There is something extremely emotional about re-visiting your family home especially when it was an Orphanage where you spent the first eleven years of your life. Yet this is no sad story because from the moment I was handed to Nancy, the Nursery Nanny, as a tiny baby, I began a life of magic, enchantment and most of all love. She never tired of telling me growing up that from the moment I was placed in her arms she knew God had sent her a daughter. Over the years my wonderful mother told me many incredible stories of how she had tried to give every child in the nursery, not only care, but love too. Her smile said, it’s going to be alright and she weaved enchantment and joy into their hearts and mind effortlessly.
The Puppy and the Orphan
When I wrote my first book Christmas at the Ragdoll Orphanage I felt as though she was standing beside me. I could almost hear her voice reminding me of the many stories she had shared with me over the years. My beautiful mother was a remarkable women who even near the end of her life and suffering from dementia would often whisper, ‘where are the children.’
Nazareth House Orphanage was built in 1817 and in 1917 was bought by the Poor Sisters of Nazareth when it became a private school for girls before becoming an orphanage. 100 years later the house has come full circle and is once more a private school for girls. When the last child had left, Nazareth House Orphanage stood quiet and silent until a very special lady called Angela walked down that driveway and knew this was the perfect place. Here, she would nurture, care for and teach children. Angela is the Head Teacher of the school today and my mother would have loved her. The children in her care and the staff she works with are in great, safe, caring and loving hands.
In October this year I was invited by Angela to visit the school to see the centenary exhibitions the children had been working on which were incredible. I was then taken to the room I shared with my mother all those years ago. I stood looking out of the window onto the chapel roof and cried. How I missed her. I was an incredible moment.
The grounds are very beautiful and when I was invited to attend the children’s Christmas Carol concert in December 2016 I stood at the top of the driveway looking down at the house. I felt as though I was a small child again. It looked exactly the same and my eyes wandered to the wooded area that ran all the way down the left side of the driveway and I smiled.
The wood was a wonderful place where we all played as children, running around the trees and gathering blue bells and crocuses. At Christmas mum would dress us up warm, put on our wellington books, hat, coats, and scarves. No mean feat for 30 children all under five years old. We would race outside and make our way to the wood making footprints in the snow.
As I stood there, I could feel the magic of those days and then suddenly I heard the barking of a dog somewhere nearby. I closed my eyes and there in my mind’s eye I saw a little boy standing in the wood his grief so heavy he was unable to speak. Mummy and Daddy were stars in the sky they had told him so he screamed up at the Heavens praying they could hear him. I could see my mother as she often was in those days, sitting with a child on her knee making them feel wanted and loved then telling them stories whilst wiping their tears.
I also looked saw the old laundry house which in the 1960s had been turned into a baby home and remembered the cries of the young girls who had left their babies there and the joy of those who would become mothers because of them.
I hurried home and began to write the story of Little Billy Miller and how Nancy and the puppy helped to heal his heart and, once more, find him a place to call home.
The story was unfolding before me as I stood looking at my childhood home. I laughed and cried writing this book and I hope reading it will warm your heart a little and remind us all that in every corner of the world there are people who dedicate their lives to bringing a little love into our lives. My mother was most definitely one of them.