The Random Thoughts of Henry Holloway
When I first left the city with its rush of traffic, it was to live in a small village where the main event of the day was the passing of the bus. Leaving home for the first time was something of a wrench. Still, it was a wonderful experience and I met some wonderful people. There was my landlady, for example. For many years she had kept the young preacher, and how she mothered every one of them! When I think back to those days of bread baked in the pot oven, on the open hearth with a turf fire, I almost wish I were back. As for chicken or meat - you have never tasted either of them properly cooked unless you have tasted them from the pot oven. Those were the days when I even had a whole chicken occasionally for my supper! My landlady did it all on the princely sum of £ 1 per week. Maybe that is why, in return, I tried to help her a little.
We lived, my landlady and I, in a wee ‘sweety’ shop in the main street of the village. The folk called it a town and there was a railway station at it. But, city man as I was, to me it was but a straggling village with one street. Sometimes I went behind the counter in the wee shop and served the customers, mostly youngsters. Trade was never too brisk and the youngsters always wanted as big value for money as they could get.
Sometimes, like all shopkeepers, we did not buy too wisely. Youngsters were much more choosey about their confections in those days than they are now. You couldn’t fob them off with something they didn’t want. So, periodically we had some sweets that just wouldn’t sell and one day I had a happy idea. It was really a hark back to my own childhood. We got bits of cardboard and some highly coloured bits of wallpaper and we made them into packets. Into these we put an assortment of sweets, some the youngsters liked and some they didn’t like so well. We put these ‘giant’ packets into the window as ‘lucky dips’ and we sold them at one penny a time.
It’s a funny thing, but lots of people can’t resist a ‘lucky dip’. I remember once during our holidays going to see some of the ‘mock auctions’ we had heard about and which had created quite a bit of stir in the news. People were trying to discover what the catch was. Others couldn’t resist being caught. One woman spent all the money she had brought with her for her holiday. Another woman, having got her man’s pay on Friday night spent the lot.
Sensible people want to see that they are getting value for their money. You couldn’t run your home on the ‘lucky dip’ idea. And you can’t run life that way either. When we were youngsters we used to say, when we were swopping something, ‘fair exchange is no robbery’.
Well, that’s how it ought to be in life. To be an honest worker you’ve got to earn your pay and to be an honest employer you’ve got to pay full value for work done. To get the most out of life you’ve got to pay full value for work done. To get the most out of life you’ve got to be prepared to put all you have into it. The world still remembers a woman of whom Christ said, ‘She hath done what she could!’ That is still the real test of life.
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