Meddlesome Matty and I Should’ve listened to Nanna

The recent post about my Granddad Hines and World War 1
https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/11/09/nov-11th-flanders-fields-remembering-war/
brought to the surface other memories , of my Nanny Hines ( his wife and my Nanna) tucking me into her lovely feather bed as she told me stories of my mum as a little girl, spoke of poems and sang the songs of my childhood. .

One particular poem, she would say was just for me – Meddlesome Matty. I was the “curious grandchild” the one who seemed to always be in the thick of any event from apple scrumping, climbing over the high walls that were covered in broken glass- set into the top to keep out the villians, in the middle of any altercation-

a lonely little petunia in a onion patch

my dad used to say. The trouble was I always wanted to see why I was being kept out! or what was going on. This little girl was always with her boy cousins getting into mischief, being the one who would be first to crawl through the boarded up doors of bombed out buildings – and the excuse

” I just wanted to see”

I have a strong feeling Braedyn has inherited the trait.

No! I didn’t get into Mummy’s lipstick!! WHO ME????

Meddlesome Matty was recited often as a “lesson” to me as was

The Little Mother Goose (1912), illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith.

There was a little girl
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 1807–1882 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
There was a little girl,
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
When she was good,
She was very good indeed,
But when she was bad she was horrid.

One ugly trick has often spoil’d
The sweetest and the best;
Matilda, though a pleasant child,
One ugly trick possess’d,
Which, like a cloud before the skies,
Hid all her better qualities.

Sometimes she’d lift the tea-pot lid,
To peep at what was in it,
Or tilt the kettle, if you did
But turn your back a minute.
In vain you told her not to touch,
Her trick of meddling grew so much.

Her grandmamma went out one day,
And by mistake she laid
Her spectacles and snuff-box gay
Too near the little maid;
“Ah! well,” thought she, “I’ll try them on,
As soon as grandmamma is gone. ”

Forthwith she placed upon her nose
The glasses large and wide;
And looking round, as I suppose,
The snuff-box too she spied:
“Oh! what a pretty box is that;
I’ll open it,” said little Matt.

“I know that grandmamma would say,
‘Don’t meddle with it, dear;’
But then, she’s far enough away,
And no one else is near:
Besides, what can there be amiss
In opening such a box as this? ”

So thumb and finger went to work
To move the stubborn lid,
And presently a mighty jerk
The mighty mischief did;
For all at once, ah! woful case,
The snuff came puffing in her face.
( If you wonder what ‘snuff’ is, it is ground up tobacco leaves flavoured with fruit or flowers or spices. People put it up their noses )

Poor eyes, and nose, and mouth, beside
A dismal sight presented;
In vain, as bitterly she cried,
Her folly she repented.
In vain she ran about for ease;
She could do nothing now but sneeze.

She dash’d the spectacles away,
To wipe her tingling eyes,
And as in twenty bits they lay,
Her grandmamma she spies.
“Heyday! and what’s the matter now?”
Says grandmamma, with lifted brow.

Matilda, smarting with the pain,
And tingling still, and sore,
Made many a promise to refrain
From meddling evermore.
And ’tis a fact, as I have heard,
She ever since has kept her word.

Ann Taylor
(30 January 1782 – 20 December 1866 / Colchester, England)

Unfortunately, I made no such promises –

– I have been burned by reputation, http://web.archive.org/web/20090108004352/http://thewomblog.com/?p=296
sneezed at by the powers that be

https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/non-quixote-tired-of-tilting-at-windmills/ on so many occasions,
plowed in where angels feared to tread

https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/category/cra/.

I have smarted with the pain of “people” –
https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2010/12/04/dec-4th-how-cold-is-cold-lombardi/

https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2011/09/26/what-are-they-thinking-the-thought-process-stops-here/

become dizzy with the spin of government and legalese

https://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/11/13/away-with-the-fairies-living-in-lorain/

And still it seems I haven’t learned the lesson my Nanna tried to teach me – time for Meddlesome Mattie to grow up me thinks before I “snuff” it

For more poems by Ann Taylor

http://www.poemhunter.com/ann-taylor/poems/