Happy Memories of the Past.

The mists of the past ...
2008-Feb-27 - The Happy Parsonage..


The parsonage in B., where my sister and her family lived for 27 years, is at least 150 years old. We spent many holidays there, during the time that my brother-in-law was a minister of the Reformed Church in this village. Two of their children were born here. My mother celebrated her eightieth birthday here and in the church opposite the house, two of her grandchildren sang and played for her. The house has 5 bedrooms and a bathroom on the first floor. Downstairs are two livingrooms, a study, an enormous kitchen and a sun room. My broter-in-law has been retired since 1994 now and he and my sister live in a far smaller house now. Their children have their own homes and come to stay every now and then.
I remember that my children loved to stay with their aunt and uncle when they were young. My sister has a lot of imagination. One day she told the children that there was an old treasure hidden in a hollow tree in the garden. It was all written on an old map of the garden, but they had to look for the map first. She then suggested that such old maps are sometimes hidden in old bibles like the one she had on the mantelpiece in the largest livingroom. Of course the children went looking for the map in the bible. And lo and behold there it was: an old dirty map of the garden with miraculously enough the same trees that must have been there 120 years ago. There was also the hollow tree and when they went climbing in it, they found a real treasure. ( My sister had bought some plastic necklaces and rings in the supermarket). The children had been busy all afternoon and they had enjoyed themselves immensely.Opposite this house, which is no longer a parsonage, is the church, built in the Middle Ages.