even eight years old, been caught up in a terrifying incident in Nazi-occupied Austria and then lost her mother as well. He’d marvelled at the fact that someone who’d been through so much so young could still be so cheerful, so friendly and so good-natured. And he’d been attracted by her wonderful personality and her lovely face but, above all, he’d been attracted by her dedication to and compassion for her patients, especially the children who must so often have reminded her of the brothers she’d lost. He’d hardly been able to believe his luck when she’d agreed to marry him, and he’d vowed that he’d give her and the children that they planned to have together everything that he possibly could.

Last edited by Alison H on Tue Jan 30, 2007 6:38 pm; edited 1 time in total
#135:  Author: Changnoi, Location: Milwaukee, USA PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:04 pm
    —
A new drabble--how lovely! I wonder how everyone on the Gornetz Platz is doing. I like Biddy and Eugen in this--they're happy with each other, but they seem like they just sort of roll their eyes and laugh about the social situation on the Platz.

Chang
#136:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:05 pm
    —
Have I already said that I'm greatly enjoying this drabble?

It is difficult for the married ones, especially in such a closed community as the Platz.
#137:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:26 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
...felt that he’d only been chosen because he was married to Jack Maynard’s brother-in-law’s niece...


That's the most complicated bit of nepotism EVER!

This is great, thanks Alison. I'm glad Laurie has been redeemed a little. I've always liked him, not sure why, maybe because the name Laurie conjours images of Christian Bale as Laurie in Little Women...
#138:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:34 pm
    —
thanks alison
#139:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:48 pm
    —
At least it sounds as though Laurie is still in love with Daisy and once he's realized how unhappy she is, he will probably want to do something about it.

Thanks Alison.
#140:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 7:29 pm
    —
Might have been easier to say (and think) Sir James Russell's niece - after all Jem is the big boss! Wink


Well at least Laurie is concerned about his wife - but it doesn't yet seem to have penetrated as to why she should be unhappy.


Thanks Alison
#141:  Author: Sarah_K, Location: St Albans PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 8:13 pm
    —
I'm glad Laurie still cares so much for Daisy, now if he can just see that protecting her and giving her everything he can isn't really what she wants...

Thank you Alison Very Happy
#142:  Author: dorian, Location: Dublin PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 10:06 pm
    —
Oh, for goodness' sake! Laurie, cop yourself on and ask Daisy if she wants to come see the San with you!
#143:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 10:43 pm
    —
It's very difficult isn't it? All the things that influence why you do something - and sometimes you look back and wonder just how and why you are where you are....
#144:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:46 pm
    —
Poor Laurie, desperately trying to prove himself and move out from under the Russell/Bettany shadow - then realising he's been very insensitive to his wife in the process.
Daisy sounds so lovely, and it's so easy to forget all the ghastly things she's coped with in her life. Laurie's affection for her is obviously deep and sincere, which augurs well for an eventual happy outcome - I hope!
#145:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 9:52 am
    —
I think Laurie is one of those men who actually need to be hit over the head with the facts.
#146:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:00 pm
    —
A male friend once informed me (after realising that he'd upset me but claiming that he didn't have a clue what it was he'd done that'd upset me) that men aren't capable of working out why women are upset and always need to have it spelt out to them!

The irony was that by marrying him, by setting up with him the stable home that she’d longed for and starting a family of their own, she’d had to give up the career that meant so much to her and that she’d worked so hard for. He felt guilty about that sometimes, horribly guilty, but he supposed that it was just the way of the world: no-one could have or be everything, and looking after a house and three young children was a full time job on its own.

So Daisy had left her job at the Encliffe Children’s Hospital and settled down to making a happy home for the two of them, and later for their children too, whilst in return he’d tried to give her and the children the best life that he could – which had included moving to the Gornetz Platz, because the San there had seemed to offer better opportunities for them all than his being a country GP could ever have done. Oh, he didn’t deny that he’d been excited by the thought of working at such a prestigious establishment and of the career prospects that it might have opened up for him, but more than that he’d applied for and taken the job there because he’d wanted to do what was best for his family and he’d thought that that was it.

The whole idea of living in the fresh air of the Alps had seemed so appealing; and Daisy had been so thrilled at the idea – she’d always seemed slightly envious of the Maynards and the others who lived out there, recreating the happy life that she’d known in Tyrol before the War. It would be just like the good old days at the Tiernsee, she’d said happily, and they’d all love it out there once they got used to it. But, whether it was that Daisy had been seeing the past through rose-coloured spectacles or whether life at the Sonnalpe just hadn’t been as wonderful as she’d made it sound, he’d found that life on the Gornetz Platz was nothing like her tales of life in Tyrol. It was more like the stories he’d heard from fellows at school with parents abroad about the enclosed British communities in some of the colonies. And it really wasn’t for him: he found the whole set- up just unbearably stifling.

What was worse, now that the time was approaching he really wasn’t at all comfortable about the idea of sending seven-year-old Tony thousands of miles away in September, however many times he kept telling himself that countless other boys had been sent to school in Britain by parents who lived abroad and that it hadn’t done them any harm.

He knew that Daisy was worried about Tony too, and he’d wondered a few times whether that was why she hadn’t seemed happy lately, but he knew the causes of her unhappiness had to go beyond that: things hadn’t been right for a long time. Joey Maynard had dropped numerous hints over the last six months or so about how Mary would be starting kindergarten soon and a house could feel very empty without a baby in it; but he was pretty sure that it wasn’t another baby that Daisy wanted: the two of them had discussed the subject and had both agreed that, much as they adored their sons and daughter, three children were enough.

Something was obviously missing from Daisy’s life, though, and she’d given him no indication of what it was. Did she miss England? Did she miss Primula, and her closest friends Beth and Gwensi whom she saw so little of now? Was it that she was regretting giving up her work? Or was it that she regretted marrying him? He didn’t know, and he was frightened to ask in case the answer was that he was what was wrong in her life.

He’d hoped that this holiday in Tyrol would help to cheer her up. That was one reason that he’d been so keen to go to the conference. What was it that Joey Maynard had written in the dedication to her book about salt caves, the one that Daisy insisted on keeping a copy of? “For my niece Daisy, because she loves adventures and Tyrol,” or words to that effect. That was his Daisy – lively, cheerful, and above all happy. Or at least that was how she used to be – and that was how he wanted her to be again. And now he’d made a mess of the holiday before it’d even started. He’d be spending the first afternoon of it at the Sonnalpe San, and Daisy would be spending it making polite conversation with Gisela Mensch.

Last edited by Alison H on Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:01 pm; edited 1 time in total
#147:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:00 pm
    —
At the moment I don't like Laurie but I'm beginning to think that maybe he might surprise me and turn out decent after all (and, as a result, nothing like EBD's typical doctors!). Thanks Alison!
#148:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:06 pm
    —
As I said, he needs to be hit over the head, preferably with a sledgehammer.

Or shaken gently by the throat.
#149:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:18 pm
    —
But at least he's thinking....

Thanks, Alison
#150:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 5:05 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
He’d be spending the first afternoon of it at the Sonnalpe San, and Daisy would be spending it making polite conversation with Gisela Mensch.


I have high hopes for this conversation with Gisela! Go Mrs Mensch!!
#151:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 5:36 pm
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echoes lizzie, and also thinks the sledgehammer idea might work.... Laughing
#152:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 6:36 pm
    —
He's a bit of a pillock but his heart's in the right place. Rolling Eyes


Thanks Alison
#153:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 7:08 pm
    —
I feel like shaking him. Then hitting him over the head with an object. At least he has considered that she might be missing work ...
#154:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 11:11 pm
    —
At least he can see that something isn't right, so he is receptive to suggestions - and if he isn't that enamoured of the Gornetz Platz way of lifw, he might well be prepared to countenance some changes.
#155:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:27 am
    —
He's just accepting the mores of his time, as, indeed, is Daisy. Neither of them is aware of what's wrong, it's very hard to think outside the expectations of your culture.

It's interesting that Laurie, too, hates the Platz social set up and can't bear the thought of sending Tony away to school. Now if they can just find out that they feel the same, that'll be a start!.
#156:  Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 3:21 am
    —
I have a fair amount of sympathy for Laurie too - he followed what was expected of him by the society he was raised in, with the initial enthusiastic support of Daisy. He's not happy with it, and he senses that Daisy isn't happy, but he doesn't really know why, or what to do with it.

It also sounds like he's afraid to bring it up in case Daisy says that she's not happy and wants a divorce - he loves her and wants her to be happy and with him, but is having trouble seeing outside his cultural biases.

I've known other couples who have gone through this sort of thing - they mutually decide that the wife will stay at home to be with the kids, or alternatively, go back to work because they need the money. Then, a few years down the road she realises that she has made the wrong decision and is stir crazy at home and hates the domestic routine and wants adult conversation and respect, or is miserable being at work and missing the kids' early years and never having time or energy to do anything properly. Then the couple has to renegotiate, and sometimes the husband feels betrayed by the fact that his wife is changing their agreement.
#157:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 9:13 am
    —
they have to talk to each other
The question is how, what will be the catalyst and how many bad things will happen before they do, only Alison knows.....
#158:  Author: JayB, Location: SE England PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 2:07 pm
    —
I can understand Laurie might hesitate to suggest leaving the Platz - he'd see it as asking Daisy to leave family and friends.

But they do need to communicate.
#159:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 3:59 pm
    —
Being back at the Tiernsee had lifted Daisy’s spirits as it always did. It was a bright, sunny day and they’d walked up from the Kron Prinz Karl to the San, enjoying the fresh air and admiring the flowers that grew along the mountainside. Laurie had offered to walk over to Das Pferd with her, but she’d refused: they’d been running late as they often did and she’d told him that it would be rude to keep Gottfried waiting any longer. Truth be told, she was enjoying having a little time alone up here, on the Sonnalpe which held so many memories for her. She was rather regretting accepting Gisela Mensch’s invitation to join her for Kaffee und Kuchen: she couldn’t think what she was going to find to talk about to someone, nice though Gisela was, with whom she had nothing in common other than the fact that they’d gone to the same school – fifteen years or so apart – and knew some of the same people.

She vaguely remembered the first time that she’d been to Das Pferd: Joey had taken her and Primula along there to introduce them to the Mensches and their two little girls. Gisel had been a tiny baby then, and Natalie not much more. Gisela, she realised, could only have been about twenty-two herself at the time; but she’d thought her positively middle-aged because she had a husband and two children! Peter and Tony and Mary must think that Laurie and I are over the hill and halfway down the other side, she thought to herself wryly. How old could Gisela have been when she’d got married? Twenty, that was all: she must have got engaged almost as soon as she’d left school.

Glancing at her watch, she realised that time was marching on and that she’d better stop reminiscing and start walking a bit more quickly. Before long, she was in the Mensches’ pretty sitting room, and Gisela was smiling at her as she carefully poured the coffee out of the big coffee pot into two china cups and invited her to help herself from the plate of honey-and-nut cakes on the table.

For about quarter of an hour they made polite and rather stilted conversation about the house, the weather, their children, the dinner dance at the Schloss Wertheim and the latest news of various mutual friends and acquaintances. Gisela did her best to keep the conversation going, but Daisy really wasn’t in the mood for small talk and before long found herself glancing at the clock, wondering if it was too soon to leave without seeming rude. But then Laurie would be looking round the San for ages yet; and Gottfried was supposed to be bringing him over to Das Pferd afterwards, so she couldn’t very well leave before then. Of course, it hadn’t occurred to her husband that she might have liked to see the San as well, she thought crossly, wiping away an angry tear from her eye. He’d probably thought she’d have a far better time gossiping with another wife and mother. If he’d bothered to think about what she’d like to do at all.

Gisela, watching her, reflected that it was quite obvious, just as it had been the previous evening, that Daisy was very troubled about something. She didn’t really know her guest, who was about halfway between Maria and Natalie in age, that well; but she remembered her as being happy and cheerful, and she certainly seemed far from that now. Should she ask her if anything was wrong? Or would she be better minding her own business: the younger woman might very well be offended by someone whom she didn’t really know asking her questions about her personal business. Then again, it could often be easier to talk to someone who wasn’t either a close friend or a relative.

She’d start off cautiously, and saw how Daisy reacted, she decided.

“So how are you enjoying life on the Gornetz Platz?” she asked carefully. “Gottfried and I planned to move there once, you know, a couple of years after the San there first opened. But in the end we realised that we really wanted to settle back in Austria when we returned to Europe from America, and so we changed our minds.”

“You certainly made the right decision there,” Daisy heard herself say. Then she looked at Gisela apologetically. “I’m so sorry: I didn’t mean to sound rude.”

Gisela reached out and briefly touched Daisy’s hand. “There’s nothing to apologise for, truly. But do I understand that you’re finding that life on the Gornetz Platz isn’t entirely to your liking?” It had to be more than that, surely; but she didn’t want to ask too much too soon. “Are you homesick for England?” she probed gently.

“Not really.” Daisy shook her head. “I’ve never really lived in one place long enough to feel homesick after leaving it, I suppose. If anyone should be homesick then it should be Laurie, but he doesn’t seem to be.”

“He likes living on the Gornetz Platz, does he?” Gisela asked.

Daisy looked uncertain. “I suppose so. We don’t really talk about it much. But I suppose he has no real reason not to: he’s out at the San all day, doing the job he loves; and then he comes home to find me and the children there, his clothes washed and ironed for the next day and his meal on the table.”

She felt tears coming to her eyes and wiped them away, annoyed with herself for getting upset in front of someone else, but somehow now she’d started saying what she was really thinking she didn’t seem to be able to stop. “Whereas I – I’m thirty-four years old, my boys’ll soon be away at prep school and my little girl’s nearly ready for kindergarten, and what am I going to be left with to fill my days? Darning Laurie’s socks and going round to Joey Maynard’s for afternoon tea! Do you know that when I was younger I used to have this dream about setting up a children’s hospital? What a joke!”

She shook her head again. “Go on, tell me what an awful person I am. I’ve got a husband, three healthy children and a lovely home, everything that every woman’s supposed to want; and I’m moaning because I miss being a doctor. There, I’ve said it: I miss my work. And now you’re going to do exactly what anyone else I said that to would do, and tell me how completely unnatural I am. Aren’t you?”
#160:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 4:03 pm
    —
Um, I don't think so, somehow Daisy...

Thanks Alison, this is great.
#161:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 4:14 pm
    —
I think she might find Gisela more understanding than she thought.
#162:  Author: macyrose, Location: Great White North (Canada) PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 4:24 pm
    —
Hopefully Gisela will surprise Daisy by telling her that it's time she (Daisy) went back to work now that her children will away most of the day!
#163:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 4:58 pm
    —
I hope Gisela can help Daisy. And I do feel sorry for Laurie - it must be awful to know that your wife is miserable and not know what to do to help her. Maybe Gisela can sort him out next.
#164:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 8:09 pm
    —
I really hope Gisela surprises Daisy - although she is of an older generation and from a different time when expectations for women, especially in Austria, were far more restricted, I think Gisela will be understanding.


And what a wonderful ambition for Daisy to have - really hope she achieves it.


Thanks Alison
#165:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 10:08 pm
    —
Quote:
There, I’ve said it: I miss my work.


And it's not surprising is it - suddenly she has time to evaluate her life. I wonder what Gisela will say?
#166:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 11:37 pm
    —
I do hope Gisela will be supportive - I can't really imagine her not being. And it will be a huge relief for Laurie to know that the element in her life that Daisy is hating isn't him!
#167:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 11:54 am
    —
Hope Gisela can help poor Daisy.
#168:  Author: Nell, Location: London, England PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 12:49 pm
    —
Hope Gisela can help and that just having said it will help Daisy.

Thank you Alison.
#169:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 2:13 pm
    —
Hope this bit isn't too long - it sort of grew!


“No; of course not!” Gisela exclaimed quickly. Probably a bit too quickly to sound convincing, she realised belatedly. It wasn’t that she’d found what Daisy had said shocking in any way: it just hadn’t been what she’d been expecting. She’d thought that Daisy would say that she didn’t have any friends of her own age on the Platz, or that she missed her sister and her friends back in Britain, or even that she felt neglected because Laurie was working long hours at the San. That the problem might be that Daisy missed practising as a doctor was something that she just hadn’t thought of. Quite honestly, she’d half-forgotten that Daisy was a doctor.

“It’s all right: you don’t have to be polite,” Daisy was saying. “I don’t expect you to understand and I certainly don’t expect you to say that you think the way I feel is natural.”

“I wasn’t just being polite, truly,” Gisela assured her. “I was a little surprised, certainly, but that’s all. As for whether or not I understand … well, remember that that things were very different for me. I left school and went home to my parents, and then not long afterwards … well, I’d known Gottfried for a while - he was my friend’s brother, of course - but then things changed, and so soon we were married, and living here in our own little home, and then a year later our first baby came along to join us. And it was all very lovely: it was all that I’d ever wanted or thought of. I’ve never had a job or thought of having a job – and perhaps that seems shocking to you – but I’ve always been very happy to spend my life concentrating on being a homemaker.

She smiled, remembering. “Wanda was married soon afterwards, and then Bernhilda, and then Bette and Gertrud. Juliet was the first of us to go to university and the first of us to take a job, and she only worked for as long as she did because Donal couldn’t afford to support the two of them. In the end his father agreed to make them an allowance until Donal was earning more: that was considered more acceptable than for Juliet to carry on working after she was married. That was how it was for us.

“But it’s different for you: I know that. You may or may not know that Gisel, my second eldest daughter, got married last year, but she still works– although that may change once she has children, I don’t know. And for you to have done all that training to be a doctor – I’m married to a doctor, I know the dedication that the job requires, believe me – and then to have given it up … well, of course I can see that that would have been difficult for you. And now that your children are a little older and won’t need you to look after them during the day, it’s only natural that you should be thinking of returning to work. It wouldn’t necessarily be easy, but you could perhaps work part-time, or get someone to help you in the house and with the children as Joey and Jack have done. That is what you’re saying, I assume? That you would like to return to work?”

Daisy nodded. “I suppose so. Oh, I think opening a children’s hospital myself was just a teenage dream, but I enjoyed working at the hospital, and I quite liked what I saw of general practice when Laurie was in partnership with another doctor in Devon.” She looked up at Gisela. “It all sounds so much better the way you put it. I just keep thinking about everything that I’ve given up and where I might have been now if I’d carried on working. The way you put it, it almost sounds like something positive.”

“Isn’t it?” Gisela smiled at her.

“I suppose it is,” Daisy said. She laughed and shook her head. “Yes, I suppose it is. Of course it is! Or at least it would be, if it were ever likely to happen.”

“Ah.” Gisela sighed. “Your husband says that he won’t hear of it – is that it? I suppose that a lot of men still think that it’s a man’s role to provide, and that it might somehow reflect on his ability to support his family if his wife worked, and …”

“Oh no: it’s not that!” Daisy cut in. “Sorry – for interrupting you, I mean. I haven’t said any of this to Laurie. He’s got no idea how I feel about this. He thinks that I’m quite happy as things are.”

“But you’re not.”

“No.” Daisy picked up her cup and took a long gulp of her coffee. “It’s not just about … well, this. It’s everything. I hate living on the Platz, Gisela: I really don’t like it. I thought that it was going to be like the old days when we all lived here, before the War; but it’s nothing like that. No-one there ever seems to see or speak to anyone who isn’t connected with the School or the San. Everything revolves around the School and the San. No-one ever does anything but go round to each other’s houses or go to events at the School. Everyone’s always talking about everyone else’s business. And, what’s worse, there’s no English-speaking boys’ school there, so we’re sending Tony, our eldest, to school in England in September. He’s only seven, and he won’t even be in the same country as us.

“And I can just imagine what the other people on the Platz would have to say about the idea of a married woman with three children going back to work – if I could find anywhere to work anywhere nearby - when she’s got a husband to support her! You should hear the way that they talk about something as minor as a schoolgirl wearing make-up, never mind something like that! I’m sure that some people love living there, in that sort of community, but I don’t. I can’t stand it.” She looked at Gisela anxiously. “You won’t tell Joey or anyone else that I’ve said this, will you?”

“Of course not. Everything that you’ve said to me this afternoon will remain between the two of us. But does Laurie know that you feel like this about living there?”

Daisy shook her head. “How could I have told him? I’m the one who was so keen for us to move out there, after all. I kept telling him how wonderful it’d be.” She bit her lip. “And I was the one who decided to give up work when we got married. Well, we didn’t really discuss it as such, I suppose that it was just understood that that was what I’d do; but he certainly didn’t force me into it. Sometimes I feel angry with him for not realising how I feel – but why should he realise? Things are the way that they were always going to be. It’s the way we’ve always lived our lives and it’s the way that almost everyone else we know lives their lives. I’m the one who’s out of step with things and who isn’t happy with things the way they are, not him. We’re talking about the most fundamental aspects of our lives – where we live and how we live. How can I tell him that I’m not happy with that? It’d ruin everything.”

“He might surprise you,” Gisela said quietly. “You said that he had no idea how you felt: you won’t know how he’ll react until you tell him. But even if he doesn’t understand, even if he’s angry and he wants things to stay as they are, surely you still have to tell him. I could see yesterday and today how unhappy you were. You can’t carry on like this, Daisy. And, even if he doesn’t know why, I’m sure that Laurie must realise that you’re unhappy, too. You’re going to have to talk to him, my dear. It’s your life, after all, even if other people’s lives are involved too, and you can’t carry on living it in a way that makes you miserable just because you think that that way’s what other people expect.”

She reached for the coffee pot and refilled both their cups. “It’s up to you what you do, of course, but I do very much hope that you’ll decide to tell your husband what you’ve told me, Daisy. For both your sakes.”

Last edited by Alison H on Sat Feb 03, 2007 5:41 pm; edited 1 time in total
#170:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 2:41 pm
    —
Yes, she must tell Laurie straight away. And I hope he listens to her! Good for Gisela - she's really lived up to my expectations of her.

Thanks Alison.
#171:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 3:21 pm
    —
Yes, in Briesau/Pertisau there were lots of other people around, and other businesses, including tourism, farming and the mysterious Tiroler steinöl that I'm still not sure how to translate! Mineral oil, I suppose. But the point is, it was mined or dug on the Tiensee/Achensee.....

I am very much enjoying this, please go on writing it!
#172:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 4:02 pm
    —
So pleased Gisela was so supportive - Daisy you have to tell Lawrie!


Thanks Alison
#173:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 4:06 pm
    —
Yes, I think Gisela has been very wise there, making a clear distinction between her expectations and Daisy's.

Perhaps Laurie is secretly longing to be a househusband.
#174:  Author: Elder in Ontario, Location: Ontario, Canada PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 5:19 pm
    —
Glad to see that once she had started, Daisy told Gisela exactly how she was feeling, and that Gisela was able to offer both support and encouragement, even though Daisy's expectations were so different from her own. But Daisy has to take Lawrie into her confidence over this, and tell him just as frankly how she is feeling - whatever the outcome, she won't be able to move forward without doing so.

THanks Alison.
#175:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 6:19 pm
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Yay! Gisela, you little gem. I'm glad Daisy's feeling a bit more positive.

Thanks Alison!
#176:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 8:32 pm
    —
How lovely Gisela is, and very, very perceptive.

Thanks, Alsion
#177:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 11:50 pm
    —
Quote:
I certainly don’t expect you to say that you think the way I feel is natural ... I’m the one who’s out of step with things and who isn’t happy with things the way they are, not him

It's inevitable that, when her life isn't gelling with the general expectations, Daisy should feel that it is she who is at fault, that she isn't a 'proper' woman, that she can't match up.
Thank goodnesss for Gisela's wisdom and common sense.
#178:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 1:00 am
    —
Daisy has evaluated all this very honestly, but Laurie does need to know how she feels. At the same time, she probably couldn't tell him until she'd arrived at a point where it all got too much for her. And the Platz world does feel much narrower and more enclosed than the Tiernsee ever was.
#179:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 5:47 pm
    —
“Well, I’m definitely very impressed with Mayrhofen!” David said, as he and Gretchen headed towards Karen and Rudi’s hotel after an afternoon of walking round the pretty Zillerthal town. “It must be amazing here in the winter.”

“Oh, it is!” Gretchen assured him. “Listen, you don’t have to come to Auntie Karen’s with me if you don’t want to. I haven’t had chance to come over here for a few weeks and I really want to see the kids, but if you’d rather keep on looking round or go back to Wertheimhof I won’t mind: I know it can be boring sitting with people you don’t really know. I told Auntie Karen we’d both be coming, but she won’t be offended if you prefer to go off and do something else.”

“Not at all. I’m more than ready for a sit down, apart from anything else! And I’m quite looking forward to seeing the hotel, and meeting the children after you’ve told me so much about them. I just hope that they’ll be able to understand me!”

Gretchen giggled. “They’ll understand you perfectly. I keep telling you that you talk with a Tyrolean accent when you're speaking German!”

He laughed. “Do I really? Mind you, I suppose I’m bound to, when you think about it. It always annoyed me that - because of the War - we didn’t really do German at school, because I’d’ve had a head start on all the other boys! Whereas Auntie Joey and Uncle Jack were quite put out a few years ago when they realised that their lads hardly spoke German at all, because practically everyone they met on the Gornetz Platz – apart from Rosli and your Cousin Anna, and they even spoke English to them – was British! It’s a weird set-up there. Anyway, never mind! Ah – is this the hotel? What a lovely-looking building!”

“Nice, isn’t it? We can go straight through to the private wing: everyone’s used to me here! Gruss Gott, Peter!” She smiled at the man on the reception desk, who smiled and returned the greeting, and then she ushered David through to a sitting room towards the back of the building. Karen and Rudi were both sitting at the table, Karen planning the next week’s menus and Rudi checking a list of advance bookings; but they both smiled and put their work down when they saw the visitors, welcoming David to the hotel and saying how nice it was to see them both. Meanwhile, the five-year-old twins abandoned the jigsaw that they were putting together on the floor and rushed over to greet them.

“Ooh, come here! I haven’t seen you for three weeks, have I? I’ve missed you!” Gretchen held her arms out and hugged them both warmly. ”Now, this is my friend David. David, this is Anneliese and this is Alexander.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you both,” David said, gravely shaking first one small hand and then another.

“Very pleased to meet you too,” Alexander said solemnly.

“Are you Gretchen’s boyfriend?” Anneliese enquired, peering at him curiously.

“No he isn’t!” Gretchen said, ruffling her hair. “He’s just a friend who happens to be a boy!”

“Oh.” The little girl looked up at David disappointedly. “That’s a shame. I really want Gretchen to find a boyfriend, because then she might get married and I could be a bridesmaid. I’ve never been a bridesmaid.”

“Anneliese, that’s enough: it’s not polite to ask guests personal questions!” Rudi said, trying not to laugh. He grinned at David. “Sorry about that!”

David smiled. “It’s quite all right. I’ve got five younger brothers and sisters and hordes of younger cousins, so I’m used to being asked all sorts! And thank you both very much for asking us round for Kaffee und Kuchen. I’ve never been to Mayrhofen before, but Gretchen’s been showing me round: it’s an absolutely delightful place. And this is a really lovely hotel. Did you always intend to go into hotel management like your parents, Herr Braun? They must be really chuffed about you following in their footsteps like this.”
#180:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 5:55 pm
    —
The twins are very cute!

Thanks Alison.
#181:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 7:04 pm
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David's really not impressed with life on the Platz, is he? Lovely look at the twins again - they're gorgeous.

Thanks Alison
#182:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 7:30 pm
    —
I'm really enjoying this, Alison. The twins are lovely (although the name Anneliese has always made me picture the character in Neighbours, so it's going to need some mental re-adjustment!), and I really like Gretchen. And David. Those Russell/Bettany/Maynard boys...

Last edited by Lizzie on Sun Feb 04, 2007 1:54 pm; edited 1 time in total
#183:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 10:58 pm
    —
And we're back to meeting parental expectations again. I wonder what Rudi's response will be? Hope it's helpful to David and helps him to see his own situation more clearly.
#184:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 5:39 am
    —
Have really enjoyed catching up with this. Glad Gisela was lovely and love the way you've portrayed Daisy and Laurie the fact they are both good people who make mistake and that neither of them are talking to the other and both should. Very realistic. Looking forward to more
#185:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 2:05 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It's good to see Gretchen loved, valued and welcomed.
#186:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 3:54 pm
    —
Thanks for the comments Very Happy .

Rudi and Karen both started to laugh and David wondered what he’d said that was so funny. “Sorry!” Rudi said. “It’s just that thereby hangs a long tale! And please do call me Rudi, by the way.” He glanced over to see if the twins were listening; but they were busy with their jigsaw, which they’d enlisted Gretchen’s help with, so he continued. “I won’t bore you with all the details, but, in brief, my brother was never very interested in working at the Kron Prinz Karl, but I didn’t mind the idea … but when I first went there, after I graduated from university, I - well, to cut a long story short, I didn’t want to do anything my parents wanted, they didn’t agree with any of my ideas and I didn’t agree with any of theirs. And. … well, other things happened as well.” He stroked Karen’s hand, and David remembered hearing something of their story from Gretchen.

“The upshot was that we fell out pretty badly, and I went to Wien - where I worked in another hotel for a while before I got the sack because they had me labelled as a left-wing agitator. Anyway, when later on I ended up in America, I found myself working in hotels again because it was what I knew, and then my business partner and I set up three hotels of our own. Then, when I moved back to Austria and Karen and I got married, we opened the hotel here, and let’s say that the way we do things definitely isn’t the way my parents have ever done things. So I suppose you could say that I’ve followed in their footsteps, but probably not in the way you meant.

“We get on all right these days, though. I wish for all our sakes that we’d been able to sort things out between us sooner, though; but family relationships can be difficult sometimes, especially when parents expect their children to lead their lives in the same way that they do themselves.”

“That’s the problem I’m having,” David found himself saying. “I did always want to be a doctor, but Mum and Dad have always hoped and expected that I’d take over from Dad at the San when he retired, which I think he’s thinking towards now, and I don’t want to. I want to work in general practice, as we call it in Britain, and I don’t know how they’re going to take it when I tell them that.” Why was he saying all this to two people whom he didn’t know very well? Some people were just easier to talk to than others, he supposed. And he couldn’t have said any of this to people like the von und zu Wertheims, who were so close to his aunt and uncle and to his parents as well. He’d been able to tell Gretchen all this, but he wouldn’t have felt able to discuss it with Rix, say, or even Primula. Maybe with Sybil, who knew all about being expected to do what their parents wanted; but she was so far away.

“It’s never easy, is it?” Rudi said sympathetically. “It’s never easy to disappoint someone, especially parents who’ve always had certain expectations of you. But it’s your life and you have to make your own decisions and do what’s right for you; and I do hope that in your case your parents will accept that. And a general practitioner’s a wonderful thing to be, after all.”

“Thanks,” David said. “I’m just not sure that they’ll see it like that. They do tend to have rather definite ideas about things.”

“You may find them more understanding than you think.” Karen smiled at David compassionately. “Or at least you may find that it’s not as difficult as you expect to get them to see your point of view. When there was the strike at the Chalet School, the year after I left, your mother went out to Switzerland; and most of the people involved were expecting to find her thoroughly intransigent, but they were wrong. I know that family matters can be more difficult than business matters, but even so people’s ideas aren’t always as definite as they might seem.”

“I’d forgotten about the strike!” David said. “Thanks: I hadn’t really thought about all that. And I suppose that they’ve accepted two of my sisters settling in Australia, which I don’t think was quite what they had in mind.” He smiled at Rudi. “And thank you again for saying that you think that a general practitioner’s a good thing to be: I’ve always been brought up to believe that working in a Sanatorium should be what all doctors aspire to!

“I am going to do something about sorting this out when I get home, definitely: Gretchen keeps telling me that putting it off isn’t going to help, and she’s right. I’ve got just over a week left in Tyrol, and then once I get back to Britain I’m going to have to take some sort of action. Carrying on in my present job, which I don’t really want to be in, and worrying about it all, isn’t doing anyone any good.”
#187:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 4:10 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison.

Yes, parents often don't realise that their children are labouring under a huge burden of expectation, and when it's spelt out, they're "Oh, no, we didn't mean it like that!" Let's hope Madge and Jem fall into that category and are happy with David's becoming a GP.
#188:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 4:21 pm
    —
Let's hope that David manages to get through to Jem and Madge. Thanks, Alison.
#189:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 5:07 pm
    —
That can even happen when the parents don't actually have expectations - but children think they have - my youngest brother really upset himself when, at the age of 16, he wanted to leave school and thought my parents wouldn't let him. When he finally discussed it my parents' only proviso was that he have a job to go to. He's a bank manager now, so hasn't done too badly!


Glad that David has made a decision to speak with Madge and Jem.


Thanks Alison.
#190:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 8:27 pm
    —
Really enjoying this. (As always) Hope David talks to his parents soon. And hope we see Daisy and Laurie talking. Both of them assume they are doing what the other expects when both of them want to change. I feel a bit sorry for Laurie. He seemed to cop it a bit for one mistake of wanting to see the San or not inviting Daisy along. I don't think not being able to read Daisy's mind is a mistake I tend to think that's normal. Not everyone is gifted that way. Personally I think both Daisy and Laurie are at fault there because neither of them are talking with each other but are doing what they think the other wants or what they wanted a few years ago. Sorry I know I'm getting on my soapbox a bit on that.
#191:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:52 pm
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Loving the fact that there are lots and lots of intriguing developments in this and that it seems to be no where near ending! Thanks, Alison.
#192:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 11:52 pm
    —
Interestin variation that even when you do what your parents want, you might want to do it in a totally different way. All very positive reinforcement for David, anyway. And Madge certainly came good over the strike in the end.
#193:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:39 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I hope that Madge and Jem will be understanding about David.
#194:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 2:37 pm
    —
Shortly afterwards, Karen excused herself to go and see if there were any problems with Kaffee und Kuchen in the hotel dining room – which there weren’t – and then returned carrying two large plates piled high with sandwiches, cream cakes, Austrian wafer biscuits and pieces of apple strudel. Gretchen had warned David not to have too much for lunch because everyone always got very well fed at the hotel: now he could see what she meant! Then, whilst Rudi fetched the cutlery and crockery, she brought in a pot of coffee, along with a milk jug and a sugar pot, and finally a separate jug of milk for the children, who by this time had finished their jigsaw and were sitting on the settee one on either side of Gretchen.

“Oh, that’s wonderful: thank you so much!” David said as she handed him a cup of coffee. “One thing I really miss about living in London instead of with Mum and Dad is proper Austrian coffee. It never tastes anything like this when I make it! It’s wonderful being in Austria full stop, actually: I wish I could come here more often. Considering that I was born in Tyrol, I never feel that I know nearly as much about the area as I should do.”

“Do you have any plans for next weekend?” Karen asked. When David shook his head, she smiled. “If you’d like to experience something uniquely Tyrolean, the Gauder Festival is being held in Zell am Ziller from Friday to Sunday, and it’s not that far either from here or from Wertheimhof. Rudi and I are planning to take the children there on Sunday: this isn’t our busiest time of year, so we can manage a day off from the hotel together. We haven’t been before, because until this year we didn’t think that Anneliese and Alexander’d be old enough to appreciate it, so we’re really looking forward to it. We can give you directions if you’d like to go.”

“Friday might be a better day to go: that’s the day when they have the official tapping of the beer barrel,” Rudi said, winking at David. “The beer tent’s open on all three days, though!”

“We are not going in any beer tents on a family day out!” Karen said. Then she turned back to David. “There are different things on on different days, but Sunday’s the main day - there’s an open air Mass, followed by a parade in which all the participants wear local costumes and local music groups play traditional music. And then there’s music and entertainment for the rest of the day, including a fairground which is open all day and an athletics competition in the afternoon; and there’s also a market where they sell local produce and handicrafts.”

“It sounds really good,” David said with interest. “I’d love to go. And I’d be very grateful if you could give me directions: I’ll end up getting lost otherwise! How about you, Gretchen – do you fancy coming as well?”

“Come to the Festival, Gretchen.” Anneliese climbed on to Gretchen’s knee. “Next Sunday. There’s going to be a big parade. We can all watch it together.”

“And there’s going to be a fairground,” Alexander added. “And musicians. And Mummy and Daddy say that we can stay all day so long as we’re good.”

Gretchen paused for a moment. She’d never expected for a minute that she and David would end up spending so much time together whilst he was in Tyrol. But they both knew that they were just good friends, and she hadn’t had as much fun in ages as she’d been having recently. “Go on: why not?” she said. “It sounds great! Should be a really interesting day.”

The Gauder Festival is mentioned in "A Future Chalet School Girl", when Stephen Maynard asks the name of the place they're just passing and gets a very long reply Laughing .
#195:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 2:48 pm
    —
I think Gretchen has just done a 'famous last words' act there.

I'm thinking of opening the betting on whether she and David get married.
#196:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 3:20 pm
    —
I hope Madge and Jem can accept that David doesn't want to become the head of the san and that he can follow his own dreams. I'm looking forward to hearing of their visit to the Gauder Festival.

Thank you Alison.
#197:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 3:30 pm
    —
So David is about to be introduced some more to the land of his birth! Laughing

Great episode, Alison. Thank you.
#198:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 4:04 pm
    —
Funny that - of course he was born there - hope he enjoys getting to know Austria better.

Thanks Alison
#199:  Author: JayB, Location: SE England PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 4:17 pm
    —
I wonder if there's a vacancy for a GP around the Tiernsee? David seems to be fitting in well there.
#200:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 5:33 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
But they both knew that they were just good friends...


Methinks the lady doth protest too much...

Alison H wrote:
The Gauder Festival is mentioned in "A Future Chalet School Girl", when Stephen Maynard asks the name of the place they're just passing and gets a very long reply Laughing .


I love it when that happens! Ask a simple question, get a history lesson...
#201:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 8:57 pm
    —
I think we should file Gretchen's last comment under "may come back to haunt her" but I am excited to see what happens next.
#202:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 9:10 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:


The Gauder Festival is mentioned in "A Future Chalet School Girl", when Stephen Maynard asks the name of the place they're just passing and gets a very long reply Laughing .


And I thought that you had been doing research (seriously)
#203:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 10:48 pm
    —
Fascinating to see David showing an interest in Austria - of course he would have some memories of it, but it's good to see that he wants to know more.
#204:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:38 am
    —
The festival sounds fun, and it's lovely to see Gretchen enjoying herself so much.
#205:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 8:17 am
    —
Jennie wrote:
I think Gretchen has just done a 'famous last words' act there.

I'm thinking of opening the betting on whether she and David get married.


I was thinking that myself as soon as Alison had David and Gretchen meet up I was wondering if wedding bells were ahead especially as I thought from Alison's last drabble about Gretchen wouldn't it be interesting to see one of Marie and Madge's kids have a relationship. Sending lots of plot bunnies your way. Laughing Laughing Laughing
#206:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 1:28 pm
    —
I think David and Gretchen would make a lovely couple - hint, hint!
#207:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:38 pm
    —
This was meant to be recapping/pulling things together, but it sort of got a bit long and waffly and some of it got off the point Confused ! No plans for David and Gretchen to get married in this drabble, but they do seem to be getting on well so maybe in a later drabble they could get together and shock everyone Wink .

The following morning, whilst the von und zu Wertheims and their staff were at church, David took advantage of the continued nice weather to explore the grounds of the castle. He wouldn’t want to live in a place like this himself, he decided; but it was pretty amazing all the same. Especially when you thought about all the generations and generations of von und zu Wertheims who’d lived here before. It must have been horrific for Uncle Eugen knowing that the Nazis were occupying his ancestral home during the War, and a very emotional time indeed when the castle had been restored to him and he and his family had been able to move back here.

He wondered sometimes how Uncle Jack felt about giving Pretty Maids up. Admittedly it would have cost a fortune to maintain a big house like that, and it wasn’t as if Uncle Jack and Auntie Joey had ever seemed to have any intention of living there themselves; but maybe they could have arranged for it to be used as a conference centre, as the Schloss Wertheim was, and opened to fee-paying visitors as well, and managed that way. Oh well, Uncle Jack must have thought it all through before deciding to hand the place over to the National Trust, and Stephen had never expressed any interest in the place as far as he knew. It just seemed a shame to hand over your family history like that.

There was nowhere like that in the Russell family. Really, he knew very little about his father’s relations, other than Auntie Margot and Daisy and Primula of course. His father never spoke about his own parents much, and all he really knew about them was that they’d both died some time before his father had gone to live in Austria. And, from what Daisy had told him, Auntie Margot had never said much about them either.

Poor Auntie Margot: it was hard to believe that she’d been gone for over twenty years, and so sad that she hadn’t lived to see Daisy qualify as a doctor, either of her daughters married, or any of her grandchildren. Maybe if she were here now then Daisy might talk to her. It had upset him very badly during the conference to see his eldest cousin so obviously not happy with her life, and he wished that he’d been able to get her to open up to him. But then he hadn’t said anything to her about his own problems – purely because she was his cousin. Did she have the same sort of problems as he did, he wondered. Was it that she didn’t want to do what was expected of her any more either? He’d seen her look upset when Laurie had arranged to go to the Sonnalpe San and had thought that it was just because she’d wanted them to spend the first day of their holiday together, but had it been more than that?

When they’d been children in the nursery, both he and Rix had tended to dismiss girls of any “sort” as being inferior to boys, he remembered with a grin. Sybil, Bride and Gretchen, in particular, had all used to go mad about it. He’d had to look up to Daisy, though – not only qualifying as a doctor but also winning all those awards that neither he nor Rix had ever come close to. Was that what she was unhappy about? Did she miss her work?

You did hear about plenty of married female doctors working, even if it was part time, he thought. He’d certainly have no objection to having a female partner in any practice in which he was a partner. When he finally bit the bullet, left the hospital and went to work in practice, that was! He couldn’t imagine it happening at the Gornetz Platz, though. That place seemed to be stuck in a time warp sometimes. Maeve had told him numerous times that there was no way she was going to end up living there, and he’d heard both Con and Ailie saying the same thing. Len, of course, was all set to end up settling there as the wife of a Gornetz Platz doctor, but then Len had always been her parents’ and his parents’ idea of both the perfect Chalet School girl and the perfect daughter!

Unfortunately for him, his parents seemed to think that he was their idea of the perfect son and heir. The only thing they couldn’t understand was why he was waiting so long before moving back to the Welsh mountains to join his father at the San. They’d both recently taken to dropping less than subtle hints, every time they saw him, about how his father wouldn’t want to carry on working full time for ever, and how he really ought to get to know the other doctors and the rest of the staff there. In fact, it was a wonder that his mother hadn’t lined up some Chalet School Old Girl for him yet, just to complete the package!

Why did everything always have to be so complicated, he wondered, thinking back over his conversation with Rudi and Karen the day before and the various conversations he’d had with Gretchen on the same subject. All he wanted to do was be a local doctor and serve a local community, and he was prepared to work very hard at doing so: surely there wasn’t anything terrible about that, so why did he have to feel so bad about it all because of what other people had planned for him?

And Gretchen just wanted to carry on doing the job she’d worked so hard to get and was doing so well in; but she was convinced that to do so she had to rule out marriage and a family, at least for the time being, even if she wanted them which he wasn’t at all convinced she didn’t, all because of what other people might expect of her. And then, if he was right, what was making Daisy unhappy might well be that she wanted to go back to doing the job she was trained for, which – even if he, as a doctor himself, said so! - was important, and which she was good at, but that she felt she couldn’t do so because the society she lived in frowned on married women going out to work unless their financial situation made it imperative. It was as if all three of them, in their separate ways, were bound by some sort of invisible chains.
#208:  Author: Nell, Location: London, England PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:23 pm
    —
Ooo David could go into practice with Laurie and Daisy...

Thanks Alison!
#209:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:57 pm
    —
Yes, the chains are there, aren't they? Surely Madge should think to speak to her son about his plans? She used to be very astute about emotions when Headmistress.


Thanks Alison.
#210:  Author: Sarah_K, Location: St Albans PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:01 pm
    —
Just what i was thinking Nell! Very Happy

It's nice to see David thinking so carefully about it all, and if he can see how Daisy might feel then hopefully Laurie should be able to as well! Thanks Alison
#211:  Author: Vikki, Location: Sitting on an iceberg, freezing to death!!! PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:44 pm
    —
Nell wrote:
Ooo David could go into practice with Laurie and Daisy...

Thanks Alison!



Yes, and if David and Gretchen were to get together, she could be the receptionist/practice manager.....

Hint hint!

Thanks Alison!
#212:  Author: Lottie, Location: Humphrey's Corner PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 8:49 pm
    —
Vikki wrote:
Nell wrote:
Ooo David could go into practice with Laurie and Daisy...

Thanks Alison!



Yes, and if David and Gretchen were to get together, she could be the receptionist/practice manager.....

Hint hint!

Thanks Alison!


I was thinking the same as Nell, but wondered what would happen about David and Gretchen getting together, but that seems to sort everything, Vikki, assuming that Gretchen is happy to go back to the UK, or maybe they'll all set up practice in the Tyrol - Daisy would like that. Wink
#213:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:12 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
Why did everything always have to be so complicated, he wondered,

Unfortunately life is like that, David. And the more you wish the opposite, the more complicated it gets. Laughing

Thanks, Alison.
#214:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 10:26 pm
    —
It is complicated, isn't it? And do often you need to find a balance between what you want and need and what other people want and need - and how difficult that can be.
#215:  Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK PostPosted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 11:10 pm
    —
Reading a lot of these drabbles makes me wonder if when David and the rest of her children were born Madge pushed out all of her empathy and understanding that she had as "our dear Madame" in the early books as well.
#216:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 9:52 am
    —
Thanks Alison, I'm loving this...
#217:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 12:17 pm
    —
“Thank you so much, Frau Kohler,” Daisy said warmly. “I’ve been back to the Tiernsee a few times over the last few years, but I never liked to ask if I could come and look round the house. Then last week I had Kaffee und Kuchen with Frau Doktor Mensch, and Herr Doktor Maier called in with Herr Doktor Mensch and when I mentioned that I used to live here he said that I’d be welcome to come and see it any time. It’s been really lovely to see the place again. Anyway, I’ll be off now, and let you get on; but thanks again! I really do appreciate it.”

She smiled at Die Rosen’s housekeeper as she walked down the path that led past the garden where she’d spent so many happy hours as a child. Laurie had assumed that she’d want him to go with her to Die Rosen, but she’d said that it was something she’d rather do alone. It was her past, after all, not his. She’d said that she’d see him back at the Kron Prinz Karl as soon as she’d finished looking round the house; but, almost without realising it, she found herself wandering along towards the San. As she drew closer to the building she stopped and stood and looked at it, not so different from how it had been before the War; and Rix, David and John’s scornful boyish voices came back to her down the years. “Don’t be silly: girls can’t be doctors! Girls have to get married and look after their houses and babies.”

“Hello! I didn’t expect to see you here!” The words were English but spoken with a slight Austrian accent, and she looked up to see Gretchen Monier smiling at her. “I’m just on my lunch break. Are you having a nostalgic look round?”

“Something like that.” Daisy said. “Actually, I was just remembering how Rix and David and John, even though they were all younger than me, used to tease me, whenever I said I wanted to be a doctor.” She made an effort to keep her tone light-hearted, but despite herself she felt her eyes filling with tears. She hoped fervently that Gretchen wouldn’t notice.

“They could be absolute horrors, couldn’t they?” Gretchen said, smiling reminiscently. “So could Sybil, when we were kids. Mind you, I was a little monster myself at times! In fact, I think Peggy was the only one of us who didn’t get into any trouble on a fairly regular basis!” Then she caught sight of the tears in Daisy’s eyes, and put her hand on David’s cousin’s arm anxiously. “Hey, are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Daisy said hastily. “Just … well, overcome with nostalgia, I suppose. There are a lot of memories round here, after all. I’ve just been to look round Die Rosen, and then – well, I sort of thought that I’d come and have a dekko at the outside of Uncle Jem’s old stamping ground. Of course, you work here now, don’t you? David was telling me that you do all the bookkeeping and administrative work at the San. You’re lucky: it must be interesting for you.”

Gretchen nodded. “It is, most of the time. I can’t believe I’m here, sometimes. I started off as the general dogsbody at a shop in Armiford and I thought I’d be there for ever, but … well, here I am! It was a lot of work one way and another, but it was worth it. I have to admit that I used to feel quite resentful that I didn’t get the chance to go to somewhere like the Chalet School and take the School Certificate and Higher School Certificate exams and try to get a place at university, but thankfully things haven’t turned out too badly for me in the end. I am pretty lucky really, I reckon.”

She smiled at Daisy. “I might sometimes have been a bit resentful of you Chalet School girls and all the opportunities you had, especially when I was younger; but I‘ve always really admired you – you personally, I mean -, you know. Even now so few women go into medicine. Sybil always says that she doesn’t understand why the Chalet School doesn’t make more of a fuss of you, especially given the way they’re always going on about former pupils who’re authors and musicians and so on, and I agree with her!”

“That’s very kind of you to say, but there wouldn’t really be much to tell about me now,” Daisy said. “I’m just doing the same as most of the other girls I was at school with, I suppose – looking after the house and the children.” She bit her lip. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like I was complaining. I’m very lucky to have Laurie and three healthy children and a nice house. I just meant that, whereas people like Joey Maynard and Margia Stevens and Jacynth Hardy are still making a success of their professional lives, I’ve long since given mine up.” She tried to smile but didn’t really succeed.
#218:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 1:00 pm
    —
(((((((((((Daisy))))))))
Don't give up!
#219:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 1:32 pm
    —
Poor Daisy. She sounds very down. I hope she can get her life together again and feel worthwhile once more.
#220:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 3:48 pm
    —
It will do Grechen good to think of a way to tell Daisy that she can work and be a wife and mother - tactfully, of course - and then she can use the same idea for herself! Thanks Alison.
#221:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 4:52 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
"...Sybil always says that she doesn’t understand why the Chalet School doesn’t make more of a fuss of you, especially given the way they’re always going on about former pupils who’re authors and musicians and so on, and I agree with her!”


How true! I'd never thought of that.

Thanks Alison!
#222:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 5:26 pm
    —
Yes, they ought to be really proud of Daisy.

I think Alison is doing a great job here of showing people who feel constrained by what they assume are ohter people's expectations of them. If Daisy went back to work, se could afford a nanny for her children.
#223:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 8:02 pm
    —
Poor Daisy, hiope Gretchen can help her.

Thanks Alison.
#224:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 9:57 pm
    —
Of course she might well have been teased by the boys for wanting to be a doctor. Interesting to see that Gretchen can now view her childhood more objectively and see how much she has achieved. I wonder what she will say to Daisy?
#225:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 12:20 pm
    —
“You sound like you miss it,” Gretchen said. “Sorry, Daisy: it’s none of my business. Feel free to tell me to shut up! Here you are trying to have a walk in peace and I’m driving you mad.”

“Oh no, you’re not, honestly!” Daisy assured her. “Really, you’re not. It’s nice to see you again. And you’re quite right: I do miss my work. I miss the work itself, working as a doctor I mean, and I miss getting out of the house and feeling that I’m a person in my own right rather than just Laurie’s wife and the children’s mother. Especially recently, because I keep finding myself wondering just what on earth I’m going to do with myself once the boys are both away at prep school and Mary’s at the Chalet School during the day.”

“Could you not go back to work, at least once Mary’s at school?” Gretchen asked. “You used to work at a children’s hospital before you got married, didn’t you? Would you fancy doing something like that again, or would you like to work as a G.P. perhaps?” She just stopped herself in time from adding “like David wants to” – that really would have put the cat amongst the pigeons! That reminded her: she’d have to speak to David to finalise the arrangements for going to the Gauder Festival on Sunday. She didn’t have a phone at her house, but hopefully she’d be able to catch him at the Schloss Wertheim using the phone at work. No-one minded the odd personal phone call as long as it wasn’t long-distance and didn’t happen too often!

“I used to have this idea about setting up my own children’s hospital,” Daisy said. “When I was much younger. It sounds like a strange thing to have had as a childhood ambition, but I always wanted to work in medicine. Maybe it’s in the blood! As well as Uncle Jem being a doctor, Mummy was a trained nurse, if you remember: when we lived in Tyrol she was one of the Matrons at the Chalet School. Where I got the idea that I could set up my own hospital from I don’t know, though! Well, I suppose it was because Uncle Jem’d set up his own San, but he was in a position to afford it and I was certainly never going to be: I must have thought that there was a money tree growing in the back garden, as Mummy used to say when we were kids! It was hardly as if any bank was going to lend money to a young single woman, was it?”

Gretchen frowned slightly. She’d half-forgotten that Margot Venables had once worked at the Chalet School. It was strange really, she thought. She didn’t remember Daisy and Primula’s mother very well; but she wouldn’t have had her down as the career woman type, so presumably she’d worked because she’d wanted to support herself and her children rather than wanting or expecting her brother to support them all. It was rather odd that Frau Venables hadn’t had any of what the Russells and their friends referred to as “private means”, though.

David and Daisy’s grandparents must have been well-off: Sir James had been quite a young man when he’d first come to Austria and her father had first started working for him, and surely someone of his age could only have acquired the money to set up the San by inheritance. Unless he’d borrowed it, but she couldn’t remember there ever being any suggestion of that. Or unless he was a secret gambler, she thought, suppressing a grin; but that didn’t seem very likely either! And yet none of that family money seemed to have found its way to his sister. Then again, hadn’t there been some sort of family feud, something to do with Daisy and Primula’s late father? Oh well, it was hardly anything to do with her, and she couldn’t very well ask anyway!

“Gretchen? Sorry, am I boring you!”

“No: no, of course you’re not! Sorry, I was miles away there for a minute. I go off in a daydream sometimes, I’m afraid. What were you saying?”

“What was I saying? Oh, just that, as regards the children’s hospital, even if I had the money for something like that it wouldn’t be practical for me to work those sort of hours now. However, I do sometimes – well, most of the time, to be honest - wish that I could go back to practising medicine, but as an ordinary G.P.. Although in Switzerland there’s a lot more specialist medicine than there is in Britain where so many doctors work as general practitioners. And I don’t think some male doctors would be too keen on having a female partner, and even then I’d have to find the money to buy into a practice. And I’ve been out of medicine for ten years now, and things move on so quickly.”

“You sound as if you’re trying to talk yourself out of it!” Gretchen said. “Surely you could go on some sort of training courses to catch up on recent developments. And I bet some doctors’d be quite keen to have a female doctor in their practice. There are plenty of medical matters that I should imagine most women’d rather consult another woman about! Look – feel free to tell me that it’s nothing to do with me, but you really did sound as if you were trying to convince yourself that going back to work wasn't a realistic possibility, even though you said that it was what you wanted. Now was that because your husband doesn’t like the idea?”
#226:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 12:59 pm
    —
Poor Daisy. It must be very hard not being able to fulfill her dream. And it is interesting to see how Gretchen is trying to assist her here. And Gretchen raises a good point - just where did Jem get the money from?
#227:  Author: Chris, Location: Nottingham PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 1:03 pm
    —
Well - a bit of plain speaking doesn't come amiss, does it! Good for Gretchen - I hope it pushes Daisy in the right direction.

I'm really enjoying this.
#228:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 1:04 pm
    —
Very interesting that, about the Russell money I mean - although it's quite possible that Jem was left all the money being the only son whereas any daughter would only have had a dowry (given to her husband of course) and as the Russells didn't want Margot to marry Stephien she didn't even have that. Rolling Eyes


Please let David and Daisy speak with each other soon. Laughing


Thanks Alison.
#229:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 4:18 pm
    —
Thanks Alison. Very Happy
#230:  Author: Alex, Location: Cambs, UK PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 4:32 pm
    —
David and Daisy can go into practice and Laurie can run the Welsh San. Excellent.
#231:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 5:45 pm
    —
Lesley wrote:
Very interesting that, about the Russell money I mean - although it's quite possible that Jem was left all the money being the only son whereas any daughter would only have had a dowry (given to her husband of course) and as the Russells didn't want Margot to marry Stephien she didn't even have that. Rolling Eyes


Please let David and Daisy speak with each other soon. Laughing


Thanks Alison.


I think margot was actually cut off, as I remember reading somewhere that letters were returned saying "not known"(cant even remember which direction).
#232:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 6:49 pm
    —
That's what I meant - she wouldn't have any money - but good for her in being prepared to work rather than just live off Jem.
#233:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 9:44 pm
    —
Thanks Alison, everyone seems to be getting sorted...I wonder how many more spanners'll get chucked in the works... Very Happy
#234:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 11:12 am
    —
“I’ve never actually mentioned it to him,” Daisy confessed. “We don’t seem to talk to each other much about anything these days, except the children. We don’t even go out much any more, because there’s nowhere to go on the wretched Gornetz Platz. The only people we ever see are the other doctors and their wives, and the staff at the flaming School: we’ll go back and all anyone’ll be talking about’ll be how long it is until the School Sports Day, because that’s the highlight of their summer! Oh, you do not know how glad I am to get away from that place, even thought it’s just for a couple of weeks.” She smiled at Gretchen ruefully. “I’ve shocked you now, haven’t I, saying all that about the wonderful world of the Swiss Chalet School and San?”

Gretchen laughed. “Not in the slightest. I would absolutely hate to live on the Gornetz Platz, from what I’ve heard about it! Mind you, my Cousin Anna seems happy enough there; but then she’s always been utterly devoted to the Maynards, she’s always had a rather old-fashioned outlook on things and she’s never taken much interest in what goes on in the wider world. I suppose it’s probably quite nice to live somewhere like that if you like living in a small community that’s a bit out of keeping with the modern world; but it wouldn’t do for me and I don’t think it’d do for most other people either. And I can quite understand your saying that you’re glad to be having a break from the place.” She looked at Daisy intently. “Is that bothering you? What the people there might think if you went back to work?”

“Sort of. It’s just not what people there do – unless they can work from home, like Joey does; and she’s about the only married woman there who even does that.”

“I don’t know what decade they’re living in up there!” Gretchen said. “Plenty of women with husbands and children worked during the War, after all, and no-one objected to that. I know that there was a bit of a backlash against it afterwards, but these days it’s not nearly as uncommon as it used to be for women to have jobs as well as homes and families, if that’s what they want. And it’s none of anyone else’s business what you do, after all.”

She paused for a moment. “Daisy – I know that it’s your business, not mine, but do you not think that you ought to talk to your husband about all of this - going back to work and not liking where you live? He might agree with some of what you’ve said and be happy to make some changes in your lives. Anyway, even if he doesn’t you’ve still got to do something about it. It’s your life: you can’t carry on being unhappy with it like this.”

“That’s exactly what Gisela Mensch said when I had Kaffee und Kuchen with her earlier in the week,” Daisy told her. “You’re both right, I know that, but – well, I did give up work when we got married and there was never any suggestion at the time that that wasn’t a permanent decision, and then I was pretty keen to move to Switzerland. It’s not that easy just to say that you want to change everything, especially when you’re not the one who goes out to work and supports the family. You’ll find all this out when you’re married yourself!”

“Not me!” Gretchen shook her head decisively. “No way am I getting married! Well, not for a long time yet, anyway, and even then not if it means being expected to give up everything I’ve worked for long term. No way in the world!”

Daisy looked at her incredulously, and then started to laugh. “Gretchen Monier, haven’t you just been telling me that it’s not nearly as uncommon as it used to be for women to have jobs as well as homes and families, and that it’s a person’s own life and that they shouldn’t worry about what other people think? No offence, but you’ve just completely contradicted yourself! Well, I assume that you’re not about to tell me that what you actually think is that I should give up any idea of going back to work and stay at home for the rest of my life, so it sounds to me that maybe you should stop telling yourself that marriage is out of the question and that if you happen to meet a nice young man you should give him a chance and see how it goes! Or are you saying that marriage and a career are mutually exclusive for a woman after all?”

“I don’t know.” Gretchen looked puzzled for a moment. “I have just contradicted myself, haven’t I?” Then she smiled. “Well, I suppose that maybe people can do both. Under the right circumstances. Right job. Right man. I’ve just never really let myself think about what it might be like to try to have both. If I ever met Mr Right, that is! I suppose that I’ve been too frightened that it might all go wrong. So I’ve kept telling myself that realistically it wouldn’t be possible. Which is exactly what I’ve just been telling you that I think you should stop doing!”

“Well, it sounds to me like maybe we both need to have a bit of a rethink!” Daisy said.

“I think,” Gretchen said, “that you might very well be right!”
#235:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 11:38 am
    —
That went well! I really hope Daisy goes and talks to Laurie now.
#236:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 12:35 pm
    —
Well done Daisy for making Gretchen see that - hope Daisy speaks with Lawrie - she may be pleasantly surprised.


Thanks Alison.
#237:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 1:31 pm
    —
I also hope Daisy talks to Laurie.

Thanks, Alison.
#238:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 4:51 pm
    —
thanks alison
#239:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 10:18 pm
    —
Thanks Alison. This is fabulous. Glad Gretchen and Daisy are able to have a chat. They both seem to gel and be on the same page so hopefully they will be able to help each other.
#240:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 12:02 pm
    —
Using a bit of poetic licence here and making the Gauder Festival sound more like it is today than like it would've been then - partly because it was hard to find info on what it was like in the late '50s and early '60s and partly because Jack Maynard's comments about cattle shows didn't sound overly interesting! Becky, if you're reading this, thank you very very much for translating some of that stuff off the website into English for me Very Happy .

“Well, here we are, everyone!” Rudi said as he carefully parked the car in Zell am Ziller on the Sunday morning of the Gauder Festival. “Safely arrived and parked and it’s nowhere near ten o’clock yet: we’ve done quite well there. And it looks like it’s going to be an absolutely lovely day – fingers crossed!”

“It’s pretty warm out already,” Karen said, looking up appreciatively at the cloudless blue sky as she got out of the car and the twins clambered out after her. “The weather forecast said that it was going to be nice all day, so let’s hope they’ve got it right! I think we can leave the coats in the boot: we can always come back for them if it cools down later. Now, one of you two hold my hand, and one of you hold Daddy’s hand: we don’t want to be losing either of you in all these crowds! And if you’re both very good during Mass, we’ll go straight to the fairground afterwards, and you can go on some of the rides before the parade starts. Daddy and I might even try some of the rides ourselves!”

“And seeing as it’s so nice and warm out I think we might just see about getting some ice cream before the parade as well,” Rudi said. “I’ve heard very good reports about the ice cream here! And a little birdie told me that there were some really good toys for sale at the craft market, if anyone just happens to fancy having a look at those later on.” He and Karen shared a smile, then he took Anneliese’s hand and she took Alexander’s. “Okay, are we all ready? Yes? Right, come on: the Gauder Festival here we come!”



“I’m really looking forward to this,” Gretchen said happily to David as they drove from Briesau towards Zell am Ziller. “I always mean to go to things like this but somehow I usually end up not having the time one way or another.”

“I know what you mean! You’d be amazed at how many of the main sights of London I still haven’t seen after all the time I’ve been living there. When is it that we turn off?”

“Soon! Slow down a bit: we’ll end up missing it if you keep haring along like this. Now hang on: I’ll just have another look at Rudi’s directions.”

“How can I hang on in the middle of the road? And I’m not haring along at all: if I go any slower the car behind’s going to drive into our boot! We can’t be far from this turn off by now, surely?”

“I don’t think it can be much further … ah! Here it is, just coming up ahead. Oh good! Now, it’s a straight road from here for the next few miles, and it doesn’t look too difficult after that either. We should start seeing signposts for Zell am Ziller before long, anyway.”

“Jolly good! The sooner we’re there and parked, the sooner we can start concentrating on enjoying ourselves! We’ve got all day and we may as well make the most of it.”

He smiled at Gretchen and she smiled back at him. “That definitely sounds good to me!” she said.



“You are pleased about coming to the Gauder Festival, aren’t you?” Laurie asked Daisy anxiously as he drove their hired car towards Zell am Ziller, about quarter of an hour behind David and Gretchen. “I know that I shouldn’t have gone off to look at the Sonnalpe San last week and I’m sorry about it; and I’m really hoping that you’ll enjoy this. It’s something different, and everyone I’ve spoken to about it says that it’s always good fun. I know that things haven’t been wonderful lately, and I really wanted us to have a day out together somewhere special before going back to the Gornetz Platz.”

“I’m sure it’ll be very nice,” Daisy said automatically. Then she tried to force herself to sound a bit more enthusiastic: Laurie had been quite excited yesterday when he’d told her that he’d arranged a surprise for her for Sunday. “It sounds very good. I’ve always been interested in Tyrolean customs, and the parade definitely sounds worth seeing, and I’ll enjoy listening to the music and looking round the market as well. Thank you for thinking of it: I’m sure it’ll be a very enjoyable day.” She smiled at him. “Really. Thank you.”
#241:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 12:30 pm
    —
I hope Daisy enjoys the day.

Thanks Alison.
#242:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 12:53 pm
    —
Hmmm, she obviously hasn't spoken to him yet though, has she?

Thanks Alison
#243:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 2:33 pm
    —
Daisy, TALK TO HIM!!!

Thanks Alison!
#244:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 3:38 pm
    —
((daisy))
#245:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2007 10:40 pm
    —
For goodness sake Daisy talk to the man. He's obviously trying and at least he's apologised about going off to the San. Come on Daisy. Mind you it doesn't sound like Laurie has talked to Daisy about he's felt. I guess that's understandable as he feels like he's already stuffed up about looking around the San on their holidays and doesn't want to push Daisy into doing something else he wants and until she talks to him he's not going to know. By the way this is great Alison
#246:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 1:15 am
    —
Laurie is trying to make amends isn't he? Hopefully there will be a chance for them to talk.
#247:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 3:26 pm
    —
“I saw your cousin Daisy on the Sonnalpe earlier in the week,” Gretchen said to David as they drew close to Zell am Ziller.

“Oh right.” David looked at her with interest. He felt a little bit guilty about not seeing more of Daisy whilst they were both on holiday in Tyrol, but he hadn’t wanted to intrude on what was supposed to be her second honeymoon. “What did she have to say?”

“Oh – she said that she’d fancied having a nostalgic look round, whilst she was in the area. We were talking about old times – especially what little monsters you and Rix and John used to be!” Gretchen said lightly. She paused for a moment, wondering what to say next. She certainly wasn’t going to betray Daisy’s confidence by repeating what had been said about Daisy wanting to go back to work and not being happy on the Gornetz Platz; but she couldn’t help wondering how much Daisy’s views about women working were linked to her own childhood. Did she think that women should only work if they needed the money? And, although it was none of her business, she couldn’t help wondering, especially given Daisy’s comments about needing to have money to buy into a medical practice, just why Margot Venables didn’t seem to have inherited anything from her parents whereas Sir James seemed to have inherited so much.

“She was talking about when they first came to Tyrol and her mum worked at the Chalet School,” she said cautiously. “I’d almost forgotten about that, but then I was only a baby when they first arrived and only four when we all moved to Guernsey.”

“I could only have been about two myself when they first came to Tyrol,” David said. “I don’t really remember a time when they weren’t around. But yes, Auntie Margot was a nurse before she got married, and after she’d been at the Sonnalpe for a few months she went down to work at the School. Daisy’d started there as a pupil pretty much as soon as she’d arrived, but of course Primula was only the same age as me so she stayed in the nursery with all of us. It must have been hard for Auntie Margot being away from her, but being a Matron I suppose she had to be there overnight. Besides, it really wouldn’t have been practical to've been going up and down between the school building and the Sonnalpe every day: that’s why Mum wasn’t really involved on a day- to- day basis after she and Dad got married.”

“She’d have given up anyway, wouldn’t she?” Gretchen asked. “Wouldn’t your dad have insisted on it, even if she’d wanted to go into the school every day.”

David laughed. “You really do think that most husbands want their wives tied to the kitchen sink, Gretchen Monier, don’t you? What about your own mum? And Karen? And Auntie Joey, for that matter. And Sybil still does her needlework. Mum went back to teaching part-time once the school was up on the Sonnalpe, remember. And she’d probably have gone back to being Head full time temporarily that term that Hilda Annersley and Nell Wilson were off if Ailie hadn’t been on the way at the time. Sorry, I’ve got off the point now! Where was I?”
#248:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 3:50 pm
    —
thanks alison.

i think davd and gretchen might be arguing about this for a while

i hope they can help daisy though
#249:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 4:09 pm
    —
I'd forgotten that Margot Venables would have been separated from Primula while at work. Poor little thing, no wonder she was such a quiet little creature. What a lot of changes she went through so young.
#250:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 5:08 pm
    —
Interested to hear what Gretchen has to say in return - most of the examples David has mentioned worked because they needed the money - and Joey had the money and servants to allow her to write. Point about Madge is a good one - would she have taken over as Head had she not been expecting Allie????


Thanks Alison.
#251:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 7:36 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
David laughed. “You really do think that most husbands want their wives tied to the kitchen sink, Gretchen Monier, don’t you? What about your own mum? And Karen? And Auntie Joey, for that matter. And Sybil still does her needlework. Mum went back to teaching part-time once the school was up on the Sonnalpe, remember. And she’d probably have gone back to being Head full time temporarily that term that Hilda Annersley and Nell Wilson were off if Ailie hadn’t been on the way at the time.


Yes David, you convince her!

(I know, they're just friends...a girl can dream, right? Laughing )
#252:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 8:42 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I've just read this from the start of the drabble and I'm sorry I haven't started reading this before now. I'm really enjoying it so far. I hope that Daisy and Laurie will be honest with each other.
#253:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 7:35 am
    —
Lesley wrote:
Point about Madge is a good one - would she have taken over as Head had she not been expecting Allie????


Isn't that the reason she gives as to why she can't take over? I thought otherwise she would have

Fatima wrote:
I'd forgotten that Margot Venables would have been separated from Primula while at work. Poor little thing, no wonder she was such a quiet little creature. What a lot of changes she went through so young.


That was the main reason I was so annoyed that Jem didn't financially support his sister. I know in this day and age nobody would expect it however, reading any other book set around that time (ie L M Montgomery) all single women and widowers are financially cared for by their families. The ones that aren't are the ones that don't have anyone that can take on that role. And if Margot was insisting on working couldn't she have been the Matron for the annexe and been a lot closer. If I was Jem I would have really empasized that Primula had gone through so much and needed her. The other thing to in that day and age where it was more expected for brothers to financially care for their widowed sisters I wonder what everyone else thought about Jem for allowing his sister to work especially as he was a doctor and seen as being quite wealthy.

Anyway I digress. Thanks Allison. It's a great drabble
#254:  Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 10:16 am
    —
Fiona Mc wrote:
Lesley wrote:
Point about Madge is a good one - would she have taken over as Head had she not been expecting Allie????


Isn't that the reason she gives as to why she can't take over? I thought otherwise she would have

In Gay Madge does say the family’s ‘having an extension’ when she’s talking to Joey, thus Jem wouldn’t hear of her being head. So it does rather sound as though she would have been Head otherwise. Of course, EBD needed a reason why Madge couldn’t take over so that Miss Bubb could be introduced. Interesting that she feels the need for there to be a reason Madge can’t take over; it suggests that she felt that was the obvious thing to happen. Of course, it would only have been temporary in the way that Joey works there that term, Simone too; and they both have their babies there.

One of things I like about the Chalet School is the way they all help each other out. e.g. Joey teaching that Term when Miss Bubb is head, and also in Jo Returns when it is seen as her duty. There’s a similar situation with Stacie in Challenge where she owes the school so much. But on the other hand, if a staff member has a crisis, there is no question that they go off and be with their family when they are needed. I’m sure there’s an axample of this in one of the early books when one of the mistresses is off until half term as her brother(?) and family need her. Of course this places obligations on people but that;’s life. They do seem to be there for one another.

Fatima wrote:
I'd forgotten that Margot Venables would have been separated from Primula while at work. Poor little thing, no wonder she was such a quiet little creature. What a lot of changes she went through so young.

Hmm, but now I'm feeling that was wrong. After all, Joey considers Stephen her 'proper' job in Gay when he is crying and Miss Bubb won’t let her go to him. So why wasn’t Primula Margot’s?
#255:  Author: JayB, Location: SE England PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 10:17 am
    —
Quote:
Isn't that the reason she gives as to why she can't take over? I thought otherwise she would have

Yes. Then when Miss Bubb proves to be a disaster, Josette's accident keeps Madge out of things.
Quote:
That was the main reason I was so annoyed that Jem didn't financially support his sister. I know in this day and age nobody would expect it however, reading any other book set around that time....all single women and widowers are financially cared for by their families.

Jem's supporting Joey, who is more capable of earning a living than Margot (young, fit, no dependents) and isn't even a blood relation.

Since it was really, presumably, the Russell parents' money, I think even today one would expect someone in Jem's circumstances to settle a sum of money on Margot and the girls, to enable them to live independently.
#256:  Author: Kat, Location: Kingston-upon-Thames/Swansea PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:22 pm
    —
Thank you Alison!

Just read this through from the beginning, and really want to whack Laurie and Daisy's heads together!

Here's hoping...
#257:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 5:27 pm
    —
Thanks for the comments. I find it very weird that Margot went to work at the CS whereas Joey's career plans - until she later became an author - were to sit on her backside at Die Rosen and just "help" with the kids (even though Madge and Jem employed Rosa to look after the kids) Rolling Eyes !


“Right, to get back to Auntie Margot, I don’t suppose she was very happy about being separated from Primula; but from what I know she worked because she needed the money, not to put too fine a point on it. Didn’t want to be dependent on Dad. I’m pretty sure that Stephen Venables didn’t leave her and Daisy and Primula a penny - from what I gather, he spent most of what they ever had on drink.”

“Poor Frau Venables,” Gretchen said sadly. “She must have had a terrible time with him.”

David nodded. “She had a bad time with him all right. And she had no-one in Australia, apart from a friend who’d been Daisy’s nurse; and she was so far from home and her own family. My grandparents never even spoke to her after her marriage, you know. They even cut her out of their wills: everything they had went to Dad – I know that much. They were dead set against Stephen Venables. Of course, they were right not to approve of him, as it turned out, but to have cut their own child – and future grandchildren – off like that … well, it was just horrendous. But I suppose that’s how some families do deal with children who won’t do as their parents want.”

“Oh David, your parents aren’t going to disown you because you don’t want to work at the San!” Gretchen exclaimed. What he’d said about all the Russell money going to his father, and Frau Venables not receiving any of it, had been pushed to the back of her mind by his last remark. “Don’t think like that! That was years ago. Anyway, your dad didn’t cut his sister off, did he? And he looked after Daisy and Primula after she’d passed away.”

“I suppose he must have kept up some sort of contact with her, at least before her husband died and she moved,” David said. “Apparently when Sybs was born he said that they couldn’t call her Daisy because there was already a Daisy in the family, and Auntie Margot knew to come to Tyrol when she was looking for him so she obviously knew that he’d moved out there.”

He sighed. “I do think he feels guilty about Auntie Margot, though. I vaguely remember him saying once, or maybe he was speaking to Mum and I overheard, that he should have made sure that she got some of their parents’ money, or at least things like jewellery which would normally have gone to a daughter rather than a son. And I know he feels that if he hadn’t expected Auntie Margot to take Sybs and me, and the Bettanys, as well as Daisy and Primula, on that awful journey across Europe with only one other adult then she wouldn’t have been so exhausted when she got to Guernsey and maybe her health wouldn’t have gone downhill so quickly. Anyway, it’s all a long time ago now. Oh look, this must be Zell am Ziller now. Made it!”

Gretchen sensed that for the time being he didn’t want to talk any longer either about his aunt or about how he felt his parents might react to his career plans, and half-wished that she’d never mentioned Daisy’s mother at all. Still, David was smiling now, the sun was out, and hopefully they had a lovely day ahead of them. Oh - and was that parking spot free?

“Is that a free parking spot there? Yes, it is! Quick, David!”

“I know: I’ve seen it!” He parked the car, and then opened the door and jumped out. “Come on, slowcoach! I’ve been looking forward to this all week and I can’t wait to get there!

“Me neither,” Gretchen said. “Come on: let’s go!”
#258:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 5:41 pm
    —
It is interesting that David has picked up on these family issues. And of course, it must have been an horrendous journey across Europe with all those children for Margot.
#259:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 5:46 pm
    —
Thank you! I am loving this drabble.
#260:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 6:12 pm
    —
Yes, interesting that they knew so much about one another even though Margot's family had cut her off! Thanks Alison.
#261:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 6:27 pm
    —
Thanks Alison.
#262:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 7:52 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It was interesting to see it from David's point of view.
#263:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 8:59 pm
    —
And in some ways, David is speaking as an outsider looking in.

I think the thing about Primula being separated from Margot when she was a matron is that Primula was supposed to be settled into the nursery at Die Rosen and was getting superior care there from her aunt. In those days, there was no acknowledgement of separation anxiety, and it was often seen as ingratitude on the part of the child.
#264:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 11:29 pm
    —
Interesting reminders of Daisy's background there.

I think David's being a little bit naive thinking that it's straightforward to ignore cultural presuppositions and just do what you want, but he does point out Gretchen's inconsistencies very neatly!

Hope they enjoy the day.
#265:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 4:36 pm
    —
thanks alison
#266:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:02 pm
    —
A lot of the people who’d attended the open air Mass had gone to look for a drink and something to eat between the end of the service and the start of the parade, so the fairground was fairly quiet at that point. There were no long queues for any of the rides or stalls, and everyone was thoroughly enjoying themselves.

“David Russell, I cannot believe that I let you talk me into going on a merry-go-round!” Gretchen laughed. “I haven’t been on one of those since I don’t know when. In fact, I haven’t been to a fairground since I don’t know when! I vaguely remember taking Josefa and Andy to one near Armiford once, but I dread to think how long ago that was! Oh, this is fun! Oh look, there are Auntie Karen and Rudi and the kids.”

She waved at them frantically and went rushing over to speak to them, with a grinning David following on behind. He wasn’t sure what his fellow doctors at the hospital in London would have had to say if they’d seen him on a merry-go-round, but he quite honestly didn’t care!

“Gruss Gott!” Karen greeted them both. “Are you having fun?”

“Gruss Gott everyone. We certainly are!” Gretchen said. “Ooh, what have you two got there?”

“Daddy won them for us,” Alexander said happily, as he and his twin sister proudly held up matching teddy bears. “On one of those stalls where you have to throw things and knock things over.”

“I somehow managed to win one by an absolute fluke, and then of course I had to keep going until I’d won another one. It cost me a fortune!” Rudi said ruefully.

“You were thoroughly enjoying yourself!” Karen said, laughing. “And we’ve all just been on the dodgems. Anneliese and I were in one car, and we kept hitting the car that Daddy and Alexander were in, didn’t we darling? I think it’s time we got over to where the parade’s going to be now, though: we want to be near the front or this pair aren’t going to be able to see anything and that’ll be no good. It’s ten past eleven now, and it starts at half past.”

“Oh, we’ve got a couple of minutes yet,” Rudi said. “Now – is ten past eleven too early for ice cream?” He winked at the twins, who both immediately started insisting that it wasn’t; and Karen smiled and said that she supposed that ice cream at this time in the morning would be all right for once. They all walked over to a nearby ice cream stall where he bought six ice cream cones, waving away David’s offer to split the cost with him – “My treat!”- and then all six of them made their way over to where the parade was going to take place, eating their ice creams and chatting merrily.
#267:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:05 pm
    —
It's great to see Karen so happy, and with such a lovely family.
#268:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:06 pm
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thanks alison! they all look so happy there
#269:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:13 pm
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All sounds like a lot of fun!
#270:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:22 pm
    —
Ahhhhh...

What a lovely day. Thanks Alison!
#271:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:30 pm
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What a lovely day out for them. Nice to see them all so happy.
#272:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 6:21 pm
    —
Awww, that's lovely.

Thanks Alison
#273:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 10:06 pm
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They are having fun, and it's so good to see.
#274:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 10:13 pm
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Thanks, Alison. It's lovely to see them all so happy together.
#275:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:25 am
    —
Lovely. Thanks, Alison.
#276:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:09 pm
    —
The parade was on a far bigger scale that David had been expecting, and he heard Rudi telling the children that this was the biggest folklore parade anywhere in Austria. He’d never seen anything like this before – he couldn’t remember ever even being taken to see a carnival when he’d been young – and, slightly to his own surprise, found it absolutely fascinating. One beautifully decorated float followed another, all carrying bands and folklore groups each dressed in the traditional costumes of their own parts of Tyrol. He really must try to read up on Tyrolean history and customs, he told himself: maybe his parents had some books on the subject somewhere.

He smiled at the twins, who were absolutely captivated by it all, gazing at the floats with big smiles on their intent little faces. Then he grinned as he heard Gretchen, Karen and Rudi all cheer loudly as a float went past carrying two groups dressed in the traditional dress of the Tiernthal. He remembered people wearing clothes like that in Briesau when he’d been a little boy. They didn’t so much these days.

“My wedding dress was quite like the dress that that girl’s wearing,” Karen said reminiscently. “Not so many brides choose traditional dresses now, though: the British and American-style big white dresses are becoming more popular all the time. The bride at the last wedding reception we had at the hotel said that she wanted to look like Grace Kelly did when she married Prince Rainier! It was a very pretty dress that she had on, but it’s a shame that the old ways aren’t so popular any more. Oh well: times change, I suppose!”

“What sort of dress will you wear when you get married, Gretchen?” Anneliese, who’d been very taken with the dresses that the little bridesmaids had worn at the wedding Karen had just referred to, asked, tugging at Gretchen’s hand. “Will you have a white one or will you have one like the dress that girl on the float’s wearing?”

Gretchen’s response to questions like that was always so predictable that David was sorely tempted to tease her by chanting “I’m never going to get married!” along with her, and was quite taken aback when the words didn’t come. So were Karen and Rudi, he could see. Instead of giving her usual reply, Gretchen just smiled and said “I’ll let you know when and if it ever happens! I do rather like the white ones, but I like the traditional Tyrolean dresses too. Mum used to say sometimes that it’d be nice if I wore her wedding dress – she’s still got it, and I don’t think she ever wore it again – but I’m quite a bit taller than her so it probably wouldn’t fit me. Anyway, it might be a bit weird wearing a dress that was older than I was!”

“Your mum’s wedding dress must be the same age as me, seeing as I was born on your parents’ wedding day!” David laughed.

Gretchen smiled at him. “So you were! Oh, it’s lovely seeing all these different outfits and hearing the lovely music! I hope you’re not bored by all this Tyrolean stuff, though.”

“Not at all: I think it’s wonderful!” He meant every word of it: he thoroughly enjoyed the entire parade, and was very sorry when it came to an end.
#277:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:29 pm
    —
Hmmm, slight softening of the attitude there, Gretchen? Laughing


Thanks Alison
#278:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:29 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I had forgotten that David was born on Andreas and Marie's wedding day.
#279:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:34 pm
    —
thanks alison
#280:  Author: Sandra, Location: Oxfordshire PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:45 pm
    —
I really do think that they would make a great couple.
#281:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 6:11 pm
    —
I also think they'd make a lovely couple! They are such good friends and seem to have a lot of time for each other.
#282:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:30 pm
    —
I like to think that you might be worn down by this constant appreciation of David and Gretchen as a couple, Alison! Very Happy

This is lovely, thank you.
#283:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 1:57 am
    —
Sounds like a wonderful outing!
And yes, Gretchen does seem to be mellowing on the marriage front.... Smile
#284:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:30 pm
    —
Yes, I'm in favour of David and Grechen getting together, too. It's nice to see Grechen beginning to change her views about marriage.
#285:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 5:28 pm
    —
Thanks for the comments Very Happy .

Sorry though David was that the parade was over, it was getting towards one o’clock by then and he was starving. “I don’t know about anyone else, but personally I think the next stop should be somewhere where they sell food!” he said. “I’m more than ready for something to eat.”

“I am myself,” Gretchen confessed. “Shall we head over towards some of the food places?”

“We’ve brought a picnic with us: the hamper’s in the car. We’re going to go and get it now, and then sit and eat it in the Festival Square where there’s a Zillerthal band playing,” Karen said. “You’re both very welcome to join us if you’d like to.”

“Oh no – it’s lovely of you to offer, but we can’t pinch your dinner!” Gretchen exclaimed. “We’ll probably bump into you round and about later on, though. What are you planning on doing after you’ve eaten?”

“We thought that it’d be nice to go and look round the Gauder Market – and you never know, we might even buy the odd toy or two there! - and maybe watch a bit of this athletics competition as well. Plus there’s some sort of show on in the Brewery Gardens: we’ll probably have a look at that too. And we’ll go back to the fairground at some point later, once everyone’s dinner’s had plenty of chance to go down! Most things are on till six o’clock, so we’re planning on staying till the end or nearly the end unless Anneliese and Alexander are getting tired by then.”

“We won’t get tired!” Anneliese said indignantly. “We’re not babies.”

“Of course you’re not!” Gretchen said reassuringly. “Anyway, we’ll see you around somewhere later on, I’m sure. Have a nice picnic!”

“We will!” Rudi said. “See you later.”

The Brauns headed back to their car to retrieve the very substantial picnic that Karen had packed, whilst David and Gretchen walked over towards the Zillerthal Beer Marquee, where refreshments were being served to the parade’s participants, to choose from the food on offer at the various stalls around it.

“I normally just have a cheese sandwich at this time of day when I’m working!” David said. “Right, what do you fancy? That soup looks nice, but not in this weather!”

“It’s Kartoffelsuppe,” Gretchen told him. “I do like potato soup, but it really is too hot for anything like that today! What else is there? They’re selling schlutzkrapfen there – you know, the meat and potato in dough that Mum makes sometimes – or there are sausages with onions. And there are all sorts of pancakes and doughnuts and fritters if you’d like something sweet. Or there probably are cheese sandwiches somewhere, but that’d be boring!”

Eventually they both decided on schlutzkrapfen, and – “We really don’t need them, but they look so nice!” Gretchen said – doughnuts, and sat down to enjoy them whilst they sat in the sun and listened to a colourfully-dressed band playing lively Tyrolean music.
#286:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 6:33 pm
    —
lovely

but am i the only one worrying that this is all going too well??

Confused
#287:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 6:49 pm
    —
Am I the only one that is feeling hungry?


Thanks Alison
#288:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 7:17 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It was nice to hear about the food.
#289:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 7:34 pm
    —
This is fabulous. Thanks
#290:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:55 pm
    —
Lesley wrote:
Am I the only one that is feeling hungry?
No, Lesley, you're not!

It certainly is all going well, it all sounds lovely.
#291:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 3:50 am
    —
Do you think Karen packed the traditional little pies and hard boiled eggs and crisp salad that she always made for the Chalet girls?!
#292:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 1:06 pm
    —
After they’d finished eating, David and Gretchen watched some of the athletics, then walked over to the Gauder Market in the Bandstand Square. Some of the stalls there were also selling food: David nearly bought some delicious-looking locally produced cheese but Gretchen pointed out that he’d either have to carry it about or leave it in the car all afternoon and that neither of them would be very good options in this hot weather. They both bought some chocolate instead, but then decided that it’d probably have melted by the time they got back to the car and ended up eating it there and then.

“You’ve got chocolate round your mouth,” Gretchen said, giggling and reaching into her pocket for a handkerchief. “Come here! There, it’s gone now. Oh, I do love all this needlework and knitwear: I wish I wasn’t so useless at sewing and knitting! And I think one of those green hats would really suit you: come on, try one on!”

“No way! I know that they’re traditional Tyrolean wear but they’d look silly on me!” David said, laughing. “So would the matching jackets, although the blue ones are better. Shall we go and have a look at the toys? I’d like to find something to send to Australia.”

They bumped into the Brauns by one of the toy stalls: Rudi and Karen were just buying a doll in traditional Tyrolean dress for Anneliese and a wooden jigsaw for Alexander, and David chose a teddy wearing a Tyrolean hat for Sybil’s baby. Afterwards, they all walked round the stalls selling glassware, crockery from Tiernkirche, hand-painted porcelain and more needlecraft items: David bought a hand-embroidered tablecloth as a present for his parents, and Karen and Rudi bought themselves a similar one and an embroidered collar as a present for Anna Pfeifen.

“We’re off to watch the athletics for a bit now,” Rudi said when they’d all paid for their purchases.

“Oh, we’ve already done that!” Gretchen said. “Hopefully we’ll see you again later, though. If not, enjoy the rest of the afternoon!”

“You too!” Karen said. “And, in case we don’t see you, have a safe trip back to England,” she added, smiling at David.

“Thanks!” he said. Gretchen hugged both the twins, then, once the Brauns had gone, she turned back to David. “Right, what shall we do next? Do you fancy going to watch another of the bands, or shall we go back to the fairground?”

“Whichever you prefer,” David said, smiling. “This is great. I haven’t been to anything like this since … well, I can’t remember ever going anywhere like this before. Mum and Dad never took us to anywhere like this when we were kids, and your Auntie Rosa used to take us to the swings in the park but it would’ve been impossible for her to’ve lugged the whole lot of us round somewhere like this. Although of course the War put a stop to a lot of things when I wasn’t much older than Anneliese and Alexander. And since being in London and working at the hospital … well, I’m trying not to think about all that whilst I’m on holiday. And thank you so much for coming with me: I wouldn’t have enjoyed it nearly as much if I’d come here on my own.”

“Me neither,” Gretchen said. “Right, come on you – let’s go and see if we can win anything at the fair! First one to win a prize gets to buy the next lot of ice creams!”
#293:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 4:56 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm glad that they are really enjoying themselves.
#294:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 5:30 pm
    —
they both seem so happy here
#295:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 5:59 pm
    —
Pleased they're having a good time - wonder about Daisy and Lawrie?

Thanks Alison
#296:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 9:10 pm
    —
Oh, aren't they having fun! Very Happy

Thanks, Alison.
#297:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 10:11 pm
    —
Lovely.

I don't want David to go home!

Thanks Alison!
#298:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2007 10:57 pm
    —
That's delightful; thank you Alison.
#299:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 12:12 am
    —
Lovely, Alison - as I seem to keep saying! Thank you.
#300:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 1:29 am
    —
Thanks Alison, this is great
#301:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 3:14 am
    —
It's great to see them having fun!
#302:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 1:02 pm
    —
By quarter past five, both Anneliese and Alexander, although they wouldn’t admit it, were tiring; and they didn’t protest when Karen and Rudi said that it was time to leave the fairground. The four of them walked over to the Brewery Gardens, and found somewhere to sit where they had a good view of the musicians and the folk dancers. Rudi went to get some drinks, and had just returned with coffees for himself and Karen and lemonades for the children when they caught sight of David and Gretchen, who spotted them at the same time and walked over to say that they’d had a wonderful day but had decided to head off now.

“I’ve got to get myself organised for work tomorrow - and David doesn’t want to be late getting back to the Schloss Wertheim because he’s got to get himself spruced up ready for the Count and Countess’s mysterious guests,” Gretchen said mischievously.

David pulled a face at her. “Auntie Marie said that she’d got some people coming for dinner tonight, but when I asked who they were she said that they wanted to surprise me,” he explained to the Brauns. “You’d think I was still about ten!”

“I reckon she’s got some old school pal of Josefa’s lined up for you,” Gretchen teased him. “It’s probably Mary-Lou Trelawney and she didn’t want to tell you in advance in case you did a runner!”

“Very funny,” David retorted sarcastically. “It’s more likely to be some old school pals of hers and Auntie Joey’s, who’ll spend all evening harping on about Auntie Joey jumping into the lake and Auntie Grizel climbing the Tiernjoch and telling me that they remember Mum bringing me into the School when I was a baby! Oh well, who it is it is!” He smiled at Karen and Rudi. “Before we go, I really want to thank you both for recommending coming to the Festival and giving me directions. I have to confess that I’d never heard of it until you mentioned it; and I wouldn’t have missed it for anything - it’s been an absolutely lovely day.”

Gretchen echoed his last comment, and when everyone had said their goodbyes the two of them went back to the car and set off back towards the Tiernsee.

“I’m glad they seem to have enjoyed it as much as we have,” Karen commented after they’d left. “It has been a lovely day, hasn’t it?” The twins both nodded enthusiastically, and Rudi smiled at both of them. “We’ll try to arrange another day out somewhere soon,” he promised.

When they’d both finished their coffees, he put his arm round Karen. “I’m so glad you’ve enjoyed yourself, my love,” he said quietly. “You really deserved a good day out: you work hard.”

“We both do,” Karen said. “But it’s worth it.” She slipped her hand into his, and leaned against his shoulder for a moment as the band began playing a slower tune. “The music’s on until eighteen o’clock so we might as well wait till then before we go, mightn’t we?”

Rudi nodded. “Don’t see why not. Anneliese and Alexander’re both fine now that we’re sitting down.” The two children were both happily sipping their lemonade and tapping their little feet in time with the music. “It shouldn’t take us too long to get back, and … Good Lord, what on earth was that noise?”
#303:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 1:16 pm
    —
Nice cliff-hanger! What was the noise please?

I am really enjoying this!
#304:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 2:16 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
“Very funny,” David retorted sarcastically. “It’s more likely to be some old school pals of hers and Auntie Joey’s, who’ll spend all evening harping on about Auntie Joey jumping into the lake and Auntie Grizel climbing the Tiernjoch and telling me that they remember Mum bringing me into the School when I was a baby!


...and you know they would, too!

Alison H wrote:
Good Lord, what on earth was that noise?”


Ooh, mysterious! Thanks Alison, more soon please!
#305:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 2:24 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I wonder what the noise is and whom the mystery guests are.
#306:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 2:28 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. how much longr do we have to wait before David and Gretchen realise that they're meant for each other?
#307:  Author: Lexi, Location: Liverpool PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 2:39 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
“I reckon she’s got some old school pal of Josefa’s lined up for you,” Gretchen teased him. “It’s probably Mary-Lou Trelawney and she didn’t want to tell you in advance in case you did a runner!”


Laughing
#308:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 3:24 pm
    —
I hope for David's sake it isn't OOAO! I'm rather concerned about the noise, though.
#309:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 5:30 pm
    —
whats the noise?

whats the noise?

alison, dont scare us like this!!
#310:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 7:13 pm
    —
Ooooh a cliff! Laughing


Thanks Alison
#311:  Author: Rose in Toronto, Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 8:00 pm
    —
Ever since they got to the fair i've been worried. Has anyone else read Madeleine L'Engle's "The Severed Wasp"?
#312:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 9:03 pm
    —
Yes, and it's a wonderful book, but -- not that part! Thank goodness no one we know is on the rides right now. At least, I don't think so. *wibbles*

*more worried about autos*
#313:  Author: Alice, Location: London, England PostPosted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 10:53 pm
    —
What a lovely day.

Jennie wrote:
Thanks, Alison. how much longr do we have to wait before David and Gretchen realise that they're meant for each other?


Just what I'm thinking. But the suspense is exciting.
#314:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 12:29 am
    —
Loved David's assessment of the evening's probable conversation - and his tolerant acceptance of it.

What was the noise?
#315:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 1:39 am
    —
Alison how could you leave us hanging. that's two cliffs and thats not fair
#316:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 10:04 am
    —
Like the Brauns, Daisy and Laurie intended to stay at the Festival until it ended. Unlike the Brauns, their day didn’t get off to a particularly good start. Daisy, having decided that she needed to speak to Laurie about everything that was troubling her, was so busy trying to think of the best way to bring the subject up that she misread the directions given to them by the Kron Prinz Karl’s receptionist, and they ended up taking a wrong turn and getting lost in the Tyrolean countryside.

Eventually they found someone who was able to direct them back to the right road – Laurie didn’t understood a word the man said, but luckily Daisy was able to follow his instructions - but by the time they reached Zell am Ziller and found somewhere to park it was almost time for the start of the parade, and the music from the bands and the chatter and cheering of the crowd made it impossible for Daisy to embark on a serious conversation. Finally, she decided to concentrate on trying to enjoy the day and to speak to Laurie another time, but she was aware that they’d be back in Switzerland within a few days and she really wanted to try to resolve matters whilst they were on their own and away from the Gornetz Platz.

Despite everything, they both found that they were rather enjoying themselves. Laurie knew very little about Tyrol and was intrigued by the local costumes, the local music and the local produce, whilst Daisy, who had so many happy memories of childhood days at the Tiernsee, thoroughly enjoyed being immersed in Tyrolean culture and explained as much of it as she knew to her husband. He was delighted that she was so obviously having a good time, and she was pleased to find him so interested in everything they were seeing and everything she was saying.

After the parade, they had something to eat and then walked round the Gauder Market for a while. Daisy saw a hand-made necklace which she was very taken with but reluctantly decided was too expensive, but Laurie insisted on buying it anyway - “Call it an early anniversary present!” They also bought presents for each of their three children, and some of Joey’s favourite Tiernkirche pottery as a present for the Maynards to thank them for looking after the children for the fortnight.

They went to put all the presents safely in the car, and then watched the end of the athletics competition, Daisy reminiscing about her days as Chalet School Games Prefect and seeming more relaxed than Laurie had seen her for a long time. Once that was over, they went to listen to the band in the Festival Square.

“D’you fancy going to the fairground?” Laurie asked after they’d been sitting there for a while. “It’ll be closing at six o’clock and it’s already gone five, and it seems a shame not to see it whilst we’re here. Even if we are a bit old for that sort of thing … well, without having Tony and Peter and Mary with us, anyway. It’s strange being away from them, isn’t it?”

“We’d better both get used to it, because come September we’re going to be away from Tony about three-quarters of the year, and come a year September it’ll be the same with Peter,” Daisy reminded him sharply. Then she touched his arm apologetically. “Oh Laurie, I’m sorry: I didn’t mean to snap at you; and I know we’ve been through all that already. Look, come on: let’s go over to the fairground like you suggested. There’s no law that says that supposed grown-ups like us can’t go on the rides, after all!”

They stood up and started walking, and Laurie took her hand diffidently. “It’s going to be hard for me too when Tony and Peter go away, you know. I know that I keep saying that plenty of boys go away at seven to boarding schools in Britain when their parents live in other countries, but I’m just trying to make both of us feel better about it. It’s going to be very worrying for both of us – and the house is going to feel very empty without them.”

“They’re so young,” Daisy said sadly. “And I’m going to be worrying about them both all the time, even though I know that they’ll be taken good care of at school. And … and … well, once Mary starts kindergarten I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself all day.”

“Is that what’s been bothering you?” Laurie asked quietly. “I know something hasn’t been right for a while, and although I know you're worried about Tony I know that there's something else too. I hoped that maybe this holiday’d help - but it hasn’t, has it?”

Daisy shook her head unhappily. “It’s been a nice holiday, it really has, but spending a couple of weeks away from the Gornetz Platz doesn’t change anything. Oh Laurie, I’ve … oh dear Lord, what was that noise?”
#317:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 10:12 am
    —
Naughty Alison! Laughing Laughing Laughing Laughing


Very pleased they have at least started talking.

Thank you
#318:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 1:03 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm glad that Daisy and Laurie have started to talk but you have forgotten to tell us what the noise is twice!
#319:  Author: MaryR, Location: Cheshire PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 1:46 pm
    —
Not only is Daisy talking but Laurie is listening.

That was a lovely description of their day, Alison. Thank you.
#320:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 2:21 pm
    —
I'm loving this story, Alison, it's ace.
#321:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 2:27 pm
    —
So what was that noise. It must be OOAO, she's the only person who can make enough noise for a riot all by herself.
#322:  Author: Rose in Toronto, Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 2:27 pm
    —
Quote:
"Oh Laurie, I’ve … oh dear Lord, what was that noise?”



Now, Alison, you just stop that. Wink "It's cruelty to dumb animals, that's what it is."

(Identify the quotation, for extra marks.)
#323:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 2:57 pm
    —
Definitely mean, Alison! I hope you'll put us out of our misery soon.

And I am glad that Daisy has started to try to talk to Laurie.
#324:  Author: Pat, Location: Doncaster PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 4:03 pm
    —
Lesley wrote:
Naughty Alison! Laughing Laughing Laughing Laughing


I do love examples of the pot calling the kettle black!!!! Twisted Evil Rolling Eyes Rolling Eyes
#325:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 4:19 pm
    —
Hey I can appreciate work done by others. Wink
#326:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 4:42 pm
    —
NORTY Alison! Wink
#327:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 5:46 pm
    —
What was the noise?????
#328:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 8:22 pm
    —
Another cliffy! ARG!!!!
#329:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 9:56 pm
    —
They are starting to share how they feel - hopefully, when they've identified the noise, they'll be able to continue.
Hmm, I have an idea about that noise....
#330:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 18, 2007 9:58 pm
    —
Cath V-P wrote:
They are starting to share how they feel - hopefully, when they've identified the noise, they'll be able to continue.
Hmm, I have an idea about that noise....


Do share please!
#331:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 3:43 pm
    —
I can't imagine that anyone from Zell am Ziller is going to accuse me of doing down their Festival's reputation, but even so I'd better just point out that this is entirely fictitious!

“Sounds like it’s coming from the fairground,” Laurie said. He shook his head, his face shadowed with distress. “I can hear kids screaming. There must have been some sort of accident: I just hope to God that it’s nothing too serious. I’ve got to get over there and see what I can do to help, Daisy: it sounds as if there are people hurt. If we can’t find each other later I’ll see you by the car. Let’s just pray that whatever’s happened isn’t as bad as it sounded.”

“I’m coming as well,” Daisy shouted after him; but he didn’t hear her. He’d already started running, trying to make his way over to the fairground, and after a second or two she did the same; but it was easier said than done. Everybody else seemed to be heading in the same direction: people from all parts of the Festival site all seemed to be trying to get over towards the fairground, making it difficult for anybody to move quickly, and everybody seemed to be talking and shouting at once.

Laurie’s knowledge of Low German wasn’t good enough for him to be able to understand most of what was being said, but Daisy heard several different versions of events and had no idea which one to believe: all sorts of rumours seemed to be spreading as to what had caused the loud crashing noise a few moments earlier. It was only when they’d finally managed to make their way to within sight of the fairground itself that they realised what had actually happened. An enormous swing, shaped like a boat and designed to swing high up into the air first on one side and then to the other, had come loose from its hinges and fallen to the ground. With it being late in the day it hadn’t been carrying anything like its full quota of passengers, but even so there’d been over thirty children inside it.

“Oh hell,” Laurie muttered. “Let me through, please: I’m a doctor,” he called, before belatedly realising that he’d spoken in English. He tried again in his best German. “Excuse me, please: I’m a doctor. Could I get past you? Please will you let me through?” People tried to let him pass once they’d realised what he was saying, but given his limited knowledge of German, the volume of noise and the general air of panic he found it difficult to make himself understood and it was some time before he was able to get anywhere near the accident scene.

Meanwhile, Daisy was also slipping her way through the crowds. “I’m a doctor. Please will you let me through? I’m a doctor: there are people who need medical assistance. May I get past you? Thank you.” People seemed more willing to move aside for her than they did for Laurie, she realised. Joey was always going on about how courteous the Tyroleans were towards women, she remembered later! Or maybe it was just that they found it easier to understand what she was saying. Whatever the reason, by the time her husband reached the injured children she was already kneeling by the side of one of them. She was talking to two women who seemed to be some sort of medical staff in such rapid Tyrolean German that Laurie was unable to follow any of it, but, seeing him approach, she looked up at him.

“It’s not as bad as it looks, mercifully” she said concisely. “Mostly walking wounded. A First Aid team’s on its way over – ah, this looks like them now. A lot of cuts and bruises, but nothing too serious in the main. Looks like we’ve got a broken arm here, though - I could do with something to use as a sling until we can get her to hospital - and the little lad with the two nurses there’s taken a nasty bang to his face but thankfully I don’t think he’s done too much damage. Could you have a look at that little girl over there, the one in the pink dress? She’s done something to her leg.”

She switched back into German. “ Has anyone got a headscarf or anything that I could use as a sling for this little girl? I’m afraid it looks as if she’s broken her arm. Thank you so much, meine Frau. No, it’s all right: I’m sure she’s going to be fine. We need to get her to hospital, but in the meantime I’m going to bind up her arm and try to get her more comfortable. It’s all right: I’m a doctor. Now, hold still for me, darling. What’s your name? Gretel – that’s a pretty name. All right, Gretel: I’m just going to put this on your arm, like this … there, now that wasn’t too bad, was it? It’s all right, Gretel. I know your arm hurts, but it’ll get better. You’ll have to have a big plaster on it for a while, but you’re going to be fine.”
#332:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 3:56 pm
    —
Awful though that was, it's definitely done Daisy a lot of good to be able to do the job she loves. I hope this gives her the confidence to return to work.

Thanks for finally putting us out of our misery, Alison!
#333:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 4:00 pm
    —
Aww how lovely of Daisy! I can't believe Laurie didn't think his wife would be any help!
#334:  Author: Karry, Location: Stoke on Trent PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 4:00 pm
    —
Yay for Daisy! Hopefully this will make Laurie see that Daisy has more than sufficient skills to go back to doctoring!
#335:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 4:33 pm
    —
Smacks Laurie with a dead!fish.
Shame on you for forgetting your wifeiis a doctor!
#336:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 4:47 pm
    —
hopefully this will help laurie to realise what Daisy needs
#337:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 5:22 pm
    —
Laurie should be ashamed. I hope this makes him realise that Daisy is not just his wife; she's also a very good doctor!
#338:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 6:39 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It's good that they were able to help and that nobody was killed.
#339:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 7:04 pm
    —
He will see that she is so thriving on what she has done that he will realise that she needs to go back to doctoring
#340:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 7:24 pm
    —
Laurie needs a big kick - how could he forget? And so pleased Dasiy has had the opportunity to show that her skills are just as valid.


Thanks Alison.
#341:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 8:31 pm
    —
Daisie's skills aren't as valid as Laurie's, they're infinitely better. she can communicate wth the children in their own language, and she's a paediatrician so she knows how to approach the children.

Hands out poking sticks for anyone who wants one to poke Laurie.
#342:  Author: Pat, Location: Doncaster PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 9:19 pm
    —
I think that it's because it's so long since Daisy worked that it slipped Laurie's mind. He's not used to seeing her as a doctor anymore - she's been a housewife for too long.
#343:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Mon Feb 19, 2007 9:36 pm
    —
Pat wrote:
I think that it's because it's so long since Daisy worked that it slipped Laurie's mind. He's not used to seeing her as a doctor anymore - she's been a housewife for too long.


My thoughts exactly. My sister hasn't worked outside the home for nine years and so I don't automatically think of her as what she used to do and before people start saying but you don't live with her, Laurie has never lived with Daisy while she was a doctor. And I think there's a difference when you say good bye to your wife on a daily basis as she heads out the door to work. Its easy to forget when it happened so many years ago. How many people could say what their spouse did 8 or 9 years ago if he had changed jobs? And off the top of their heads without thinking about it. Laurie and Daisy have had three kids and moved to another country. That alone would push a lot of memories of what Daisy did before she married out the window.
#344:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 12:48 am
    —
I wondered if this was what would happen - and of course it's been so long since Laurie saw Daisy working that he might well not think of her skills.

And she dealt with this superbly.
#345:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 3:11 am
    —
Fabulous job, Daisy! Could this be the needed catalyst?

Laurie was rather thoughtless, running off without thinking of Daisy's skills, but he certainly didn't react negatively when he arrived and saw she'd taken charge. Sounds as though he just ran off on "Get to patients - Fast" autopilot rather than stopping to think.
#346:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 2:04 pm
    —
Under other circumstances Laurie might have been slightly taken aback by Daisy’s actions, but as it was he didn’t even have time to stop and think: he rushed over to the little girl she’d pointed out to him, and explained to the child and her frantic parents as best he was that he was a doctor and that he was going to try to help her. He gently examined her right leg and found that it was indeed broken, but that it didn’t seem to be a bad break and given the right treatment it ought to heal cleanly. When he tried to explain himself in words it was obvious that none of the family were managing to grasp exactly what he was saying, so he tried to indicate what he meant by using his hands; and eventually the mother nodded, smiled at him and said something which he couldn’t fully understand but which was obviously an expression of gratitude, whilst the father shook his hand vigorously.

How on earth had he managed to live in a German-speaking canton of Switzerland all these years without learning to speak German properly, he found himself wondering. Then again, he’d heard Jack and Joey Maynard saying the same about their sons: the Gornetz Platz was more like a little piece of Britain abroad than part of Central Europe. Still, he didn’t have time to think about that now: he smiled at the little girl and her parents, and then turned to see what he could do to assist those with minor injuries.

By this time there were a number of local medical personnel at the scene of the accident, which, as Daisy had said, thankfully wasn’t as serious as it had looked at first; and the noise was dying down and the crowd dispersing as officials ushered anyone who wasn’t directly involved away from the area. Laurie and Daisy offered to accompany the most seriously injured children to hospital, but were assured with many expressions of thanks that it wouldn’t be necessary.

“We can’t thank either of you enough for what you’ve done,” one of the Festival officials said, shaking both their hands. “We really are very grateful, Herr Doktor and Frau Doktor … er?”

“Rosomon,” Laurie said. “Herr Doktor Rosomon and Frau Doktor Rosomon!”

“Oh!” the official said, smiling. “You’re a married couple, and both doctors? How wonderful! Well, thank you very much, again – and may I suggest that you both go and get a drink before you leave? I think one or two of the coffee stands may still be open. We’ve all had quite a shock.”

It was a while before they managed to make their way away from the grateful parents grasping their hands and thanking them but, when they did, they did as the official had suggested and found the nearest stand still serving coffee. They bought two cupfuls, and Laurie heaped several spoonfuls of sugar into each even though normally he only took one sugar and Daisy didn’t take any.

“Well, I hadn’t quite expected that to happen on our day out,” he said when they’d found somewhere to sit. “Thank heavens it wasn’t any worse than it was. When I saw that wooden boat thing lying on the ground … well, my heart was in my mouth for a moment.” He looked at her and put his hand on her shoulder. “You were wonderful, Daisy.”
#347:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 2:16 pm
    —
Well Laurie's just redeemed himself! Give that man a pat on the back.
#348:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 2:28 pm
    —
Quote:
“Rosomon,” Laurie said. “Herr Doktor Rosomon and Frau Doktor Rosomon!”


I bet Daisy liked hearing that! Thanks Alison.
#349:  Author: Lexi, Location: Liverpool PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 2:39 pm
    —
I've gone from wanting to smack Laurie very hard for being so dense to wanting to give him a big hug Very Happy
#350:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 3:32 pm
    —
Ah, he's a sweetie after all. I always suspected as much.

Thanks Alison!
#351:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 4:18 pm
    —
Laurie is a sweetie. Occassionally thoughtless at times but I think thats normal and he certainly comes accross as someone who cares about Daisy deeply. I hope this gives Daisy the push she needs to talk to Laurie. If she doesn't she truly is a lost cause after Laurie acknowledged she was a doctor and came accross as being proud of her
#352:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 5:23 pm
    —
That's better - well done Laurie - perhaps he will now see what has been the problen for Daisy without her even having to say.


Thanks Alison.
#353:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 6:18 pm
    —
I hope that Laurie can start to see what it is that is bothering Daisy. Hopefully he might realise that this is what she has been really pining for.
#354:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 6:55 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It's great that Laurie told Daisy how wonderful she had been.
#355:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 9:23 pm
    —
theres hope for them yet Smile
#356:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 10:27 pm
    —
Laurie said just the right thing there - and how interesting that he should have that realisation about the Platz.
#357:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 2:18 pm
    —
Daisy laughed hollowly. “Do you have to patronise me like that? I only did what you did – or what Jack or Phil or Reg or any of the others would have done in the same situation.”

“I know,” he said quietly. “And if I sounded patronising then I didn’t mean to, honestly. And I’m sorry for going off without you like that. I just didn’t think: I realised that there’d been an accident and I just wanted to help and …”

“And you forgot that I was a doctor as well,” she finished for him. “Or were you trying to protect me by keeping me away from the scene of an accident where there might have been a bit of spilt blood? I have actually seen it all before, you know.”

“I know you have,” he said fiercely. “I met you on a hospital ward, remember? I’ve seen you at work: I know what a good doctor you are, better than anybody else you know does. Do you have any idea how guilty I felt, seeing you give all that up?”

“Oh well, excuse me!” she snapped. “You should have said. I do apologise: I’d never have married you if I’d known that I was making you feel guilty!” Then she shook her head and pushed her hair back from her eyes. “Why are we shouting at each other?”

“I don’t know,” he said helplessly. “I don’t know anything any more. What is it, Daisy? What were you about to tell me before?”

“Oh what’s the point?” she asked wearily. “It’s not your fault. I don’t know why you’re saying that you feel guilty, because it wasn’t about you. It wasn’t even about me. It’s just the way things are.”

“Nothing has to be the way it is if you’re not happy with it,” he said. “Tell me, Daisy. Come on. Talk to me.”

Daisy looked at him for a moment, thinking about everything that both Gisela and Gretchen had said. Seeing that he was serious, she took a deep breath. “All right,” she said. “I’ll try to explain. And I’m sorry I snapped at you, but I’m not sure how you’re going to take this. I don’t like being at home all day. Even when I’m not in the house, there’s nowhere nearby for me to go other than round to Joey’s, or Hilary’s, or Biddy’s, or someone else’s, and most of the time all they talk about is the wretched School and what’s going on there, or the latest news from some Old Girl or other; and it’s not that I’m not interested but I don’t want to be hearing it all the time. I am sick, sick, sick of the Gornetz Platz: I wish we’d never moved there, and I wish it more than ever now that Tony’s going to be going away to school.

"And, more than that, far more than that, just imagine for one minute that someone told you that you weren’t allowed to practise medicine any more and that you had to spend all day every day looking after the kids or doing the shopping or darning socks; and think how you’d feel.

“All those years I spent working to get into med school, at med school where half of them didn’t even take women students seriously, and at the hospital afterwards – and for what? Ever since I was a kid and I saw my brothers die and no-one able to save them I wanted to be a doctor, and how long was I a doctor for in the end? I used to be able to help people, even help to save lives. I’m not saying that looking after the house and the children isn’t a worthwhile thing to do; but soon none of the children’ll even be there during the day, and the housework doesn’t even take as long as it used to when we were first married, not now that we’ve got a washing machine and everything else. And even if it did, I don’t want to be at home all the time: I’m a doctor and I want to be a doctor.”

She shrugged her shoulders. “So now you know.”
#358:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 3:42 pm
    —
glad she got it off her chest

i hope laurie listens...
#359:  Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 3:55 pm
    —
A very honest and emotional response there. I hope Laurie is able to listen carefully to this.
#360:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 4:54 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm glad that Daisy has been honest.
#361:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 5:48 pm
    —
Go Daisy! Hopefully Laurie will listen to her.
#362:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 6:22 pm
    —
Glad she's managed to say all that. Now, what's your response, Laurie?


Thanks Alison.
#363:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 10:24 pm
    —
Hopefully, he isn't so stunned that he listens to what she's saying. He may well recognise what she's saying as something he has known, even though he hasn't put it into words before now.
#364:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 6:52 am
    —
Glad Laurie kept pushing Daisy to speak. She really seemed determined not to talk to Laurie about how she felt. It wasn't entirely his fault she gave up work. She never told him otherwise in a time when women working after they got married was the norm and how was he going to know if Daisy never told him. I am feeling a lot of sympathy for him mainly because I'm not someone that can read minds and as I always tell my SLOC if her doesn't tell me then I am not going to know what he's thinking otherwise. Glad Daisy finally got it out.
#365:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 1:16 pm
    —
So glad that Daisy has finally been able to be honest about she's feeling. I just hope that Laurie takes her seriously and that they can work towards a solution.
#366:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 1:41 pm
    —
I'm so glad she's told Laurie exactly how she's feeling. I hope he understands, though, and is supportive and doesn't just dismiss this.

Thanks Alison.
#367:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 1:54 pm
    —
“I see.”

“Is that all you’ve got to say?” Daisy shook her head incredulously. “I see?”

“Is that it?” he asked quietly. “That’s everything: that’s why you’ve been so unhappy lately? That’s all of it?”

“Everything? Laurie, are you listening to me? I’ve just told you that I don’t like where we live and I don’t like the way we live. What do you mean – is that everything?”

“I thought you were going to say that it was me.” He looked at her. “I thought, it was either me or the children, and I knew that it wasn’t the children, so I thought you were going to say that it was me you weren’t happy with: that’s why I’ve been so afraid to ask. But if it’s only this – this is nothing that we can’t sort out, Daisy. Why didn’t you tell me? And what on earth are you laughing at?”

“You!” She giggled again. “Why do men always have to assume that everything’s about them? Of course I’m not unhappy with you, you idiot! Although I wouldn’t blame you if you were unhappy with me: I don’t suppose I’ve been much fun to live with lately, but I just didn’t know what to say, or how to say it.” She looked at him intensely. “When you said that this was nothing that we couldn’t sort out – what exactly did you mean? Because this isn’t some sort of passing phase – don’t start telling me that I need to take up a hobby or something. I mean it, Laurie. I know that I’m going against everything about the way we’ve decided to live our lives and I’m sorry about that, but I can’t carry on like this.”

She took a deep breath. “But I do accept that I can’t just ask you to turn our lives around to suit me, and I’m not going to do that. For a start, although I don’t like living on the Gornetz Platz, I know that you enjoy working at the San and I wouldn’t even dream of asking you to look for a job somewhere else: I’m not that selfish. But couldn’t we find somewhere else to live – somewhere within reasonable travelling distance?” She made a fist with one of her hands. “No: that’s not going to work, is it? We’d end up living somewhere where we wouldn’t know anyone at all, and neither you nor the children even speak German fluently. I’m sorry: I haven’t really thought about the practicalities of any of this, have I?”

“Just hang fire a minute,” he said, gently but firmly. “Who said that I enjoy working at the San? We’re talking about somewhere where several people think I only got the job because I’m married to Jem Russell’s niece, where everyone insists on doing things the same old way they’ve always done, where no-one ever seems to venture outside the British colony and where there are no English-speaking schools for our boys to go to so we have to send them thousands of miles away. Believe you me, there are days when I think that taking the job there was the worst decision I’ve ever made. So could we please stop talking as if my being at the Gornetz Platz is non-negotiable?”

“We weren’t: I was!” Daisy said. “I thought you liked it there.”

“I thought you liked it there. You seemed so keen to move to Switzerland: you were so excited about it.”

“So were you,” Daisy pointed out. “It’s not exactly been what either of us were expecting, though, has it?”

Laurie shook his head. “I thought that moving there would be what was best for you and the children – and, yes, I thought it was what was best for me as well – but living on the Gornetz Platz certainly hasn’t been what I was hoping it’d be. And, as for the San itself, although they do some wonderful work there it’s not the environment for me.”

He looked away for a moment; then looked back at her. “Daisy – forgetting the question of the Gornetz Platz for the moment, why didn’t you tell me that you missed working? You gave up work after we got married, and then the children came along, and … well, it’s the way most people live, the husband goes out to work and the wife doesn’t, and I just assumed that that was the way it’d be and you never suggested otherwise - but if you weren’t happy then you should have said so. ”

“I didn’t know how to,” she said miserably. “I thought – well, like you said, it’s the way most people live and the way you assumed we’d live, and I gave up work when we got married and that was my decision, and how could I tell you that I wanted to change everything?” She reached for his hand. “Laurie – how would you feel about it? My going back to work, I mean? Are you completely hostile to the idea? Tell me the truth.”
#368:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 1:59 pm
    —
I'm now much more hopeful for Daisy. I really think Laurie will be supportive.
#369:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 4:09 pm
    —
The old, old story - each making assumptions about what the other was thinking and feeling, and neither checking them!

Let's hope that they will be able to seriously clear the air, and make some sensible decisions about their futures.
#370:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 4:12 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm glad that Laurie would consider the possibility of moving.
#371:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 5:04 pm
    —
Good that they are laughing and talking together.


Thanks Alison
#372:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 5:54 pm
    —
hopinh that there is some hope for them....
#373:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 10:05 pm
    —
Agreed with everything Laurie said there. He was lovely
#374:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 10:12 pm
    —
This sounds so familiar; each of them thinking that they knew what the other was thinking..... adn realising that neither of them has been happy with their life.
#375:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 10:57 am
    —
“I’ve never really thought about it much, to be honest,” he said. “I’m not going to say that I’m not having any wife of mine going out to work and that’s all there is to it, if that’s what you mean. I don’t suppose I’d last very long if I did! I want you to be happy, Daisy, and if that means you going back to work then that’s what I want. I don’t have any sort of deep-rooted objection to the idea of married women working. In fact, I’ve often thought what a shame it was that you spent so few years working when you were such a wonderful doctor. When you are such a wonderful doctor, as you’ve just proved! But obviously there are the children to consider, and the house. I mean, I suppose we could get someone in to help, but obviously there’d be a lot to think about. When you say that you want to go back to work, what exactly is it that you’d like to do? Would you be looking to work in a children’s hospital again?”

She shook her head. “No. I couldn’t work those sort of irregular hours. Not now, not with the children and everything else. But, although I know that I’d have a lot to catch up on and I’d probably have to do some sort of training courses, I do want to work as a doctor again. But as a community doctor, in a community practice. I could work part time: some people do. Although general practices like that aren’t nearly as common on the Continent as they are in Britain.”

“No; but there’s no law that says we have to live in Switzerland, is there? Come on Daisy, we’ve both just said that neither of us are happy at the Gornetz Platz, and we both know that neither of us are happy at the idea of being thousands of miles away from Tony and Peter once they go to prep school. It sounds to me as if what would suit both of us best – and the boys, and Mary as well – would be to move back to Britain. Now – before the boys start prep school and Mary’s ready to start school either. I could look for a job at a sanatorium there, and you could look for a position in a general medical practice which, as you say, would probably be a lot easier to find there than it would in Switzerland.”

Daisy looked at him incredulously, her face lighting up. “Are you serious?”

“About moving back home? Or about you going back to work? Actually, it doesn’t matter, because I’m completely serious about both of them.”

“It’d mean turning our lives upside down,” she said, her initial euphoria dying down as she started to think about the reality of it all. “And when we lived in Devon you used to say how difficult it’d be for you to get a job at a hospital when you’d been working in general practice for so long; and even if I could find someone who was willing to take on a part time female partner, it’d mean buying into the practice and where would we find the money for that from?”

“We’ll manage about the money somehow,” he said firmly. “And I’ve been working at the San for five years now, haven’t I? It’s not like when I was trying to get back into hospital work after being out of it for ages. I’m not saying that any of this is going to be easy. We’re going to have to think about and discuss all this a lot more: we’re talking about some very big decisions, and finding jobs for both of us and somewhere to live that suits both of us probably isn’t going to happen overnight. But it will happen, Daisy.”

“It will, won’t it?” she said, smiling at him. “Thank you: thank you so much for understanding. And I’m sorry that I’ve been so hard to live with lately. I should have told you how I was feeling.”

“I should have realised. Neither of us has been doing a very good job of realising how the other one was feeling recently, have we?” He took both her hands in his. “Daisy - could we agree here and now that the next time anything’s bothering either of us we’ll talk about it? Because I’ve been so unhappy these last months, knowing that you were unhappy and not knowing why or what to do about it? It’s our tenth wedding anniversary in the summer - let’s make a fresh start, shall we?”

“Sounds good to me,” Daisy whispered. Then she smiled, the way she used to smile at him when he first met her, and even though they were sitting where dozens of complete strangers could see them she flung her arms round him. “In fact, it sounds very good to me! Very good indeed.”

Last edited by Alison H on Fri Feb 23, 2007 11:01 am; edited 2 times in total
#376:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 10:59 am
    —
What a nice Laurie! I'm so glad they are going to plan a different kind of future together. It sounds as though they'll both be so much happier now.
#377:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 11:11 am
    —
[quote=AlisonH]“I should have realised. Neither of us has been doing a very good job of realising how the other one was feeling recently, have we?” He took both her hands in his. “Daisy - could we agree here and now that the next time anything’s bothering either of us we’ll talk about it? Because I’ve been so unhappy these last months, knowing that you were unhappy and not knowing why or what to do about it?[/quote]

It's probably the best suggestion Laurie has made. Hope it all works out okay for them both. Thanks Alison
#378:  Author: JayB, Location: SE England PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 11:16 am
    —
It might take time, and things might be tough for a while as they wait for everything to come together, but they'll be much happier knowing that they both want the same things and are working together to achieve them.

Now what have David and Gretchen been doing all this time?
#379:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 1:23 pm
    —
This all sounds so hopeful now. I'm so glad they've been able to talk things through.
#380:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 2:45 pm
    —
Aaaahhhh, how loverly. Laughing

So pleased that they are talking and planning together.

Thanks Alison
#381:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 10:11 pm
    —
That sounds so very positive; yes, it will be an upheaval (and I'm willing to bet that a few people won't understand what they're doing) but it will be worth it.
#382:  Author: Sandra, Location: Oxfordshire PostPosted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 10:59 pm
    —
He's starting to sound like a proper SLOC now.
#383:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 11:45 am
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm really happy that Laurie has agreed to both ideas!
#384:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 12:46 pm
    —
Thanks for the comments. Several people've asked if David and Gretchen are going to get together: they're persisting in getting on very well, but this story really wasn't meant to be about them so I think I'm going to leave that open-ended the while, whilst I try to tie up the various loose ends of the original story. Hope that makes sense!

Karen and Rudi had been some distance away from the fairground when the accident had happened and so, although they’d heard the crash, they hadn’t been able to tell exactly what had happened. They hadn’t wanted to upset Anneliese and Alexander or risk them getting hurt amid the large numbers of people surging in the direction of the noise; so Karen had stayed with them in the Brewery Gardens whilst Rudi had gone to try to find out what was going on and if there was anything he and Karen could do to help.

A harassed Festival official had told him and a group of other people that there’d been an accident in the fairground and that there were injuries but that none of them were life-threatening, and that there were doctors at the scene and that the best thing that everyone else could do, with all due respect, was to keep well away from the fairground. The accident scene and the surrounding area were overcrowded already, she’d said, and they were trying to get people away so as to make it easier for the ambulances to get through when they arrived and to remove the risk of people being crushed in the press of the crowd.

So he’d returned to his family and explained quietly to Karen what had happened; and they’d told the children truthfully but simply that the noise had been caused by something falling over, and that it might be best to set off for home once they’d finished their drinks as a lot of other people would be leaving before long and they didn’t want to get stuck in traffic trying to get out of Zell am Ziller village.

By the time they’d got home and had something to eat, it had been past the twins’ usual bedtime. They’d bathed them, put them to bed and read them both a bedtime story and then, having been assured by the staff that everything was running smoothly and light-heartedly reminded that the two of them were supposed to be having a day off rather than worrying about what was going on in the hotel, they’d settled themselves down in their sitting room for the rest of the evening and snuggled up together on the settee.

“I still keep feeling that I should have done something to help,” Rudi said. “The official I spoke to kept saying that there were doctors attending to the injured children and that there was nothing more that anyone could do, and that they wanted to try to clear the area to let the ambulances through, but even so.”

Karen stroked his hand. “There wasn’t anything that either of us could have done that wasn’t being done already,” she pointed out gently. “I know what you mean, though. It’s horrible when something like that happens. Especially when there are children involved: I keep thinking about the twins … but they did say that there weren’t any serious injuries, so let’s be grateful for that – and, before we go to bed tonight, let’s say a special prayer for those who were hurt. It was an awful thing to happen, and everybody who was there’s probably feeling a bit shaky this evening.”

Rudi nodded. “I’m glad that Gretchen and David’d gone by then: at least they missed it all. Having said which, if they’d still been there then there’d have been another doctor on hand to help; but the doctors who were there were managing all right, from what was being said.”

“I forget that he’s a qualified doctor sometimes! I can still see him as a little curly-haired baby, chuckling at Marie and Rosa and me when I used to go up to the Sonnalpe to see them!” Karen said. “Mind you, I can still see Gretchen as a baby as well!” She paused for a moment, drumming her fingers against the arm of the settee. “What do you make of him? David Russell, I mean?”

“Seems like a nice enough young man. Shame that he seems to think he’s going to have problems with his parents over his career plans: I just hope that he does decide to go ahead with what he really wants to do and that they don’t react too badly about it. Why do you ask?” He looked at her thoughtfully. “Are you wondering if he’s the reason that Gretchen finally seems to have softened her stance on the idea of marriage?”
#385:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 12:56 pm
    —
Thank goodness Rudi, Karen and the twins had left the fair before the accident.
#386:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 2:21 pm
    —
Pleased they had already left and that the twins were not involved.


Thanks Alison.
#387:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 1:46 am
    —
Alison H wrote:
Thanks for the comments. Several people've asked if David and Gretchen are going to get together: they're persisting in getting on very well, but this story really wasn't meant to be about them so I think I'm going to leave that open-ended the while, whilst I try to tie up the various loose ends of the original story. Hope that makes sense!


That doesn't mean we will stop asking for their story and what happens to them - fixing a beady eye accross the oceans to Manchester. Laughing Laughing
#388:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 9:10 am
    —
“You noticed that about Gretchen as well?” Karen asked “Good: I haven’t imagined it, then - she does finally seem to have accepted that her job doesn’t mean that she has to dismiss the whole idea of marriage out of hand, doesn’t she? I’m not saying that everyone has to get married, and obviously it’s only something she should consider if she meets the right man, but I’m glad that she doesn’t seem so dead set on excluding the very possibility of it any more! ”

Rudi nodded. “She certainly seems rather more open-minded about it all, or at least that’s how it seemed to me. I’m not sure that I think David Russell’s got all that much to do with it, though. She’s said a few times that he’s just a friend, and she was even teasing him about the idea of the Countess setting him up with a young lady. Anyway, he’s going back to London next week. Although they did seem to be getting on extremely well together.”

“They did, didn’t they? And I used to tell myself that you were “just a friend” when I first knew you! But then there’s no reason why a young man and a young woman can’t get on well together without there being anything romantic between them. It’s a shame in one way, because I think somebody like him might be exactly what Gretchen needs … but, on the other hand, I don’t want even to start thinking about all the problems that it’d cause.”

“With Sir James and Lady Russell and Marie and Andreas, you mean? Yes: I think I can imagine.”

Karen looked troubled. “They’d be about as pleased about it as our parents were about us when we were young. Oh, it’s a different time and a completely different set of circumstances and in this case there wouldn’t be very much that they could do about it, but I certainly wouldn’t wish any of that sort of unpleasantness on Gretchen. Nor on David. And it could all be very awkward for Marie and Andreas as well. Not to mention the fact that David lives in Britain whilst Gretchen’s very much settled over here. And the fact that he’s not a Catholic.”

She laughed. “Listen to me - talk about running away with myself! She does keep saying that he’s just a friend; and, as you’ve said, he’s going back to London in a few days’ time. I always did read too many romantic novels: I’ll stop going on about it now!” She stretched her arms and sat up.

“Hey, where are you going?” he protested. “Come back! I’ll get lonely on here by myself!”

They both laughed. “I’m only going to the kitchen to make some hot chocolate!” she said. “I assume you’d like some as well?”

“Ooh, yes please!” He sat up as well then, and put his arms back round her. “It was a lovely day out, wasn’t it? Apart from what happened at the end – and thankfully that wasn’t nearly as bad as it could’ve been.”

“Mmm.” Karen put her head on his shoulder. “Any day’s lovely as long as you and I and Anneliese and Alexander are all together,” she said sentimentally. “You and I were always meant to be together, weren’t we? Despite what anyone else might have thought. And if it’s the same with Gretchen and David, then Gretchen’ll know that we’ll always support her even if there are other people who don’t. But even if it’s not, then let’s hope that she doesn’t go back to thinking that doing her job means that she has to forget about anything else she might want to do, and that he doesn’t let his parents push him into working at the Welsh San if it’s not what he wants. Right, shall I go and make that hot chocolate now?”

“Sounds good to me! What’s more, I shall come to the kitchen with you and get us a couple of chocolate biscuits to go with it! Does that sound like a good idea?”

Karen kissed him. “It certainly does.”
#389:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 9:36 am
    —
Aaaaahhhh, lovely interlude. Karen's right about possible problems - but she didn't take the analogy between Gretchen/David and Karen/Rudi to its logical conclusion - that, despite all the difficulties, she and Rudi are now happily together...




Thanks Alison.
#390:  Author: brie, Location: Glasgow PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 11:18 am
    —
thanks alison
#391:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:16 pm
    —
Now you really have to let them get together, having wet our appetites like that!

Thanks Alison.
#392:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 6:58 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. It's good that the children weren't scared by the crash. It was nice to see Karen and Rudi's discussion.
#393:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 8:35 pm
    —
I'm all for David and Gretchen getting together. Didn't someone say that the basis for a good marriage is friendship Wink
#394:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 1:01 am
    —
Yes the situation would have problems as Karen says, and it might be that David and Gretchen are good friends who will stay just that - but a sound friendship is a valuable thing.
#395:  Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 6:54 am
    —
Gretchen and David would have even more awkward a time in many ways than Karen and Rudi - Gretchen is the daughter of David's parents' servants. Can you see Madge and Jem at their son's wedding, when the parents of the bride are the people who would normally be doing the cooking and cleaning for the event?
#396:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 11:53 am
    —
Ahhh, lovely. Glad Daisy and Laurie have sorted things out too (just catching up!)
#397:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 2:10 pm
    —
David and Gretchen had been back at the car and on their way to Briesau well before the accident at the fairground occurred: they knew nothing about it at the time. There wasn’t much traffic on the roads, and they were back at Gretchen’s in what seemed like no time at all.

“I suppose this is goodbye, then,” David said as they drew up in front of the little house. It didn’t feel like goodbye: something felt unfinished, somehow. He got the impression that Gretchen felt the same - she wasn’t making any move to open the car door and get out – but he wasn’t quite sure what else to say.

“I suppose it is,” she said. “David …”

“Yes?”

“Thank you - for everything. For taking me to the dinner dance at the Schloss Wertheim, and for today, and for Mayrhofen last week, and for everything else as well. Thank you for reminding me that there’s more to life than work, I mean – that I can do other things as well. It’s been wonderful. Seeing you again, I mean – and all the places we’ve been to, and everything. And I hope you have a good journey home, and I really really hope that everything works out for you – with going into general practice, and with your mum and dad. You’re going to be a brilliant G.P.; I know it. And thank you again. I really have enjoyed this last fortnight.”

“Me too. And I’m the one who should be thanking you – for showing me round, for one thing; and, more than that, for listening, and for helping to make me see things more clearly and realise that it’s time to sort my life out. And you will keep in touch, won’t you?”

“Of course I will. You know my address. Oh – I haven’t got yours, though. Hang on: I’ve got a pen and my diary in my bag. Here.”

She handed him the pen and paper, and he carefully printed out his address for her. “For as long as I’m there!” he said. “Hopefully I won’t be in London much longer. I’ll let you know my new address as soon as I know it myself, though!”

“Make sure you do!” They were both silent for a minute, then she reached for the door handle. “I suppose I’d better go in and let you get off. I don’t want to make you late for this dinner with the von und zu Wertheims and their guests.”

“You won’t. That is, you’re not doing. I’ve got plenty of time yet. Er, not that I mean that I think you want to sit outside your house in a car for ages, obviously. Er, right … yes. And you’ve probably got loads of things that you need to be doing anyway.”

“Not really.” She was still holding the door handle. “Er, David – if you’re not in a rush, and only if you want to, would you like to come in for coffee?”

Last edited by Alison H on Mon Feb 26, 2007 2:12 pm; edited 1 time in total
#398:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 2:12 pm
    —
Yes, I'm sure he would!

Thanks Alison.
#399:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 2:16 pm
    —
Well, it's about time. Thank goodness.
#400:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 3:16 pm
    —
Say yes, David!


Thanks Alison
#401:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 3:27 pm
    —
Yay!

Lovely conversation and so realistic!
#402:  Author: Chelsea, Location: Your Imagination PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 4:08 pm
    —
Ahh, bless. So sweet.
#403:  Author: KathrynW, Location: London PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 5:04 pm
    —
That was such a lovely moment between them....thanks Alison
#404:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 7:18 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I hope that David accepts.
#405:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 8:25 pm
    —
Thanks Alison. Very Happy
#406:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 11:51 pm
    —
Just caught up on three lovely conversations. So glad that Daisy and Laurie have sorted out their misunderstandings (I wonder if Daisy, finding that the conventional mould didn't fit her, was blaming herself and feeling in adequate as well). Karen and Rudi are so nice together, and that awkward, embarrassed conversation between Gretchen and David was so realistic! New beginnings all round, perhaps.
#407:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 12:48 am
    —
Rudi & Karen are lovely. Very Happy

Ooooh, an invitation for coffee. The ice has been well and truly broken.

Thank you, Alison.
#408:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 11:27 am
    —
Gretchen unlocked the front door, and David followed her into the house and into the small kitchen where she made coffee for them both. He looked around with interest, trying not to appear too nosy. He’d been surprised to hear that she was living by herself rather than with her grandparents or any of her other relatives in the area, or even at the hostel up at the Sonnalpe where some of the nurses and other San staff lived. He was happy enough living on his own in London, but he couldn’t imagine Sybil or Josette doing so. Which was rather strange, really, because they’d probably manage a lot better than he did. If he didn’t have a cleaner then his flat would probably be knee-deep in dirt, and the least said about his cooking the better!

But then his mother didn’t do much of that sort of thing either. It was all done for her. By the mother of the person he was with now. Which was also starting to seem rather strange.

“David?” Gretchen was holding a cup of coffee out to him. “Wake up!”

“Sorry.” He took the cup from her. “Thanks.”

She poured a second cup for herself, then put it down on the kitchen table as she opened a cupboard, took out a plate and filled it with a selection of biscuits from a box which she took out of a second cupboard. “Have a biscuit as well if you’d like one. I don’t know about you but I’m starving! I made them myself – see, I’m not as undomesticated as you think!”

“I don’t think you’re undomesticated. I mean, I’ve never really thought about it. And actually, I don’t know what I should be saying because most girls’d take someone calling them undomesticated as an insult, but you might take it as a compliment!”

They both started to laugh. “I have been rather bloody-minded about everything, haven’t I?” she said, as they sat down. “It was just that I put in so much work before getting the job at the San and I’ve put in so much work since being there, and I enjoy working there and I really feel that people there respect me. I never felt like that at the shop where I worked at Armiford. And then there was Will, that awful bloke I went out with, the one who wouldn’t introduce me to any of his family or friends; but the least said about him the better! People like …” Her voice tailed off. She’d nearly said “People like your cousin Daisy,” but she’d stopped herself just in time. “I’ve seen a lot of women give up work to become full-time housewives and mothers, and some of them are happy like that and that’s fine, but I’ve seen others who aren’t and I don’t want to end up like that,” she went on instead.

“You won’t do,” he reassured her. “Any man who’s right for you won’t want you to be unhappy. There are always ways of working round things.”

“Auntie Karen says that. She and Rudi manage to run the hotel and look after the twins – they’re not six till October, so they’re not at proper school full time yet – but that’s different: that’s a hotel. And I know that your aunt writes her books, but she’s got Cousin Anna and Rosli living with her! I suppose everyone works things out their own way, though. And I think that maybe I have been spending too much time worrying about work: I needed someone to make me see that, and I haven’t enjoyed myself as much for ages as I’ve done these past two weeks with you, so thank you again for that. From now on, I’m going to try to take a much more open view of life in general, and just see what happens!”

She smiled, took a biscuit off the plate and ate it.
#409:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 11:33 am
    —
what about the person Marie wants her to meet

I do not have time to write, but i want to say I follow this drabble keenly and I enjoy the way you take a storywe all know and turn it upside down
#410:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 11:34 am
    —
Thanks, Alison. It's nice to see them sharing their thoughts.
#411:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 2:36 pm
    —
jennifer wrote:
Gretchen and David would have even more awkward a time in many ways than Karen and Rudi - Gretchen is the daughter of David's parents' servants. Can you see Madge and Jem at their son's wedding, when the parents of the bride are the people who would normally be doing the cooking and cleaning for the event?

Well, you never know - since Madge and Jem are kind people (at least, in EBD's universe - we haven't really met them in this one, yet), whatever their private thoughts on the matter, I am sure they would never, for one moment, make Gretchen feel she wasn't exactly the person they would have liked David to have married. It is rather, I suspect, Andreas and Marie who would be shocked and disapproving!

Alison, I am really enjoying this story - thank you!
#412:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 3:28 pm
    —
Actually, yes, Jennie, I can see that too, now you've pointed it out. They might feel that Gretchen was marrying above her station and really dislike the idea.
#413:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 9:30 pm
    —
Thanks Alison
#414:  Author: Dawn, Location: Leeds, West Yorks PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 9:46 pm
    —
I am so enjoying this - lovely that Daisy and Laurie are well on the way to sorting themselves out and fingers crossed for Gretchen and David
#415:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 11:49 pm
    —
I really must find another word for 'lovely', but it keeps on being!
#416:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 10:29 am
    —
David took a biscuit as well. “Mmm – these are lovely!” He grinned at her. “You’d make some lucky man a wonderful wife all right!”

Gretchen pulled a face at him. “Very funny! Anyway, that’s enough about me. What about you? You are going to look for a general practice position, aren’t you? And you’ll explain to your parents about not wanting to work at the San?”

David nodded. “I’ll go and see Mum and Dad the first weekend I can after I get back. No time like the present after all. I’ve put it off long enough. I can’t go on like this, and I’m sorry if they’re not happy about it but I’m just hoping that they’ll accept it, and that they’ll understand that I’m not being ungrateful, or disrespectful of everything that Dad’s achieved, but that it’s just not what I want to do. You never know – maybe Kevin or Kester’ll decide to go in for working at the San instead!”

“Don’t start wishing that on them,” Gretchen laughed. “They’ve got to make up their own minds just like you have. I’m sure Sir James’ll find someone to take over at the San long term, and I can kind of understand that he hoped it’d be you, but if it’s not what you want then he’ll have to accept that. Mum and Dad weren’t too keen on the idea of me moving back to Austria at first, but they accepted that it was what I wanted and they were fine with it after that.” She touched his hand briefly. “It’ll be okay, David. Remember what Auntie Karen said about the way your mum handled the strike at the school – and remember that your dad kept in touch with his sister after their parents cut her off. It’ll be all right.”

“I hope so.” He looked at his watch. He really didn’t want to go, but nor did he want to be late for Auntie Marie and Uncle Eugen and whomever these wretched visitors of theirs might be. “I’m going to have to go,” he said reluctantly. “Thank you – for the coffee and biscuits, and for everything else as well. Thank you so much – and all the best for the future, Gretchen. You will write, won’t you?”

“Of course I will,” she promised. “Have a safe journey back to London. And good luck - with everything.”

“Thanks.” he said. “I might well need it.” He stood up and they walked together to the door. He held out his hand to shake hands, then changed his mind and leaned forward to kiss her on the cheek instead. Then, somehow, he found himself putting his arms round her for a brotherly hug, but it didn’t feel anything like hugging Sybil or Josette or Ailie and they found themselves clinging together for rather longer than either of them had originally intended.

“Goodbye, David,” she said a little shyly, when they eventually drew apart.

“Goodbye Gretchen,” he said. He walked to the car, unlocked the door, put the key in the ignition and drove away, looking back over his shoulder to see her still standing on the doorstep, and wishing that he hadn’t had to leave but at the same time not quite sure what he wished he’d done instead.
#417:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 10:43 am
    —
*bounce* Yay!

They must need GP's at the tiernsee, surely! Wink
#418:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:45 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison Very Happy
#419:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:49 pm
    —
*bribes Alison's bunnies to let Grechen and David be happy together*

Thanks Alison.
#420:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 3:37 pm
    —
Of course it might not be Kevin or Kester - what about Ailie? Or has she already left school?


Thanks Alison - definitely scope their for further relationship between David and Gretchen.
#421:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 4:59 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I hope that Madge and Jem will agree.
#422:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 6:59 pm
    —
AHA!

Hurrah! Nagging really works!

Thanks Alison.
#423:  Author: Dawn, Location: Leeds, West Yorks PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 9:23 pm
    —
YAY!!!!!!!
#424:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 10:34 pm
    —
Thank you Alison; David and Gretchen have come a long way both in their friendship and in the perception of how their lives might develop.
#425:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 12:12 am
    —
They do seem to have strengthened each other in a number of ways. Thanks, Alison.
#426:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 2:40 am
    —
Very promising. Very Happy
#427:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 2:09 pm
    —
I'm afraid there aren't going to be any wedding bells in this particular drabble or I'll never get it finished! Maybe there's scope for a sequel though?

The last thing in the world that David felt like doing was making polite small talk with some friends of his Auntie Marie and Uncle Eugen’s – or, worse, some friend of Josefa’s whom they might have invited to be his dinner partner – he thought ruefully as he drove back towards the Schloss Wertheim. Thoughts were going round and round his head and he couldn’t quite seem to get any of them clear in his mind.

He’d said goodbye to Gretchen. He hadn’t just dropped her off: he’d gone into the house with her; and they’d had a drink and something to eat together; and they’d wished each other well; and they’d promised to keep in touch … so why did he feel as if something had been left unfinished somehow? And what, if anything, could, should or would he do about it?

And then there was the conversation that he’d had with her earlier, when they’d somehow got on to the subject of his Auntie Margot? How had they come to be talking about her? Ah – that was right: Gretchen had mentioned that she’d seen Daisy. That was another thing. He’d had such good intentions about speaking to Daisy and finding out what was troubling her; but she’d been so distant at the conference and he knew very well that he hadn’t really been able to help her at all. She and Laurie would be in Tyrol for another few days, so should he seek her out and try again? Or would she see it as interfering and resent him for it? He wasn’t sure what to do, and wished now that he’d asked Gretchen what she thought about it.

And from talking about Daisy they’d started talking about his Auntie Margot, and how she’d worked at the Chalet School because she’d hadn’t wanted to be financially dependent on her brother. Gretchen would applaud that, and his own mother had worked rather than expect her brother to support her – not that Uncle Dick could have supported Mum and Auntie Joey on what money he’d had back then, he reminded himself – but it still seemed odd that his father had never thought it appropriate to make part of their parents’ inheritance over to her. He’d inherited it all under the terms of his parents’ wills, and much of it would have been tied up in the San in those days, but even so it was odd.

Still, it was in the past now, and there wasn’t really much point in dwelling on it. The present and the future were what he had to worry about – and worry he was doing. Gretchen had said that she was going to “see what happens” and he was glad that she no longer seemed so determined that she had to act in a certain way based purely on what she thought other people might expect, but in his case it was different – he had to take action.

He suddenly realised that he was about to miss a turning. He’d realised just in time but, he told himself firmly, he’d better give his full attention to watching the road from now on, especially given that he had to get the car back to the hire company in one piece before he went home and the road was in dire need of resurfacing. Some of the roads near where his parents lived were like that, he thought, his mind turning to the small village near the San. He’d never particularly liked the place and had always wished that his parents had stayed in Howells, or better still moved closer to Armiford: he had happy memories of the lovely old cathedral city and his time at the cathedral school there. Now his mind was wandering again! Concentrate, David, he rebuked himself.

He did manage to keep his attention fixed firmly on his driving after that; but about halfway between Briesau and Wertheimhof he began to get a horrible sinking feeling that all was not well with the car.

Last edited by Alison H on Thu Mar 01, 2007 6:34 pm; edited 1 time in total
#428:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 3:10 pm
    —
Still loving this, Alison, it's great. And hurrah for the definite possibility of a sequel! How exciting!
#429:  Author: Elbee, Location: Surrey PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 3:25 pm
    —
I'm really enjoying this story. I too would love to hear more about David and Gretchen!
I hope Daisy and Laurie manage to sort themselves out.
Thanks Alison.
#430:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 5:56 pm
    —
David really is thinking, isn't he? Now what's wrong with his car?


Thanks Alison - like that there is scope for sequels. Laughing
#431:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 6:23 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I hope that David won't have an accident.
#432:  Author: Dawn, Location: Leeds, West Yorks PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 10:47 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
I'm afraid there aren't going to be any wedding bells in this particular drabble or I'll never get it finished! Maybe there's scope for a sequel though?



Yes please Very Happy


now who's going to come and rescue David when the car dies completely?
#433:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 11:04 pm
    —
I'm dying of curiosity about who has been invited for dinner and every time I catch up with this, you leave me hanging! Am really enjoying this and it certainly makes me think about a lot of things Very Happy Very Happy
By the way when did the Russells move out of the Round House/Howells? I don't remember that happening, though I do remember you writing about it in your last drabble
#434:  Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 11:40 pm
    —
There's an ominous little feeling running through this. David has managed to avoid an accident - but where will he be stranded?
I won't be on here again until after the weekend - not fair to leave me on a cliff!
#435:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 7:52 am
    —
Fiona Mc wrote:

By the way when did the Russells move out of the Round House/Howells? I don't remember that happening, though I do remember you writing about it in your last drabble


It's mentioned very briefly in one of the early Swiss books - I think it's Mary-Lou. Joey says something about being surprised because she'd thought Madge and Jem were settled at the Round House for good, and someone else makes a comment about Madge not being able to come to the Sale/some other school event because she was busy moving house.
#436:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 1:28 pm
    —
David briefly considered the idea of carrying on driving in the hope that the car would be able to make it back to the Schloss and that he’d be able to worry about it in the morning when the garages would be open; but he decided that it wasn’t worth taking a risk, and pulled over. He groaned when he saw that one of the tyres was steadily deflating. He must have driven over a nail in the road. Great. He was in the middle of nowhere and there was no-one else around; and although there were some tools in the boot he really knew embarrassingly little about cars and wasn’t quite sure where to start when it came to changing tyres.

Someone like his cousin Stephen, or Roger Richardson, or Gretchen’s brother Jakob, would have had this sorted out in a matter of a few minutes, he thought to himself wryly, as he tried to work out exactly what he needed to do. Eventually he managed to get the tyre off and the spare tyre on, but it was a struggle and it took him a lot longer than he was sure it should have done. He hoped that the crystal bowl he’d bought at the Gauder Market, just before he and Gretchen had left the Festival, as a thank you present for Auntie Marie and Uncle Eugen, was still in one piece: he checked it and was relieved to find that it was undamaged.

He also hoped, glancing at his watch, that the von und zu Wertheims’ guests wouldn’t arrive too early. His hands and clothes were absolutely filthy and it would be very embarrassing if he ran into whomever they were before he’d had chance to clean himself up and get changed. Oh well, these things happened: it couldn’t be helped, and at least he had managed to get the tyre changed successfully!

He was very relieved when he made it back to the Schloss Wertheim without any further mishaps, but grimaced when he saw that there was a strange hired car parked next to where he usually parked his own hired car. Evidently the mysterious guests – the fact that they were driving a hired car suggested that they weren’t local, but that didn’t really narrow the list of possibilities down much - had indeed arrived early. Oh dear! He made his way furtively up the steps to the front door and rang on the bell, belatedly wishing that he’d thought to use the entrance by the kitchen and hoping fervently that once the butler had let him in he’d be able to dash upstairs and make himself look presentable before anyone else saw him.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t the butler who opened the door: it was his Auntie Marie herself, looking quite relieved to see him. “Oh David, thank goodness you’re back! We thought you’d have been here ages ago and we were starting to get quite worried!” she said. “And what have you been doing to yourself? Oh well, never mind: so long as you’re all right. Come on through: we’ve been waiting for you.”

“Sorry, Auntie Marie: I didn’t mean to worry you,” he apologised. “The car got a flat tyre in the middle of nowhere, so I had to stop and change it; and I’m afraid I’m not much of an expert with cars so it took me a while. That’s why I’m covered in muck: sorry, I must look a right mess! I’d better go and tidy myself up: I can’t very well go into your Saal and meet your guests looking like this. I’ll try not to be too long. ”

Marie laughed. “My guests have seen you looking much worse than this, I assure you! However, I can understand that you want to get changed – although we’re not having a formal dinner, so there’s no need to dress up! - and I must say that I’d rather my furniture didn’t get covered in oil! It’s all right: I’ll explain that you’ll be down soon.”

He was getting very curious as to whom the guests were now, and hurried straight back downstairs as soon as he’d managed to make himself look respectable. Hoping fervently that he wasn’t going to have to spend the evening with anyone too awful, he made his way through to the grand Saal which the von und zu Wertheims used for entertaining guests, and pushed open the big double doors.

“I’m really sorry for keeping everyone waiting,” he began. Then his voice tailed off, as he saw who was sitting there facing him.
#437:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 1:41 pm
    —
Oh, poor David! I wonder who's there?
#438:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 1:43 pm
    —
So who is it then? His parents? It's mean of you to leave us hanging like that Alison.
#439:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 2:05 pm
    —
Who's there? *Agog*

Thanks Alison!
#440:  Author: keren, Location: Israel PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 2:19 pm
    —
oh....

at least he didnt get stuck too badly

so who is it?
his auntie Jo?????
#441:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 5:05 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I am really curious to find out whom is waiting for David.
#442:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 6:04 pm
    —
Oh Alison, you beast - I'm going away for the weekend and won't get to find out until Sunday evening, if then!
#443:  Author: Changnoi, Location: Milwaukee, USA PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 6:28 pm
    —
Is it Mary-Lou???


Love this!

Chang
#444:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 6:44 pm
    —
His parents?


Thanks Alison
#445:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 7:53 pm
    —
Mrs Redboots wrote:
Oh Alison, you beast - I'm going away for the weekend and won't get to find out until Sunday evening, if then!


I am in the same situation, though I don't think I'm going to the same place as Mrs Redboots!
#446:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 11:20 pm
    —
Sybil? His parents?

This is interesting - and now he knows how to change a tyre!
#447:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 7:22 am
    —
Alison!!!! Do you know I have this mental picture of you hunched over your computer gigling madly to yourself, knowing full well, we'll all want to stangle you for not telling us who is the mystery guest.
(Hoping it's not Jo or Mary Lou. Please surprise us with someone we haven't seen for awhile. Please)
#448:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 11:49 am
    —
“Hello Mum and Dad,” he said through clenched teeth. What the hell were they doing here? They were supposed to be at home in Wales - where he was going to see them next weekend, after he’d worked out exactly what he was going to say to them. He just couldn’t believe that they’d turned up in Tyrol like this. It was the last thing he’d expected.

“They wanted to surprise you,” Marie laughed. “But you could look a little bit more excited to see them, David! Or were you hoping that my surprise guests were some pretty young single ladies?”

“What? Oh, no: I’m just – er, surprised, that’s all,” David muttered helplessly. He tried desperately to think of something to say. “Er, sorry again about keeping you waiting.”

“I must admit that we were starting to get quite worried,” Madge said. “We were expecting you earlier. What happened exactly? Marie said something about a problem with the car. Thank goodness you weren’t hurt! I don’t like to think about what might have happened if you’d come off the road down one of those quiet country lanes by yourself. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’m absolutely fine, Mum, honestly,” he reassured her, not sure whether he was more touched by her concern or amused at the way she sometimes still seemed to worry about him so much - as if he were seven rather than twenty-seven! “It was only a flat tyre! It just took me a while to change it; that was all. I’m not much use when it comes to cars, I’m afraid!”

“Well, I think you did jolly well to change the tyre by yourself!” Jem said heartily. “I’m not sure I’d have known what to do! Andreas deals with everything to do with the car. Do you remember my man Andreas, Eugen? Good chap to have around when it comes to cars! His eldest boy’s the same - works at the garage where my car went to be fixed up after the crash, as it so happens.”

“How are you feeling now, Dad?” David asked, suddenly guiltily aware that it was a question that he should have thought to ask as soon as he’d walked into the room and seen his father sitting there. What on earth was up with him? He couldn’t seem to think straight – and hearing his father talking about Gretchen’s father and brother somehow seemed to have made the muzzy feeling in his head even worse.

Come on, David, he muttered to himself. It was hardly his parents’ fault that they were the last people he wanted to see just now, was it? And they both seemed very pleased to see him - whereas at the moment he was behaving like a complete boor, and he should be ashamed of himself.

Obviously his father was feeling much better and they’d decided that they’d have the break in Tyrol that they’d originally intended to have just before or just after the conference now instead. That was all. Why else would they be here? They were hardly going to start raising the issue of the future of the San just now this minute, were they? Whilst they were all on holiday, and in front of the von und zu Wertheims! Anyway, he was only in Tyrol for another few days. His parents were presumably staying a bit longer so he’d have to postpone his visit to Wales to tell them what he’d decided, but that would only be for a little while.

In the meantime, all he had to do was to act normally for a few days. Nothing more. And surely that couldn’t be too difficult, could it?
#449:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 12:11 pm
    —
How awkward for him - and very telling that he feels strange listening to his father talk of gretchen's father and brother in that manner.

Can understand Madge's concern - mothers never stop being mothers, but even so

Poor David.


Thanks Alison
#450:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 1:13 pm
    —
Poor David, finding them there waiting for him. I hope they don't want to discuss the San with him, though, until he's had a chance to think about it.
#451:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 1:27 pm
    —
Oh, dear, poor David. That's the last thing he needs!
#452:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 1:04 am
    —
Oh dear, he really has been startled by this hasn't he?
#453:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 2:00 am
    —
I must admit I wasn't expecting them either! Poor David. Who knows maybe it would be the best time to bring up that he doesn't want to work at the San. I only hope David doesn't start acting weird around Gretchen while his parents are there
#454:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 9:55 am
    —
“Pretty much as good as new, thanks,” Jem said. “I’m not sure that I’m quite up to going back to work yet, but I was starting to go mad in the house with your mother and Marie and Rosa all fussing over me and I felt rather bad about doing your mother out of her break in the Alps, so we decided a few days ago that we’d come out here and have our holiday after all.

“We’re going on to the Gornetz Platz to stay with your Auntie Joey and Uncle Jack for a couple of weeks, but we both wanted to have a bit of time in Tyrol as well so here we are! It didn’t seem worth opening up Die Blumen just for a few days and only for the two of us, so we were going to go to the Kron Prinz Karl, but then when we rang Marie and Eugen to tell them that we were coming over here they very kindly insisted that we stay with them. And we thought it’d be nice to surprise you, so we asked them not to mention it to you. It’s good to see you, lad! We’ve been starting to forget what you look like. Anyone would think that you’d been trying to avoid us lately: every time we suggest that you come up to Wales for a few days, you find a reason not to!”

“Sorry,” David said. “I know that I haven’t been to see you for ages.” What could he say by way of explanation? He couldn’t very well tell them that he’d been avoiding them because he hadn’t wanted to get embroiled in an awkward conversation about the San. “I’ve just been really busy at work.” It was hardly the most original of excuses, but hopefully it was a believable one.

“Ah, the joys of being a doctor!” Madge laughed. “How many times have we had to put off doing something because your father’s “been really busy at work”? You sounded just like him then!”

“Speaking of which, I haven’t thanked you yet for standing in for me at the conference!” Jem put in. “Eugen’s just been telling me that Gottfried Mensch said that you did a wonderful job. You see: I told you you’d be good at that sort of thing. You found the conference interesting, I assume?”

“Er, yes,” David said. How on earth had the conversation got round to this - and so quickly? It was his own fault: why the hell hadn’t he thought of some excuse for not going to see them that hadn’t involved work? And how could he change the subject without making it too obvious that that was what he was doing? Maybe he could make some remark about what a lovely setting the castle had made for the conference and how much everyone had enjoyed the post-conference dinner dance … but then either Auntie Marie or Uncle Eugen would be bound to refer to the fact that Gretchen had been his guest that evening, and for some reason the thought of Gretchen becoming the subject of the conversation made him feel a little bit strange.

What else could he talk about? “I’ve just been to the Gauder Festival at Zell am Ziller,” he blurted out. He regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth: now they were bound to ask whether he’d gone there on his own or not. “The weather’s been very nice today,” he added desperately. “Very … er, nice. For the time of year, that is.”

He wasn’t sure whether or not Marie von und zu Wertheim had sensed his awkwardness and, being the excellent hostess that she was, decided to rescue him from whatever he might be feeling awkward about, or whether she’d just been making a remark that she’d have made anyway, but at that moment she stepped into the conversation and saved him. “They have all sorts of bands playing at the Gauder Festival, you know,” she said brightly to Madge and Jem. “Do you remember the Tzigane bands who used to play down by the Tiernsee in the old days? Oh, we all had such fun then, didn’t we? Dear me, I can hardly believe that it’s well over twenty years since I left school!”

“Neither can I!” Madge laughed. “How time does fly! It doesn’t seem like five minutes since you and Wanda were arriving at the School, and Wanda and Gisela and Bernhilda were my three eldest girls! In fact, I was only saying to Jem earlier that we must see Gisela and Gottfried whilst we’re here: I can’t believe that they’re back at Das Pferd after all this time. Oh Marie, do you remember when …?”

David took a seat and heaved a huge sigh of relief. Phew! Crisis averted, at least temporarily. But how on earth was he going to get through even a few days of feeling that he had to watch every single word that either he or anyone else might say? This was a nightmare.
#455:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 11:16 am
    —
Poor David. But surely it would be better for him to just tell them? Otherwise he's going to find himself roped into going back to the Welsh San without saying anything! Laughing


Thanks Alison
#456:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 2:20 pm
    —
I hope David will have the courage to sit down with his parents and talk to them about the San.
#457:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 3:20 pm
    —
Poor David. He's got to talk to them soon, though, so he avoids further awkward conversations like that.

Thanks Alison.
#458:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 10:22 pm
    —
Perhaps he will find it easier after a meal and a little more general conversation.
#459:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 12:37 pm
    —
Thanks Alison!
#460:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 1:45 pm
    —
Very awkward for David.
#461:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:19 pm
    —
Soon afterwards they were called in for dinner. It might not have been a formal dinner party, but the von und zu Wertheims’ cook had put on an excellent spread all the same, David thought. He was hungry now: it seemed like a long time since he’d had that biscuit at Gretchen’s; and he tucked in enthusiastically.

“This is absolutely delicious, Marie!” Madge said. “Oh, I do like Austrian cooking. Everyone keeps telling me that the food at the School’s never been the same since Karen left! Of course, I’ve been very lucky having Marie Monier to cook for me all these years, and Joey’s been the same with Anna. I think it was a lucky day for all of us when Dick and I decided to stay at old Frau Pfeifen’s pension when we first came to Briesau all those years ago. Dear me, are you quite all right there, David?”

“Er, fine, thanks. Something just went down the wrong way, that’s all,” David said, hastily taking a gulp of wine to stop himself from choking. This evening was beginning to feel like someone’s very bad idea of a joke! Maybe he could excuse himself to go to bed early by saying that he felt tired? No: that wouldn’t really be very polite. He was just going to have to stick it out.

Much to his relief, the rest of the meal passed off fairly peacefully, with everyone reminiscing about past events and exchanging the latest news of mutual friends and acquaintances; and eventually he started to relax. He accepted a second helping of apple strudel, and was waiting expectantly for Marie to ask her maid Elsa to bring some coffee up from the kitchen when Eugen von und zu Wertheim rose and asked if Jem and David would like to join him in his library. No doubt Marie and Madge would have plenty to chat about amongst themselves, he added, smiling.

Jem stood up immediately and followed their host out of the room, and a moment later a bewildered David followed too. What on earth was all this about? Men and women separating into two separate groups after dinner was a bit Edwardian, wasn’t it? Especially when there were only five people present and they were all old friends! Anyway, wasn’t it the ladies who were supposed to leave the room, or had he got that wrong? Not that it really mattered. But what on earth were they supposed to do now? Was Uncle Eugen going to produce brandy and cigars for the three of them? All right, they were in a castle; and he knew that manners in Austria tended to be more formal than they were at home; but this was ridiculous!

Surprised though he would have been if they had indeed been offered brandy and cigars, he was even more surprised when their host muttered something about having urgent estate business to attend to and asked if the two Englishmen would excuse him. What was going on, he wondered. This was bizarre! Did Auntie Marie have some sort of problem that she wanted to discuss with his mother in private, perhaps? But, if that were the case, why would Uncle Eugen suddenly disappear like that?

Then he saw the look on his father’s face. Oh, this had nothing to do with the von und zu Wertheims at all, had it? Except that their help had obviously been enlisted to enable his father to get him on his own, in a situation from which he couldn’t very well escape without making a scene in front of their host and hostess. But what was it that his father was about to say? He didn't know, but, given the likelihood of its being something to do with the San, should he try to forestall him by getting in first? He was going to have to, wasn't he?

He took a deep breath, hoping that the words would come to him; but he was too late. Before he could say anything at all, his father had started speaking.
#462:  Author: JustJen, Location: sitting on the steps PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:27 pm
    —
And here comes the storm...
#463:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:30 pm
    —
This is so unfair to David. he's a grown man now, and has professional qualifications, so let him use his own judgement.
#464:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:49 pm
    —
I'm sure Marie and Eugen meant well, but oh dear...
#465:  Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:50 pm
    —
Jennie wrote:
This is so unfair to David. he's a grown man now, and has professional qualifications, so let him use his own judgement.


We don't know that! It might be on another matter entirely.... or perhaps Jem has found someone who he knows would be utterly ideal to run the San, and is trying to find a way of telling David that he's OUT.....

Alison, this is being marvellous, but oh, how I want to swear when you leave us dangling like this!
#466:  Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:51 pm
    —
Well, I'd say that Madge is quite definitely living in the past, in this drabble, anyway.
#467:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 4:45 pm
    —
Yes, you have been excessively diligent in your provision of cliffs in this drabble Alison. Please hurry back and tell us what Jem has to say!
#468:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 6:27 pm
    —
I like the cliffs - long may they continue! Laughing

Wonder what Jem has to say to David - and why it couldn't be said in front of Madge?



Thanks Alison.
#469:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 7:25 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I wonder what Jem will say.
#470:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 10:31 pm
    —
Jem may well have some idea of how David has been feeling, and want to talk to him.
#471:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 12:05 pm
    —
“Well, as you’ve probably gathered by now, we weren’t being entirely honest when we said that the reason we’d decided to come to Austria and Switzerland was for a holiday,” Jem said. “There’s something that I need to speak to you about. I’ve been wanting to have a proper talk with you for a while, but you’re not easy to get hold of these days: that’s why I decided to come to Austria whilst you were here rather than waiting until you were back in London. We really haven’t seen much of you at all lately, David: you used to come home fairly regularly, or suggest that we come down to London for the odd weekend, but we’ve seen next to nothing of you recently. Your mother in particular’s been getting quite upset about it.”

“Sorry,” David said guiltily. He really hadn’t handled this very well at all, had he? He should have told his parents months ago that he’d decided that he was going to become a G.P.. Instead, he’d kept putting it off because he hadn’t liked the idea of upsetting anyone; and now he’d upset them anyway, before the subject had even been mentioned.

Oh well, no use crying over spilt milk: he couldn’t go back and change that now. And, with any luck, all his father wanted to say to him this evening was that he ought to come and visit his parents more often, and then when they got back from the Gornetz Platz he’d go and see them and explain everything. And then it would be done at last – and then, whatever the consequences were, he’d deal with them. He’d done a lot of messing about, but he wasn’t doing any more. Gretchen had kept telling him that there was no time like the present, and she’d been right.

“I’m surprised you’re still in London at all, to be honest, never mind seeming to be so chained to the place that you can’t even make it up to Wales to see your parents for a day or two,” Jem was continuing. “When you first went there you said that you weren’t keen on living in big cities and that you were only going to stay there until you were fully qualified. I appreciate that people change their plans and that the bright lights of London can be appealing and so on, but even so! In fact, your mother’s been wondering whether there might be … ah, a young lady involved somewhere along the line?”

“What? Oh: no, there isn’t. I mean, I haven’t got a young lady in London, if that’s what you’re asking,” David said hastily. He tried to lighten the mood a bit. “Trust Mum to think of that! Ever since Len got engaged she’s been dying for me to do the same so that she and Auntie Joey can compare notes on wedding plans! I’m afraid I can’t oblige her on that one, though!”

“That’s what I thought,” Jem said, sounding rather satisfied at having been proven right. “I’ve kept telling her that if you’d found a young lady you were serious about then you’d’ve brought her home to meet us. Although I have to confess that I have sometimes wondered whether maybe you’d found yourself a girl whom you didn’t think you could bring home to meet us … but, anyway, that’s obviously not the case so it doesn’t matter. So it’s the job, then? And the lifestyle? You’re still in London because you enjoy working at the hospital there and you enjoy the life that you lead there? Fair enough, I suppose.”

“I don’t enjoy them!”

David had uttered the words before he could stop himself; and he could have kicked himself. Oh, of all the stupid things to say. He’d just led the way right into the confrontation that he’d been hoping to avoid until he was ready for it.

Well, he’d said it now; and he couldn’t leave it at that. And maybe it was for the best. What had to be said had to be said. Now he just had to try to find the words in which to say it. Well, here went …
#472:  Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 12:20 pm
    —
I think David's outburst is understandable. Jem has just steam-rollered in and made assumptions without giving him a chance to breathe! Not to mention playing the "your mother's very upset" card. (Think's that phrase should be banned from all paternal lexicons!)
#473:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 1:20 pm
    —
I love that phrase "young lady". So old fashioned.

Poor David. This is tough for him.
#474:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 3:38 pm
    —
Oh Jem. Well-meaning, but a little clueless.

Thanks Alison, you are very sneaky with your cunning cliffs...
#475:  Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:04 pm
    —
I'm glad he's going to tell Jem how he feels at last. I hope Jem listens and understands what David is saying though, and doesn't keep on about how much happier he'd be at the San.
#476:  Author: Dawn, Location: Leeds, West Yorks PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 5:14 pm
    —
Love Jem being worried that he'd met someone unsuitable Very Happy
#477:  Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 7:37 pm
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I think it's nice Jem cares enough to ask David what's going on. David is obviously not being very forthcoming so and he is concerned. And if David refuses to see them, it's nice they care enough to see him where he is. I also think it was very tactful having just one of them discuss it with him rather than both. It's less likely for David to end up feeling like its two against one. Hope he can take the chance to talk to his Father, for all he know he may be really supportive of David being a GP.

Thus speaks the eternal optimist
#478:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 9:40 pm
    —
Alison H wrote:
Although I have to confess that I have sometimes wondered whether maybe you’d found yourself a girl whom you didn’t think you could bring home to meet us ...


Wonders if David has done that....


Thanks Alison - hope David will finally explain to his father.
#479:  Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US PostPosted: Tue Mar 06, 2007 11:29 pm
    —
Hopefully David will be able to explain, and Jem to accept his explanation. However, I admit wondering if there isn't something more lurking behind Jem's visit....

Thank you, Mia.Smile
#480:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:41 am
    —
Oh dear - it's such an important discussion; I do hope they can both remain reasonably calm and understanding.
#481:  Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:08 pm
    —
“You don’t enjoy them?” Jem exclaimed. “Oh David, you don’t know how glad I am to hear you say that! I’ve been having a few doubts about what I’m about to say to you, thinking that you were settled in London; but it looks like I’ve been worrying over nothing!”

“Oh – no, I didn’t mean that!” David said in horror. “No – Dad, I think you’ve just taken what I’ve said the wrong way.”

“Let me speak, will you!” Jem said exasperatedly. “You don’t know what I’m going to say yet. Allow me to finish without being interrupted, at least! Now. I’ve been thinking for some time of reducing my hours at the San. Reducing them pretty drastically, in fact: really, I’d like to remain just in a sort of advisory role. I’m away at conferences quite a bit these days, and … well, with Sybil and Josette in Australia your mother and I would like more time to be able to go and visit them, and also I’m just not as young as I used to be. Some of these new things that’re coming out – well, it’s time for a younger chap to take over, and during the time I've had to think after this car accident I've realised that I need to admit that.

“I don’t know how far you’re aware of this, but the original idea when we opened the San in Switzerland was that your Uncle Jack would run it for ten years or so, and then come back to work with me in Wales. It’ll be ten years this year; but Jack’s explained to me that really he and Joey aren’t ready to move back to Britain yet – in fact, they’re not sure that they ever will be. They’ve got their friends there and they enjoy living on the Platz; and Felicity, Cecil, Phil and Claire are all at the School there and will be for some time yet. Plus once Len marries Reg Entwistle she’s going to be settled out there as well and they won’t want to be too far from her.

“Which is all very nice for them, but it does rather beggar the question of what’s to happen with the San in Wales – and that, of course, is where you come in. You’ve always known that it was all going to be yours eventually, and I must admit that I hoped that you’d have come to work there with me already, but I can understand that a young man doesn’t necessarily want to feel that his father – or even his uncle – is breathing down his neck when he’s working. But, with me pretty much out of the picture and Jack staying at the Swiss San, you’re not going to have that problem.

“Oh, I know that you’ve no experience of working at the San and that you couldn’t take over as Head there yet, and that someone else’d have to take over the role for the next few years, but … well, wouldn’t now be a good time for you to come home, David? The San’s there waiting for you: you’d have a big say in things even if someone else was in overall charge for the time being. And your mother and I are there waiting for you as well: it’d make us both so proud to see you working there, and to have you close by. You’ve just said that you’re not happy in London – so what is there to wait for? There’s no time like the present, after all!”

Last edited by Alison H on Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:15 pm; edited 2 times in total
#482:  Author: Lexi, Location: Liverpool PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:12 pm
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Noooooooooo, don't get bullied into it David!
#483:  Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:14 pm
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Now let him speak, Jem - you're not picking up the vibes here!


Poor David - hope he doesn't bottle it! Laughing


Thanks Alison
#484:  Author: Lottie, Location: Humphrey's Corner PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:16 pm
    —
Why won't Jem let David speak?!?!!! Mad But then why change the habits of a lifetime? He's always rather inclined to ride roughshod over everybody else, isn't he? Poor David - I wonder what's going to happen when (if ever) he is allowed to get a word in.

Thanks, Alison.
#485:  Author: bethany,  PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:46 pm
    —
I am really enjoying this, but poor David and poor Jem, I think they will both be pretty unhappy by the end of their chat Sad

I hope David doesn't get talked into doing something he doesn't want to do. Also, I hope that Jem understands that David can make his own choices, even if they aren't what his parents might have planned.

Looking forward to the next update!
#486:  Author: leahbelle, Location: Kilmarnock PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 1:39 pm
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Thanks, Alison. Looking forward to finding out what happens.
#487:  Author: Lizzie, Location: A little village on the Essex/Suffolk border PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 4:45 pm
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Oh, but Jem thinks that David wants the San but was holding back because he didn't want his Dad breathing down his neck. Oh no!

Sort this out Alison! Only you have the power!
#488:  Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 5:08 pm
    —
Thanks, Alison. I'm sorry that Jem hasn't really given David a chance to say anything yet.
#489:  Author: Dawn, Location: Leeds, West Yorks PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 5:31 pm
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Agreeing with Lizzie that Jem's beeen worried about David not going to the San because he's still running it

Hopefully (fingers crossed) he'll listen to what David has to say and will do his best to understand.
#490:  Author: dorian, Location: Dublin PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:09 pm
    —
Oh dear. I was so hoping that Jem was going to say "sorry, you can't have the San at all". Now he's going to be all annoyed that David doesn't want it.
#491:  Author: Pat, Location: Doncaster PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:27 pm
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I can see why Jem wants to have his say without David butting in. Just hope he'll do the same for David! Depends on what sort of a Jem we have here!
#492:  Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 11:23 pm
    —
Oh dear, I do hope they can be patient with one another; they do care about one another. And of course, from Jem's point of view, this seems quite reasonable, and like any parent he wants what is best for his son. I do hope he doesn't see David's reaction as a rejection of him and Madge.
The CBB -> Ste Therese's House


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