It was set in motion before I was born...
My father had no family in Los Angeles. After WWII he lived in a rooming house named Windsor House, run by a couple who later became just like grandparents to me. When they retired, they moved to a house on E. 122st Street in Los Angeles, with perhaps a half acre of land. This area later became known as South Central Los Angeles (Watts).
Ms Moore was educated in a convent in France. I believe there was a Turkish prince in her family and her great grandfather was Count Antonie Romuald Wardecki, a Polish patriot, exiled to live Paris.
Captain Ernest Martin was retired Scotland Yard. He told us wonderful stories, but we always asked him to retell the true tale of the Fleet Street Murders (Sweeney Todd).
As children, we visited Ms Moore and Captain often. I especially remember summer times. I was the eldest and was allowed to take the gathering basket out to the hen house to find an egg or two.
I believed their fenced yard was in the country. They grew fruits, figs, vegetables and berries. We were allowed to pick whatever we could eat. I had my first passion fruit there, with its yummy creamy interior. It was an exotic plant the Captain explained to me. He nurtured it along, telling me it was not native to California.
Several large lavender plants grew at the door of Ms Moore's art studio. Every year she would gift me with sachets filled with her dried lavender. I still love lavender and its smell gives me comfort. I find it frequently when I am in Italy, growing in the wild and in Tuscan gardens.
Ms Moore’s pickled shallots were exquisite. I started collecting recipes at a very early age. I still have her handwritten recipe for these little onions.
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Miss Madeline Moore’s Pickled Onions*
(Written by her on a piece of brown paper)
Peel onions (and separate into cloves). Put them in salted water to soak overnight. Make a little cheese cloth bag and fill it with mixed pickle spice and put it into a saucepan of vinegar to boil (vinegar according to the quantity of pickles). Then put the onions into jars and pour over vinegar. Leave enough space to put in spice bag. Let soak for a couple of days and you may have to add some more vinegar to cover to allow for vinegar with has soaked into onions. It won't hurt to allow a little of the mixed spice to get into the jars but not too much. Then cover and put away.
Watch the jars from time to time in case you have to put in some more vinegar to cover.
Type of Mixed Pickling Spice: Cassic, allspice, mustard seed, coriander, ginger, bay leaves, cloves, pepper, cardamon, chillies, mace, mustard seed oil.
*These onions were grown in her garden. They separated into sections as a bulb of garlic might separate into cloves. I've never again seen onions like this since my childhood.
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Ms Moore made jams and preserves from their yard’s bounty. Each jar was unique in size and shape, as she recycled all commercial glass jars. Her jams were sealed by paraffin wax. I was fascinated by their way of living.
She also had a string drawer and a paper drawer. She never wasted anything. I would ask permission to peek inside her kitchen cupboards and drawers. Those neatly folded brown papers and wound string balls were fascinating to me. Their entire house was an adventure, just waiting for a young curious child. Its foreignness was a haven and I was enchanted by their European lifestyle.
I remember the toilet paper, bought in bulk during WW II. After 20 years, she still had a full supply of this very thin, very brittle sharp crunchy paper. Her bathroom always had a wonderful smell of Yardley’s lavender soap, which I still use today, even though the original formula was changed a few years ago.
On her dresser, Ms Moore had large rose colored, velvet pin cushion, holding various hat pins, all long and sharp. She had a old wicker sewing basket filled with scissors, thimbles and mysterious tools for mending.
I learned how to make tea and eat Roquefort cheese on French bread. She always had a fresh baguette on the counter. She would talk to me in French, if I asked. I dreamed of speaking French too. My awareness of the possibility of knowing other cultures of the world was born in their home.
Ms Moore always purchased tickets for the Irish Sweepstakes, with promises we would all return to England if she won. I anxiously awaited that winning ticket.
For Christmas sweets, we were given tiny boxed Italian candies called Torrone. Cremona, my Italian hometown, is the birthplace of Torrone, where it was first made in 1441. I just now realize, my introduction to Cremona started when I was a child.
We children were always dressed in our best clothes to visit Ms Moor and Captain. Due to our strict upbringing, we never caused any trouble or distress. The Captain was jovial and kind. He taught me table manners, including how to use a table knife properly. I tried to mimic their European eating customs.
At Christmas time, after our afternoon meal, Ms Moore would hand Captain a dish containing the warmed Plum Pudding (canned and from Britain). He would pour Brandy on the cake and then we children would wait in anticipation for the next step. With a match he would spark the brandy and which would flame up. After the flames had burnt out, the cake would be sliced and topped with a dollop of homemade “hard sauce” (homemade with unsalted butter, powdered sugar and milk).
I remember outdoor picnics in their gazebo. Captain told us pirates had roamed this land and he thought buried treasure, perhaps a whole chest of coins, was on the property. Each trip to their home, we would ask permission to look for treasure and each time, we found coins, American coins, in the gravel and area surrounding the gazebo. The thrill of finding that treasure still brings memories of pirates and adventure to me. When we were much older, my mother told me the truth about the treasure, how Captain had seeded the area with coins for us. In our innocence, it was a magical place.
My father never allowed us to ring the gong with its tiny wooden mallet. I was allowed to pull on the dangling, pine cone shaped weights, to wind the cuckoo clock. Later, as a teenager, I was granted clock-winding privileges. Using an old key, I carefully wound both the clock and its chime mechanism. Today I have my own Windsor chiming clock, similar to theirs.
Several times, we listened to Enrico Caruso (February 25, 1873 – August 2, 1921) recordings on their old Victrola Player. It was my first taste of classical music and opera. Listen to Caruso below (2 minutes).
Turkish rugs covered the floors and for tea, we were allowed to use the special sterling silver tongs to take just one sugar cube from the sugar holder.
For Christmas there was always a platter of dried dates, figs and apricots with tiny real ivory forks. Often, the house smelled a little of oil paints, as Miss Moore was an amateur artist. Several of her portraits of Winston Churchill and the Catholic Pope were on the mantel and walls. In the fireplace, a small British heater would glow on cool days.
Every Christmas I would look forward to their gift to me of old books. I’m not certain Ms Moore and Captain knew what an influence they were on me. One year, I received a set of Grimm’s and Anderson Fairy Tales. I read them from cover to cover, several times. These were scary, often sad tales of lands far away. I dreamed of visiting exotic places.
I took French in High School but lasted only a few days. The French teacher decided I was not suited to form the proper sounds in my throat. She insisted that I take German instead. I studied Latin, German, Spanish but I was never a successful speaker.
One day, Ms Moore suggested I find a pen-pal. She gave me her Catholic magazine, which listed students my own age who also had the desire to become acquainted with other cultures. I begin correspondence with four students: Michael of India, Daryl of Trinidad, Wilma of Scotland and a girl in Denmark. I recall I used money earned by baby-sitting to purchase stamps and sheets of sky-blue stationary from the Post Office, which came with prepaid airmail postage.
During the Cold War years, these friends became an important part of my young life. With the threat of nuclear war always on our minds, I worried I might never grow up to see other parts of the world.
Over the years I lost contact with each of them but I never forgot our friendships.
And this week, after 40+ years, I was found by Michael on Face Book. The computer age has truly opened the world as never before.
Last evening on July, 23, 2010, for the first time, Michael and I talked by phone. It was a wonderful, fantastic experience. The voice I heard, seemed familiar to me...just as if we had spoken to each other before. The nervous feeling in my stomach disappeared the moment I heard him say, "Yes, this is Michael."
It's an indescribable feeling...we are still friends! The bond we created has held for all these years.
I am so glad to have him and his family back in my life again. Thank you Michael for searching the world for me.
Michael, thank you also for helping to bring back memories of Ms Moore and Captain. This has given me the opportunity to honor them.
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