Glass

Dad used to say polish glass with newspaper and vinegar. It wouldn’t leave any smears.

Five minutes a day to keep on top of the garden weeds.

“While you’re under my roof, it’s my rules!”

“You’re not treating this house like a hotel.” If I got in late.

“I’ll bang your heads together, knock some sense into you,” if me and my brother squabbled.

Being “up shit creek without a paddle,” was another favourite.

Eating a hot curry would mean “shitting through the eye of needle” the next day.

“That’s the way the cookie crumbles.”

“Don’t get ideas above your station.”

“You can’t polish a turd,” he’d say, as a matter of fact.

Or that someone had “a face like a slapped arse”

Or was “Mutton dressed as lamb.”

“Don’t mess with this kiddie, ‘cause this kiddie doesn’t mess.”

“Don’t let the bastards get you down.”

“Hard work never killed anyone.”

He was right about the glass.

Jane Barlow is a former journalist, who loves words, books, poems, coffee shops, tea and cake.
She is currently editing a first novel and completing a journaling course.