Open Writing

From time to time, especially on Monday mornings when schoolchildren and I are highly inflammable, I lapse into the unforgivable habit of prefacing all conversation with my, ‘When I was your age . . .’ rhetoric.

I bore them all purple with my half-true descriptions concerning my father’s cruel black leather belt, with its brass buckle and what he would have done had I displayed half their cheek.

In reality it only left its trousers once, in my presence anyway, when I rebelled at not being allowed an ice cream wafer. These were reserved for adults. Children had to be content with penny cornets. One day I returned with two wafers and two cornets and, taking the wafer I had already started licking, I dispensed the others accordingly, handing my dad a cornet.

This outrage was greeted with another quick swap by my dad and an unprintable curse from me that roughly translated as “You greedy beggers.” That was the beginning and the end of my relationship with the black belt.

My present outburst was created at a school careers evening. We received a long list of golden opportunities all represented by an enthusiastic team of informers. All were eager to share their knowledge on working conditions, perks and wages and qualifications needed, the only drawback being the present lack of vacancies. But most include a training period with grants to apply for, which hopefully may keep them occupied until prospects are brighter.

After perusing the list, one of our dissidents, whose ambitions have fluctuated between becoming a librarian, a designer or hairdresser during the last month, has made her final decision. “I want to be housewife,” she declares.

Teaching them the art of self-respect and the importance of being earnest is not helped by the example of State spongers.

In my schooldays, when I was your age, I never heard anyone actually confess enjoyment in their work. Satisfaction came at the end of the week in a small manila envelope. Work was something my father left his bed for at 5.30am. With his ‘jock’ in his pocket he tramped the two miles across the valley towards the roar and grind of textile machinery. His day ended at 6.30pm when his clogs and his whistle rang in my ears long before his figure turned the corner of our fold.

Buses were considered a luxury when you had a pair of good feet. Although he hiked daily from Golcar to Lindley, he was never late. As for enjoying work, there was no time to indulge in such fancies. The facts of life were simple: if you worked you were paid, if not you starved. He counted himself lucky to be one of the world’s employed. Like many others of that period, he was desperately struggling to shed the bitter memories of the Thirties ‘slump.’

The question: ‘What’s your dad doing these days?’ took some answering. Anxious never to be out of work again, he cleaned windows, delivered fruit and veg with a horse and cart, was a painter and decorator. He even helped out three nights a week in a fish and chip shop at one stage in his career.

I loved walking down the cobbled mill yard to pull aside the grumbling, sliding door and step into the rattaty-tat world of worsteds. Past the stone sink with its hot smells of scalding tealeaves and fish and chips, its row of pint pots waiting to be filled, then into my father’s shed where the grease and fluffy stuffiness of warm wool seemed to sink into your pores.

The noise was deafening. Huge belts lashing round and busy looms beating back and forth seemed to create a menacing rhythm in their race against time. Clinging tenaciously to my father’s navy-blue overalls, I tried not to cringe as the steel-shafted shuttles whizzed their cargo from end to end.

Because of the noise voices were unnecessary, just mime with the lips and hands. Even when the noise stopped the conversations were unintelligible to my ears.

“He’s up at t’perch.”

“Will you twist in a bit?”

“Are you ready for downing yet?”

It was a foreign language to me. Whenever I mentioned my girlish ambition to follow in his footsteps, he always shook his head emphatically. He summed up his reason in two words, “Too hard.”

Only recently I discovered he nursed a secret dream during his youth – to become an archaeologist. A dream which today’s adult education classes could probably realise.

Youthful desires take many forms, which all have to be filled in. At grammar school we regarded career forms with the same awe as a chemical equation, far removed from reality. Nobody actually became what they put in the space marked ‘choice’, did they? As years and exams waxed and waned ‘choice’ fluctuated accordingly.

Once I optimistically wrote ‘Vet.’ Considering I could never face cow, horse or pig without benefit of a six-foot wall, this could have been a rather limited profession. Finally with mind solidly fixed I put ‘film star.’

Work experience where students spend a day trying out the type of work they fancy is a good idea. I once spent two days in a biscuit factory, but it only took me one to realise, when it came to the crunch, this vanilla flavoured Utopia was not for me.

First a lady in butterfly specs brought another girl and myself two white coats. They were so stiff she stood them against the wall with instructions to put them on. When I stood beside mine, it was three inches taller. After a perspiring fight we managed to overpower them. I put the belt around my waist and pulled as much skirt as I could over the top. This shortened it but left me with a rather pointed ‘hangover.’

We tied on our blue turbans, thoughtfully provided. I arranged my curls, prettily pulling wisps forward at the side and front. My partner with hair out of sight and Alice in Wonderland bow pulled well over her forehead . . . Well, I didn’t want to be unkind, but with those pebble glasses! Madame personnel came back and with a few efficient strokes altered my headgear to match my partner’s.

Without being given a chance to approve, we were whisked away to our department. I think she was short of exercise and had decided that very morning to take us the long way round. Either that or she just wanted to spread a little happiness. After we trailed through department after department in our long smocks and bizarre headgear, we certainly left them smiling.

My seat was at the end of a long conveyor belt. There were three girls in front, and we all had empty tins before us tilted for action. A bell introduced the next load of biscuits. Four long ribbons of shortcake came heading rapidly towards us. The idea was to gather them in rows of approximately twelve and transfer them neatly into the tin. With the efficient group in front expertly lifting line after line, would any ever reach my tin I worried?

My fears were drastically groundless. The biscuits in scatterings of fours and fives arrived with a vengeance. When I attempted to push them into twelves, they catapulted to my feet.

“Leave them,” was the order.

Meanwhile the rest of the dissident digestives were already rounding the curve to fall in heaps on the floor. I found the quickest way was to scoop them from the belt in piles and throw them into the tins indiscriminately. At the end of the load, while everyone else placed lids on their beautifully packed tins, I battled despairingly with my mountains of mutinous biscuits.

After dinner a supervisor moved me on. This time all I had to do was lift packets from another moving belt, weigh them and stick a label on. This was easy enough but the perpetual movement of the belt had a hypnotic effect. With eyelids half closed and feeling like a junkie on a ‘trip’, I struggled through the afternoon.

Personnel were so relieved the morning after when I confessed my inabilities. They told me I could leave immediately and even presented me with a small manila envelope.

Still that’s the way the cookie crumbles!