Yesterday we had a visit from two of my cousins and while they were with us we took a trip out to Currie for lunch, also visiting the house that he left fifty years ago to emigrate to Canada. There was a fortuitous encounter with the present owner, and we had a chat about the street then and now. When my cousin was working in Edinburgh with the Royal Bank of Scotland, I stayed in that house with him and his wife while attending a course at the RBS Training College in the city, and I also remember spending a short holiday there, so there were memories for me too.

While reminiscing later about our family history, he sent by AirDrop a few very old photos of occasions before I was born, but I recognised the people as younger versions of those I knew. The two you see have my four grandparents at the centre. Being the second son of the family, I was called after my maternal grandfather, Jared Woods -Jerry, as he was known by his workmates. He worked down one of the local pits until he was in his seventies, and died when I was very young. I have one outstanding memory of him when one day, in the late afternoon, my mother and I were in their house in Boyd Street in Prestwick when he came home from the mine. Granny had his tea of mince and tatties ready for him and, while he was eating it, I was standing by the table. With his fork he scooped some up and I opened my mouth to receive it gratefully. Looking back, I sense the pride he had in this tiny boy who bore his name – there was another grandson who had Jared as a middle name, and he wasn’t pleased! Granny Woods had been Mary Bryan – Polly – and both my late sister and the other cousin visiting us were given her name, neither known as Mary or Polly, but that didn’t matter. The birth certificate was what counted. Jared and Mary – Jerry and Polly – are in the photo below at the wedding of one of their sons. They had three daughters and four sons.

When my mother and father were married in March 1945, they set up home with my paternal grandparents, and that was how it was until 1962, when Grandpa Hay died. Granny Hay had died in 1958. Like many grannies of that time, she could be a disciplinarian and then relent by cuddling me close – I was known as ‘a deil o’ a boy!’ On one famous occasion as I was chasing my sister round the room, she tripped and banged her forehead on a handle of the bureau, creating a gash that required a couple of stitches. I was quite shocked, so Granny gave me a wee brandy toddy to help me get over it. I blame her for how much I like a glass of Courvoisier. Grandpa was John Hay – Jock (pronounced Joke) to many of the wider family and workmates. He gave me my very first watch, because that’s what Granny had wanted to do but passed away before I was old enough for it. It was a small Ingersoll with luminous green hands and numbers. They also had three girls and four boys, and of the seven my father was the youngest. At one point in our family, we had five John Hays – one Jock, two Johns, an Ian and a Jack. And I could have had even more cousins than I had if the three Woods girls hadn’t married three of the Hay sons. The picture below is of their Golden Wedding celebration in 1951 and there are not many people in it that I don’t remember or have at least some warm memories of. Almost all of them are gone now, but they remain in the memory banks. Looking back from my present vantage point, it was a very different world, and one that would be impossible to return to even if I wanted – which I don’t. But this is my story. This is the family into which I was born and in which I grew up. I am fortunate to be able to look back on these people and remember them with fondness. Their DNA and personalities helped shape who I am for better or worse. I know they loved me, and with the passing of the years I have become conscious of just how much I have been shaped by them, even if, on occasions, this has made me different from them.