Kathleen Leslie
RIP July 2020
Born and lived most of her life in Perthshire, now residing in Ayrshire.
Aside from family and friends her other interests include visiting museums,
art galleries and old church yards.
Also likes reading and cooking and uses all her interests in her creative writing.
Click HERE to read more from me ...
Born and lived most of her life in Perthshire, now residing in Ayrshire.
Aside from family and friends her other interests include visiting museums,
art galleries and old church yards.
Also likes reading and cooking and uses all her interests in her creative writing.
Click HERE to read more from me ...
Remembering Miss Millar
Whenever I think of Miss Millar, a feeling of fondness and warmth of memory comes over me. What I mostly remember was her keenness for gardening, her enthusiasm for the WRI, which she would try to persuade non-members to join. Also her church going activities, indeed she was as is commonly referred to of people of her ilk - a‘pillar of society’. Yet for all her involvement in the community there was a certain reservation about her, as if she didn’t want to be engaged at a personal level too much. In many ways she kept herself to herself.
When first I became acquainted with Miss Millar she was nearing retirement from her work at a local bleaching and linen factory. Miss Millar oversaw the machinist who sewed the cloth into sheets and pillowslips, tablecloths and napkins for hotels,catering and retail establishments.
She had been employed there for many years working her way, over time from sewing machinist to supervisor, a position she proudly held until her retiral.
Although acquainted with Miss Millar she remained a bit of an enigma to me.
What I did know about her was that she had moved from a farm on which her parents had worked about thirty years previously. On retiral her father had to leave the house the family had occupied as it had been provided along with his job. Tied housing it was commonly referred to.
Why Miss Millar had never married remained a mystery. Some said that she’d had a sweetheart who was killed in the war and that, like many a spinster of the time she had stayed true to his memory. Others whispered that she’d been jilted.
It certainly hadn’t been for lack of good looks or personality. Although past the age of youth and the prime of middle age she was a bonnie woman, slim and with a pleasant disposition. Her hair, which once being blond, had changed to a thick creaminess of colour. It was thick and sat just above her collar. It had a hint of a wave thought it which softly and gently framed her face giving a glow to her features. Her skin too was of a creamy tone where the lines of cruel age upon it had blended in rather that dug deep like etchings. There’s a saying in these parts that God grows our faces until we’re twenty, thereafter we grow our own. Miss Millar indeed had grown a pleasant face and countenance over time.
She was also the embodiment of old fashioned manners and charm, her conversation beinginteresting and polite.
On retiral she could be seen more often in her garden. Perhaps it had become a substitute for the children she never had. As years passed and I had moved away from the area I would occasionally, by chance meetings of someone hear about her. Eventually, when in her nineties she died having lived a full and worthwhile life.
I hope that Miss Millar, along with the others whose memories I fondly hold is in that place where it is said that the weeds of earthy life never grow.
Whenever I think of Miss Millar, a feeling of fondness and warmth of memory comes over me. What I mostly remember was her keenness for gardening, her enthusiasm for the WRI, which she would try to persuade non-members to join. Also her church going activities, indeed she was as is commonly referred to of people of her ilk - a‘pillar of society’. Yet for all her involvement in the community there was a certain reservation about her, as if she didn’t want to be engaged at a personal level too much. In many ways she kept herself to herself.
When first I became acquainted with Miss Millar she was nearing retirement from her work at a local bleaching and linen factory. Miss Millar oversaw the machinist who sewed the cloth into sheets and pillowslips, tablecloths and napkins for hotels,catering and retail establishments.
She had been employed there for many years working her way, over time from sewing machinist to supervisor, a position she proudly held until her retiral.
Although acquainted with Miss Millar she remained a bit of an enigma to me.
What I did know about her was that she had moved from a farm on which her parents had worked about thirty years previously. On retiral her father had to leave the house the family had occupied as it had been provided along with his job. Tied housing it was commonly referred to.
Why Miss Millar had never married remained a mystery. Some said that she’d had a sweetheart who was killed in the war and that, like many a spinster of the time she had stayed true to his memory. Others whispered that she’d been jilted.
It certainly hadn’t been for lack of good looks or personality. Although past the age of youth and the prime of middle age she was a bonnie woman, slim and with a pleasant disposition. Her hair, which once being blond, had changed to a thick creaminess of colour. It was thick and sat just above her collar. It had a hint of a wave thought it which softly and gently framed her face giving a glow to her features. Her skin too was of a creamy tone where the lines of cruel age upon it had blended in rather that dug deep like etchings. There’s a saying in these parts that God grows our faces until we’re twenty, thereafter we grow our own. Miss Millar indeed had grown a pleasant face and countenance over time.
She was also the embodiment of old fashioned manners and charm, her conversation beinginteresting and polite.
On retiral she could be seen more often in her garden. Perhaps it had become a substitute for the children she never had. As years passed and I had moved away from the area I would occasionally, by chance meetings of someone hear about her. Eventually, when in her nineties she died having lived a full and worthwhile life.
I hope that Miss Millar, along with the others whose memories I fondly hold is in that place where it is said that the weeds of earthy life never grow.
Copyright © 2013 K Leslie - All rights reserved