Carol’s Column
Mothers of the world unite for you have only brown paper to lose
ANITA Snodwick, desperate and beyond help, jumped out of the bedroom window last night.
The thing that drove her beyond the brink of despair?
A week ago, little Herbie Snodwick, dimple-cheeked and dumpling-faced, aged six years old, attended primary school for the first time.
On Wednesday, Anita fetched him, thrilled to find that Herbie had enjoyed his first day at school so much.
He had 11 exercise books and two text books to cover.
On Thursday, Herbie was even happier. By a stroke of good luck he'd been seated next to his very best friend, Archie, and he'd also won 342 silkworms in a class raffle.
He brought home 21 exercise books and one text book to cover.
On Friday, Herbie brought home a black eye, three marbles, 24 exercise books and seven text books to cover.
Which made Anita feel somewhat depressed.
The book story continued throughout the week and slowly Anita became desperate.
She began to hide from Herbie when he came home from school.
And then yesterday, something snapped.
Anita took one look at the pile of drab, skinny, uncovered exercise books Herbie was pulling out of his satchel, shrieked: "I can't anymore! This is the end!" And jumped out of the bedroom window.
Fortunately, the Snodwicks lived in a single-storey house and Anita sustained nothing worse than a bruised rump.
But I knew how she felt.
Right now 11-million mothers throughout South Africa are covering 103-million exercise books with 100 000km of brown paper.
Which is a mind-boggling thought.
What is more, they are covering them with carefully-folded edges and neatly-stuck corners in case the teacher makes them do it again.
Mothers with more than one child might as well opt out of living for a week.
There just isn't time to do the things that mothers always do because each and every moment is devoted to covering books.
For instance: "I'm sorry, I'd love to come and have my corns removed but I can't because I've got to cover Nicky's books."
Or: "I can't come and see the tear-jerking, jaw-locking, side-splitting movie up the road. I'm busy covering books."
Or: "I can't go and fetch your mother at the airport — I'm covering books." (Thank heavens).
This year, the Zoo Lake Mothers' League decided to rebel.
Geraldine Hatchett, always a militant, vociferous fighter, called a meeting over tea and scones.
It was attended by 793 mothers — an indication of how strongly mothers felt about the issue of covering books in brown paper.
Geraldine Hatchett, never a woman to mince words, started the ball rolling.
She spat out her cigar and in her gravelly voice shouted: "Mothers of the world unite for you have naught to lose but your brown paper!"
Mothers throughout the hall cheered loudly.
"Now is the time to cast off the sticky tape of oppression!"
More cheers. The spirit of protest was strong. Geraldine Hatchett had the mothers in the palm of her hand.
"Are we going to sit back and let ourselves be swallowed by brown paper?" She yelled above the voices.
The response was immediate.
"No, no," the mothers shouted nodding their heads enthusiastically but carefully so as not to disturb their new R22,50 hairdos.
"Now is the time to protest," said Geraldine Hatchett in a rumbling tone.
"That's it, ban the bomb and all that jazz!" shouted the rather timid, mousy mother sitting next to me. "We'll show them."
After much debate, for each and every mother had to have her say, it was decided that brown paper would be banished. As would covering books.
A small, radical splinter group of mothers, alienated themselves totally from the greater body of mothers by refusing cream (it was decadent, they said) with their scones and insisting on drinking lemon tea to keep their already trim figures in shape.
They then insisted on marching on Pretoria carrying slogans such as: COVERING IS CRAZY or BROWN IS OUT.
There have been some interesting sequels to the brown paper saga.
Brown paper has been banished from this house.
Why only yesterday I discovered Jamie covering his history book with the centre-page spread of Playboy magazine.
"Do you think that's suitable?" I asked dubiously. "Won't it get dirty quickly with all that white space showing?"
"Ma, it gives my history book a different perspective. Besides, it will brighten Mr Barker's day," replied Jamie.
Mind you, it seems that this is only the beginning.
When my spouse returned from work last night, he kissed me gaily and being unusually observant remarked: "What's the matter? Why is your right arm in a sling?"
"It's exhausted from filling in forms. In the past two weeks since school started again I've lost count of the forms I've had to fill in."
He paused reflectively. Then: "It's all nonsense," he said. "You mothers should get together and do something about it."
Right.
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Editorial note
Masthead reads "Sunday Express LIVING, January 17, 1982", page 5; 17 January 1982 was a Sunday. The standing head "Carol's COLUMN" is set over a drawing of her, and the column is signed "Carol Lazar" at the foot. The drawing is signed "dave GASKILL" and is cropped from the close-up, page-162. The clipping is trimmed with scissors on a slant, so the first two columns end higher than the rest, and the last column has gone grey in the photocopy and reads only at nine or ten times magnification. The title is not the same column as "Mothers of the world unite" of 25 January 1981, which the source catalogue lists separately a year earlier.
Transcribed as printed. Doubtful readings:
- "11 exercise books", "21 exercise books", "24 exercise books": the paper sets the word "excercise" at all three of these, in the first column only, and "exercise" everywhere else in the column. Corrected here as a plain slip.